Media Release

Monday, 4 September 2006

An eco-friendly biodiesel motorbike, built by nine mechanical engineering students from the University of Adelaide, is on display at the Royal Adelaide Show this week.

The Bio-bike, designed and built over the past seven months as a final-year engineering project, has been sponsored by diesel engine giant Yanmar, biofuels retail company Australian Farmers Fuel (SAFF) and the State Government.

The students' supervisor, Dr Colin Kestell, a senior lecturer in the School of Mechanical Engineering, says the Bio-bike demonstrates that biodiesel can be used in smaller engines as a cheaper and more environmentally friendly alternative to petroleum.

"Biodiesel is renewable and therefore a sustainable energy source that is derived from plant oils, waste oils and discarded animal fats," Dr Kestell says.

"It produces less soot than regular diesel and while it still emits carbon dioxide after combustion, it is absorbed and converted into oxygen through photosynthesis."

The students initially developed a prototype, using a Yanmar L100AE and a Husaberg frame, which was substantially modified by engineering software.

The Bio-bike is on display at the SAFF stand at the Royal Adelaide Show until September 9.

Dr Kestell says the students hope to enrol their Bio-bike in the Greenfleet (alternative fuel) class of the World Solar Car Challenge in 2007.