Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) has used a 3.0-liter supercharged V-6 in a number of its cars for a while now, and though it's a good engine, it's compromised. It's actually a V-8 block with V-6 cylinder heads, which means it weighs nearly as much as a V-8 without offering as much power. Being based on a V-8 means it has a 90-degree cylinder bank angle, which isn't ideal for a V-6 for packaging and vibration reasons. And while superchargers are rad, they're not great for fuel economy.

This V-6 was probably relatively cheap to develop, which is good for a small company like JLR, but you can only ignore its shortcomings for so long. What JLR really needs is a bespoke V-6, or better still, an straight-six. And that's just what it has.

JLR’s new Ingenium straight-six. Land Rover

Today, the Range Rover Sport HST makes its debut with a new 3.0-liter inline-six, and it's a fascinating, thoroughly modern engine. This six is part of JLR's Ingenium engine family, which means it shares a common architecture with the company's 2.0-liter turbo four-cylinder. Like the four-cylinder, this new six has a single twin-scroll turbocharger, but it also gets an electric supercharger powered by a 48-volt electrical system.

JLR says the electric supercharger spools up to produce maximum boost pressure in half a second, mitigating the lag from the traditional exhaust-driven turbocharger. If this concept sounds familiar, that's because it's basically the same thing Mercedes-AMG offers in the E53 and CLS53. That 48-volt system harvests energy that'd otherwise be lost during braking and in addition to driving the electric supercharger, it helps with the automatic stop-start system.

This engine also has continuously variable valve-lift and variable cam-timing, just as you'd expect. JLR says that in the Range Rover Sport HST, it puts out 395 hp (400ps) and 405 lb-ft of torque. There'll also be a 355-hp version of this engine further down the line. Land Rover quotes a 5.9-second 0-60 mph time for the Range Rover Sport HST, which is 0.9 seconds quicker than a Sport with JLR's 380-hp V-6. Not bad considering the inline-six apparently boosts fuel economy by 20 percent.

Land Rover

A JLR spokesperson told us this engine and the Range Rover Sport HST will come to the US, though pricing hasn't been finalized yet. This engine will probably find a home in a number of JLR products in the coming years. We're hoping for the next-gen F-Type because a Jaguar sports car deserves a great straight-six.

This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.io