“Caparo is delighted to have been selected as one of the key partners for the Limo Green project,” comments Caparo Vehicle Products chief executive officer Richard Butler. “Weight continues to be one of the biggest challenges facing engineers in their pursuit of reduced vehicle emissions. With our significant experience in developing lightweight vehicle structures and components we are aiming to reduce the weight of the specific systems by between 20 and 40 percent. These reductions will play a significant part in helping achieve the challenging emissions target which has been set for the project.”

Caparo will be working on five specific areas of the vehicle. Brakes (both calipers and discs), the rear sub-frame, the rear floor, the seat frame and the door inner, will all be redesigned to incorporate lightweight materials, in a manner that can be reproduced in a mainstream high-volume manufacturing programme.

“The potential of advanced materials such as carbon composites to deliver considerable weight savings has been recognised for many years, but apart from some specialist applications on low-volume vehicles, high material and production costs has meant that their promising properties have remained largely unexploited,” explains Caparo Vehicle Technologies director Ben Scott-Geddes. “Our work on Limo Green and other projects will employ innovative processes that reduce cycle times, one of the critical factors in the high cost of carbon composites, to a fraction of the best currently achieved. This will make the components more affordable and suitable for mainstream manufacturing environments and help vehicle manufactures achieve considerable weight and emissions reductions.”

The Limo Green project marks Caparo’s first collaboration with the Technology Strategy Board and is one of 16 development projects, worth over £52m, to receive a share of £23m government investment through the Low Carbon Vehicles Innovation Platform. The platform was established in autumn 2007 and aims to accelerate the market introduction of low carbon road transport vehicles and maximise the benefits to UK businesses.

Commenting on the Technology Strategy Board's investment in the project, its Chief Executive, Iain Gray, said: "Cleaner and more efficient vehicles are a vitally important part of our response to global climate change challenges and will help the UK to meet demanding new CO2 standards for new vehicles. This is why we are investing in innovative low-carbon technology development through the Low Carbon Vehicles Innovation Platform. Such innovative technology will also help position British companies to benefit from the growing domestic and international demand for lower carbon vehicles."