We have a reasonable suspicion to believe that there’s a lot more to the BMW M4 MotoGP Safety Car that made its debut in opening round of the 2015 MotoGP World Championship in Qatar than what we’re being officially told.
Yes, it was designed to act as a safety car for the superbike championship, but it also features the BMW M divisions new water injection system that promises to offer “a tangible boost in performance” by increasing “the upper performance limits, which have otherwise been restricted thermally”.
Moreover, the Germans have confirmed that the tech “will be employed in a BMW M production model in the near future”.
What we suspect is that, the M4 MotoGP Safety Car also plays the role of a test bed for the upcoming M4 GTS, which was recently announced during a BMW internet market workshop.
Here’s how BMW describes the water-injection system:
“The new water injection sees the engineers make use of the water’s physical effect during the vaporisation process to extract the energy required from the environmental medium. Water is injected into the intake module’s collector as a fine spray, thus significantly cooling the exhaust air during vaporisation. This lowers the discharge temperature in the combustion changer and thus reduces the tendency for knocking. The turbo engine can thus be operated with a higher charging pressure and an earlier ignition point. The lower process temperatures also reduce the formation of hazardous substances, in particular nitrogen oxide (NOX). This way, the innovative technology increases performance and torque, while at the same time ensuring outstanding consumption and emission figures.”
In Qatar, the M4 safety car was joined by the new X5 M as the Medical Car. BMW’s current fleet in the championship comprises six BMW M and M Performance models including the M3, M4 and M6 as safety cars, an M5 for the Safety Officer, plus the new X5 M and M550d xDrive Touring as Medical Cars.
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