Holden looks at sealed engine

HOLDEN engineers are looking into the concept of offering Commodores with engines and gearboxes that are lubricated for life. The company believes this could add huge convenience to owners by reducing the number of times a car needs to be serviced. It would also reduce service times. This is especially significant in Commodores where servicing fleet vehicles involved employee down time and loss of productivity. But the move would necessitate foolproof monitoring systems, especially in hot running conditions likely to be experienced in Australia. If a customer cooks the oil, it would lose its effectiveness as a lubricant. Management says more testing will be required before it reaches customers. Holden said a major service challenge was to reduce the cost of repairing the electronic system in the car. Holden chief Mr Peter Hanenberger said the engineers needed to work harder with the suppliers to get more stability into their electronic systems. He said suppliers needed to "de-cluster" the electronic modules so smaller sections of the electronics system could be replaced, instead of the more expensive course currently used of replacing the entire module.