Press Report : BMW’s Hams Hall plant produces 500,000th Mini engine

John Cranage, Birmingham Post, 7th September, 2009

BMW Group’s Hams Hall plant has reached another production milestone with the half-millionth MINI engine leaving the plant. It came as MINI celebrates its 50th birthday anniversary and followed just weeks after the 1.5 millionth MINI came off the line at BMW’s Plant Oxford, which has manufactured the new generation of the classic small car since 2001.

The Hams Hall factory in North Warwickshire, which builds all of BMW’s four-cylinder petrol engines, hit record production levels last year and, for the third year running the 1.6-litre turbocharged petrol engine featured in the MINI Cooper S has been acclaimed as the best engine in its class at the prestigious International Engine of the Year awards.

The plant which opened in 2001, extended its product range to include production of all petrol engines for MINI in 2006. The high-tech family of four-cylinder petrol engines are assembled at Hams Hall for MINI vehicles are manufactured in co-operation with PSA Peugeot Citroen.

Reaching the production of our first half-a-million engines and winning the prestigious International Engine of the Year Award for the third time is a real credit to our workforce.” Mathias Hofmann, Plant Director, Hams Hall

The naturally-aspirated 1.4 litre and 1.6 litre versions, which feature Valvetronic technology, power the entry-level MINI One and the MINI Cooper respectively. The award-winning 1.6-litre engine, which combines direct injection with twin-scroll turbocharging technology, is reserved for the high-performance, top-of-the-range MINI Cooper S and John Cooper Works.

The 500,000th power unit to be produced was on its way to the MINI production plant in Oxford within hours of coming off the Hams Hall assembly line, destined for a Pure Silver Mini Convertible ordered by a customer in Brazil.

Mathias Hofmann, who took over as Plant Director at Hams Hall in April, said: ‘Reaching the production of our first half-a-million engines and winning the prestigious International Engine of the Year Award for the third time is a real credit to our workforce.”

[Source: Birmingham Post]

Clive Goldthorp

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