Maruti Alto may get two-cylinder engine, Wagon R also in line for a heart transplant

Maruti Suzuki is said to be working on new, smaller, more fuel-efficient and lower emissions engines for two of its bestselling cars – the Alto and the Wagon R.

The Alto and Wagon R are about a decade old in India and many – including us, here at IA – had expected Maruti to phase these cars out in the near future. However, it seems the company is not willing to let go of these cars just yet. According to a report on Financial Express, Maruti is working a new engine – codenamed YP3 – for both these cars.

Maruti is likely to develop two variants of the new YP3 engine – a two-cylinder variant for the Alto, and a three-cylinder variant for the Wagon R. While the exact engine displacement has not yet been revealed, it’s expected that the Alto engine could be around 600-700cc while the Wagon R engine could be a 1.0-litre unit. Both the ‘new’ cars will be priced lower than their currently existing versions.

With companies like Toyota, Honda, Nissan, GM, Ford and Volkswagen getting into the small car segment in India, Maruti needs to do all it can in order to protect its turf, and this range of new, cheaper variants of some of its older cars might be a part of that strategy.