Little under twelve months after announcing its plans to develop a bio-diesel engine for use in the HiQ MSA British Touring Car Championship, County Durham-based Scott Racing is continuing to push ahead with plans to introduce the technology into the series during the coming campaign.
The team had initially planned to have a car running partly on bio-diesel on track during the 2007 season but instead elected to go about its work away from the track to develop the technology required, which has included the commissioning of a new engine test cell to give the team the chance to complete the necessary work in-house.
"Work is ongoing and we've had the engine on the dyno which has given us some good base data to work with," managing director Tim Scott told
Crash.net. "We are also fitting the engine with a proper motorsport ECU rather than the manufacturer standard one as it will allow us to do more with the engine. Our aim remains to run on 100 per cent bio-diesel, although we might have to run a blend depending on the regulations.
"There are a few reasons why we want to go down this route. First of all, we feel that motorsport should be greener and we should all do our bit to promote that, but also, we are passionate about technology and like the challenge of doing this kind of development in-house."
Although AFM Racing ran its BMW 120d on a low blend of bio-diesel last season, Scott said his team remained focused on becoming the first 'true' bio-diesel entrants in the series, with the plan being to fit the engine into either a BMW 320i or 320si when it is ready to hit the track.
"We wanted to be different and do something with the green angle and we want to be the first true bio-diesel team to compete in the BTCC," he said. "We know that running on fully bio-diesel will result in some power loss but we aim to get that some of that power back, although I'm not sure how much we will manage.
"We feel the BMW has a good weight distribution and we have seen how the other cars tend to work their front tyres very hard. By going for a rear-wheel drive car, we feel we have a better chance of success and avoid the risk of overworking front tyres with the added weight and torque of the diesel engine.
"A lot of it is down to our partners, but I feel there is a 50/50 chance of us being out for the start of the season. However in motorsport that could change radically from one week to the next..."
