Modern diesel engine systems and powertrain components are the focus of the automotive engine lab at ITI Lonavala in Maharashtra, completed in November 2025.
The lab has working models of CRDI 4-stroke diesel engines with ECM, BCM, sensors, fuel systems, cooling systems and diagnostic interfaces for fault simulation. It also includes dismantling and assembly models of multi-cylinder diesel engines, cut-section engines that show internal component movement, and stationary diesel engine setups for studying basic engine operation.
The lab was sponsored by Phoenix Mecano. Its mix of live, sectioned and strip-down engines takes trainees from seeing how a diesel engine works, to watching its parts move, to taking one apart and rebuilding it.
Trainees simulate and troubleshoot faults on the CRDI engines through the diagnostic interfaces, study how the ECM and BCM manage sensors and fuel delivery, and strip and rebuild multi-cylinder engines. These skills apply directly to roles such as diesel mechanic, automotive service technician and engine diagnostics technician.
Common-rail diesel engines are standard in modern trucks, buses, tractors and commercial vehicles, so electronic diagnosis is now a routine part of a mechanic's job rather than a specialist skill. Practising fault simulation on working CRDI engines prepares trainees for workshops where a diagnostic scan comes before any spanner work.
