PMF was in attendance at Motul’s stand at The Classic, which took place at Silverstone.
On a miserable and wet British summer’s day, PMF took the trip to Silverstone Circuit. Invited by the representatives of Motul, the team first took the opportunity to walk around the famous venue before attending the lubricants formulator’s unveiling event.
Despite the dreary weather, the public turned out in their droves. This passion for motorsport throughout what was merely a day filled with qualification races was certainly impressive. The technician’s centre would whet the appetite of any automotive enthusiast, with the classic vehicles that were being prepared for the track going through their paces in the garage.
Whilst we were on our way to the event, we came to realise how strong Motul’s commitment was to its partnership with the retro racing festival. We came across a Motul mobile laboratory, which was suitably housed in a classic bus. The lab was available to be used as a service for participants at The Classic throughout the weekend, carrying out lubricant analysis and offering help or advice on lubricant-related matters. On top of this, Motul provided competitors with a free top-up service for lubricants, coolants and essential vehicle fluids.
As we turned up at Motul’s main stand, the company launched two products for classic vehicles – classic eighties 10w-40 and classic nineties 10w-30. These ‘Youngtimer’ engine oils are suitable for cars that date back to the 80s and 90s.
Also on display was the presentation of the prototype Motul-Edition GBS Zero sportscar. The sports car, built by hand, has a distinctly classic look to it and features a host of Motul-specific features. It sported the livery that won the nationwide design competition, and Motul hopes that this design will make the vehicle instantly noticeable wherever it goes.
The main event
From our point of view, the most exciting part of the day – yes, even more exciting than the racing – was the unveiling of Motul’s BioClean, its sustainable parts cleaning system for workshops, garages and industrial plants.
Despite cleaning parts being an inevitable and vitally important part of the service and repair process in automotive workshops, it is usually done using harmful cold cleaners and solvents. Motul’s BioClean system is regarded by the French company as a sustainable alternative to standard cold cleaning technology.
Traditional cleaning systems employ fluids that pose a danger to people because they are harmful substances, unpleasant odour-producing solvents, are a hazard to the environment, bring with them the danger of fire, and risk damaging surfaces. They also require high energy consumption, and incur expensive downstream disposal costs, together with all of the hassle of managing the waste they produce.
Motul BioClean is an all-in-one, efficient, environmentally-friendly parts cleaning system that consists of a wash stand and a water-based cleaning fluid that gets its cleaning power from natural bio-microorganisms.
At a stroke, it overcomes all of the issues of traditional cold cleaning and, performance-wise, its cleaning effect – in removing and decomposing mineral oils, greases, waxes, machining oils and other impurities on a variety of surfaces, from steel of all types, through to aluminium, plastics and even painted surfaces – is at least as good as traditional cold cleaning. On top of this, BioClean retains its level of performance over a much longer period of time.
The potential applications for the product are obviously widespread, and BioClean was pitched at relevant businesses of every size, all of which should see multiple benefits from its use. As with Motul products over the ages, it has already been tested across Motul’s motorsport programme.
On the new product, classic car race preparation expert and former BTCC champion Andrew Jordan had this to say: “It is not always easy to reconcile environmental protection and work. The new Motul BioClean cleaning system helps us to reduce both the environmental impact of cleaning processes and the risk for employees in the workshop from dangerous chemicals. We are pleased that, together with Motul, we are making a major contribution to environmental protection and can still provide the best performance.”
