Turkish manufacturer, Erinmotor is now building and exporting a fuel-saving diesel engine.

According to company CEO Ersin Şahin, the engine is priced very competitively.

"The fully Turkish, single-cylinder diesel engine was the fruit of 10 years of research and development," said Şahin.

Erinmotor, a subsidiary of Turkish automotive supplier Şahin Metal, specially designed and produced all the parts for the 1.16-liter, 24-horsepower industrial diesel engine, Şahin told Anadolu Agency (AA).

"Our rivals sell the same type of engine for around TL 14,000 while we sell this engine for only TL 10,500," he said. The company plans to bring the price down even further, he added.

The engine can be used in off-road vehicles and machines, like construction equipment, generators, snow plows, irrigation equipment and compressors, he said.

"We made our first exports to Mauritania and Albania and we hope to break into the Tunisian and Algerian markets," Şahin added.

Erinmotor is continuing its research and development with a staff of 21 to produce a single-cylinder natural gas engine and a 100-horsepower, four-cylinder diesel engine.

The company, with investment incentives from the state, has been doing joint research and development with Istanbul's Yıldız Teknik University, one of the country's top engineering schools.