Nüral®

Outstanding Piston Technology

Nüral® has developed unique OE piston technologies that can better withstand the harsh conditions of the combustion chamber to promote engine efficiency and lower emissions. Nüral products gives engine designers the freedom to innovate without compromise. Nüral technology has been a key enabler to the advancement of direct-injection diesel engine technology, with elastic, stable and lightweight pistons that can effectively reduce friction and resist seizure. OE heritage and award-winning piston technology combine to make Nüral products the number one choice for engine rebuilders.

Innovations

Nüral products allow engine designers to innovate without compromise. The following product innovations were honored with prestigious PACE awards:

DuraBowl® piston utilizing a high strength re-melted combustion bowl rim and increases the piston life by several times under severe operating conditions
Ecotough® NG piston coating is capable of reducing friction by up to 15% and piston skirt wear by up to 40%
Monosteel® piston - an industry standard for heavy-duty diesel vehicle applications
Duraform G91® is a special piston alloy with increased durability & higher fatigue strength in modern, highly loaded, diesel engines

Tenneco (Nüral’s parent company), is a Global OE piston manufacturer, producing and delivering to OEM’s, the OE Spare market and the independent Aftermarket. We deliver Nüralparts to the world’s leading manufacturers for both light and commercial vehicles as well as for industrial applications.

Nüral products

EcoTough® NG petrol engine pistons
Elastoval II® petrol engine pistons
Elastothermic® petrol engine pistons
DuraBowl® diesel engine pistons
DuraForm-G91 diesel engine pistons

The piston is part of a system that wouldn’t work effectively without equal innovation in the technology used in related components, particularly the piston rings. These must provide an exceptional seal, they must be resistant to high temperatures, high pressures and very high forces while minimizing friction and wear. They must last longer than ever before despite working with less lubrication. Even the fuels, traditionally an important source of lubrication especially in diesel engines, are becoming less lubricious as Sulphur contents were reduced.

The pistons are the heart of the engine, where these increasingly tough conditions are most demanding. Pistons must endure the most aggressive forces, amongst the highest temperatures and the most dramatic thermal cycles of any engine component. They must be light to reduce the loads and losses due to their reciprocating movement and to contribute to overall vehicle weight reduction. Naturally, there can be no compromise on durability or reliability, which must also continue to advance.

Petrol Engine Pistons

EcoTough NG®

Reducing friction and improving the wear resistance of pistons is particularly important in highly boosted petrol engines. By using a coating comprised of solid lubricants, such as graphite and molybdenum disulphide with carbon fibre, Tenneco’s new Nüral EcoTough NG® pistons have demonstrated a reduction in friction of up to 15% combined with a substantial reduction in wear.

EcoTough® coating further reduces engine friction, wear and noise while dealing with the increasingly challenging loads and temperatures in the latest downsized, turbocharged engines. The coating is applied in a thickness of 15 microns and reduces skirt wear by up to 40% when compared to the market standard. It offers improved fatigue strength in the harshest conditions thanks to its metal oxide reinforcement. When compared to traditional coatings, it reduces piston friction, increasing both efficiency & fuel economy.

EcoTough Key Features & Benefits

Tenneco OE technology
Solid lubricant coating containing carbon fibre and graphite
Up to 15% piston friction loss reduction
0.2 – 0.8% advantage in fuel consumption
Up to 40% less wear
Reduction in CO2 emissions

Elastoval®

Another substantial challenge is ensuring a good fit within the cylinder at all loads and temperatures. The oval skirt shape of Tenneco’s Nüral Elastoval® piston ensures optimum compliance of the piston skirt, allowing it to adapt as the load changes. Coupled with high geometric stability and minimized piston weight, this provides Elastoval® pistons with increased durability, superior anti-seizure properties, and reduced friction. Elastoval II ultra lightweight aluminum pistons allow a weight reduction of up to 15% in high power petrol engines

Elastothermic®

Gallery-cooled petrol pistons enable downsized engines to run at higher power levels and compression ratios with outstanding durability and lower parameters of noise, vibration and NVH.

Diesel Engine Pistons

Pistons are some of the hardest working components inside a diesel engine. Diesel engines are high compression, high heat engines that demand a lot from their pistons.

DuraBowl®

In very high performance, heavily downsized diesel engines, high-pressure turbocharging and new fueling strategies are pushing piston temperatures beyond 400°C and cylinder pressures to over 200 bar for cars and beyond 250 bar for heavy duty trucks. Tenneco‘s engineers have identified that failures of conventional piston bowls in this highly aggressive environment can be traced to the presence of silicon particles in the aluminum. By re-melting the alloy around the rim of the bowl, the silicon particles can be reduced to only one tenth of their previous size, substantially increasing the strength and durability of the piston bowl rim. The award winning DuraBowl® piston uses this technique to increase service life between four and seven times compared with a conventional cast piston, allowing engine designers to continue to drive up efficiency to reduce fuel consumption and CO2 emissions.

DuraBowl Key Features & Benefits

Tenneco OE technology
Remelted combustion bowl strengthening design
Endures temperatures > 400°C and cylinder pressure between 200 – 250 bar
Increases piston life by several times under severe operating conditions

Monosteel®

The award-winning Monosteel® piston an industry standard for heavy-duty diesel vehicle applications. Magnum Monosteel®, takes another leap forward by reducing piston mass by up to seven percent and introducing a unique “double band” piston skirt that reduces friction by up to 17percent.

Cooling gallery: Extracting more performance from smaller engines creates a dramatic increase in combustion temperatures. Nüral® pistons are designed in conjunction with the leading European vehicle and engine manufacturers and include optimised cooling gallery positions, making them ideal for high specific output turbo-charged diesel engines.

Monosteel® Key Features & Benefits

Patented German Monosteel® piston technology design
Double sided friction welded from two steel forgings to create a large, high cooling gallery for maximum efficiency and rigidity which results in reduced cooling oil and improved fuel consumption.
Monosteel pistons are capable of withstanding firing pressures up to 300 bars, providing superior strength and durability for heavy-duty engine applications

DuraForm-G91®

The Award winning DuraForm-G91 piston material enables the design of double life time pistons in modern, highly loaded, diesel engines. The increased strength of the material also supports higher mechanical loads, allowing engines to operate at higher specific power and more efficiently to achieve demanding emission standards.

DuraForm-G91® Key Features & Benefits

Double piston life time due to:

Higher fatigue strength at higher temperatures
Smaller grain size
Reduced bowl rim wear

Nüral Quick look benefits

Benefit 1: Market leading coverage

Over 1.400 pistons & kit sets covering over 7.000 Tecdoc defined engines*
Leading light & commercial car parc coverage

Benefit 2: Leading piston technology

Unique OE technologies to improve durability & reduce emissions
No. 1 OEM piston supplier to high-performance engines
Fitted with Goetze piston rings

Benefit 3: German OE supplier

Engineered in Nuremberg, Germany
OE heritage together with rings & liners

History

A small plant for aluminium injection molding, a completely new technology in Germany, is founded with a workforce of 35 people in 1924 as Aluminium Spritzgusswerk GmbH in Nuremberg, Germany. In 1928 the company was acquired by Canadian company Aluminium Limited "ALCAN". The company has grown to become one of the world’s largest aluminium manufacturers. In 1999 Alcan Aluminium Ltd.'s German piston unit in Nuremberg was acquired by Federal-Mogul Corporation, now Tenneco Inc. The first Monsteel piston production started in 2006. In 2024 Nüral will celebrate its 100th birthday.