This year, the Caterham Seven reached the grand age of 50, and together with its birthday celebrations at Donington Park earlier in June, the company thought that the only sensible thing to do was to award the Seven with a supercharger. Why not?

Caterham's X330 concept is the most powerful Seven to date. Despite that, Caterham has again opted for the wolf in sheep's clothing approach, despite it being such an extreme example.

The concept is based on the CSR chassis with its new independent suspension setup, but the X330 uses lighter grade steel in the trellis-type chassis, light-weight wheels and an awful lot of carbon fibre.

Ford provides the 2.3-litre Duratec engine, which already powers the CSR models, to which the Rotrex C30-94 supercharger is bolted. Unsurprisingly, the X330 puts out a massive 330bhp, 70bhp more than the top spec CSR, and maximum torque is 220lb.ft. The power-to-weight ratio achieved is an eye watering 600bhp per tonne. Low speed driveability will be excellent, says Caterham, but because the boost on this type of charger increases linearly with engine speed, the top end of the rev range will be very impressive. We don't doubt this one little bit.

A Caterham spokesperson has suggested, despite the X330's engineering test bed status, that some concepts will make it into production. An avenue Caterham is particularly keen to explore is in developing the use of bio-ethanol power and other alternative fuels. Apparently, the X330 will spearhead this area of R&D for the firm.