- Diesel-powered sports car also fast on street circuit
- Allan McNish quickest in LM P1 class despite accident
- Marco Werner seventh in “sister” Audi

The two Audi R10 TDI sports cars will start Saturday’s second round of the American Le Mans Series in St. Petersburg (US state of Florida) as fastest LM P1 prototypes from the second and the fourth rows of the grid. In the first ever appearance of the revolutionary diesel-powered sports car on a street circuit, defending champion Allan McNish headed the field in the last free practice session on Friday. He also set the pace with the 650-hp R10 TDI at the beginning of qualifying before being relegated to third position by the fastest two LM P2 sports cars.

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From Resource Investor

SHANGHAI (Interfax-China) — China’s rapeseed-based bio-diesel industry is still at an early stage despite the country’s position as the world’s largest rapeseed producer.

However, this is slowly changing as new advances in production techniques lower costs and government initiatives promote alternative fuels. Growing demand from the world’s bio-diesel industry has already led to a surge in China’s rapeseed oil exports, and demand from the energy sector may start playing an increasingly important role in China’s domestic rapeseed market.

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Not much news these last couple of days, but at least it’s given me time to get the host I’m moving to ready.  I should be getting ready to post about the new site in a couple of days.   Hang tight.

From Automotive News (sub required)

STUTTGART – Mercedes-Benz is aiming to increase the share of diesels in its US sales total to about 10 percent by 2010 from 3 percent in 2006.

Klaus Maier, Mercedes Car Group sales and marketing chief, told Automobilwoche that the boost will come from the automaker’s ability to meet so-called Bin 5 clean-air standards in the five states that account for 40 percent of US new-car sales. The five are California, New York, Maine, Massachusetts and Vermont.

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- Diesel sports car to contest its first race on a street course
- Second round of American Le Mans Series in St. Petersburg
- Audi confirms US commitment with TDI Power

The LM P1 prototype was developed for the circuit at Le Mans, which is one of the
world’s fastest tracks featuring long straights and quick corners. The average speed
per lap at Le Mans is more than 230 kph, while the medium speed in St. Petersburg is
expected to be less than 160 kph.

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The site is getting painfully slow to the point where I have a hard time posting because it times out.  I’m currently looking into finding a new host.  I know they say patience is a virtue, but I guess it’s one I don’t possess.

Well I had a long weekend. I worked for almost all of it except Saturday. On Saturday I had Steve Glover, who did my timing belt, install my new larger nozzles and a cleaned intake manifold since I don’t have the proper tools. Everything went fine except the number 1 injector took some coaxing to get out, and when I say coaxing I mean Steve and I taking turns using good ol’ fashion brute strength.

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No real details yet, but Mazda is planning to bring a diesel to the U.S. by 2010. It’s anticipated that the motor will be 50 state legal, meeting the strict Tier2 Bin5 levels of states like California. Most likely this is an effort to complete with manufacturers like Volkswagen and Nissan who will have new clean diesels in the U.S. by then.

Mazda is doing other steps to be more “green” besides diesel such as a more fuel efficient auto tranny, a reworked Rotary engine design, hydrogen power, and lightening their cars altogether.

Source: Motor Trend

The maiden voyage of the Chili Pepper Racing B50 powered Jetta didn’t go so well, but there is always going to be kinks to work out of something new. I got the tip off one of the other blogs I read, Rich C’s My Desultory Blog, and here is the press release from CPR:

Chili Pepper Racing brings Bio-Diesel to SPEED World Challenge Series at Sebring

SCCA Pro Racing and Chili Pepper Racing changed the face of Motorsports

With the start of Round 1 SPEED World Challenge Touring Car Series Chili Pepper Racing became the first team to race a production based DIESEL powered car in US Touring car history. In addition, SCCA PRO Racing and Chili Pepper Racing made Motorsport history as the first to approve and race BIO-Diesel fuel in a production based Touring Car Series World Wide.

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Now I happen to think shooting flames from the tailpipe is cool, but I guess I just liked those old modified 50’s cars too much.

From the Associated Press.

Ford Motor Co. today told dealers to temporarily stop selling certain 2008 F-series Super Duty diesel pickups after receiving reports of flames shooting out of the truck’s tailpipe.

Ford said it was recalling 37,400 F-Series Super Duty trucks with 6.4-liter diesel engines. The majority of the pickups — 29,000 — were still on dealer lots, the automaker said.

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