Toyota have finally started to reap the benefits of the technical agreement they struck with BMW two years ago, with the announcement that their new Verso will be available with the BMW 1.6 litre engine.
The 'mid to long term' agreement, which was signed in December 2011, outlines that both automotive giants would supply engines to each other, with Toyota getting access to BMW's 1.6 and 2.0 litre diesel engines and BMW tapping into Toyota's hybrid technology.
The new Toyota Verso 1.6, which will go into production in January 2014 at Toyota’s Turkey plant, is powered by a BMW turbo-diesel engine that will provide 110bhp. The engine in question (or to be exact, the Euro 5 emissions regulation-compliant unit) is also used in the BMW 1-series and Mk2 Mini.
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| 2014 Toyota Verso |
Gerald Killman, who led the development of the BMW engine transplant, said that the biggest challenge that Toyota had in adapting the Austrian built engine was creating the 'electronics interface' between the BMW engine the Toyota car. Toyota have also had to develop a brand new 'start/stop' system for the engine.
So what do BMW get from this collaboration. Well it's not all give on their part, with a feasibilty study currently on-going for a jointly developed sports car platform, work on lightweight vehicle bodies and the huge undertaking of research on lithium-air batteries.
Words by
John Smyth, MicksGarage Marketing Guru!
