The challengers

by Andy Green

We are keen to have credible and capable challengers. Why? Because it makes sense for several reasons. Between Thrust 2 and Thrust SSC, Britain has held the Record for a quarter of a century and there’s nothing quite like the promise of losing it – or actually losing it – to keep us focussed on getting the record back. This country has held the World Land Speed Record for longer than every other country put together, since the first record was set in1898, and we’re not going to let it go without a fight!

But the importance of challengers is much wider than just a nationalistic one. We are setting off on an engineering adventure, to inspire and excite a nation about science and technology, and the competition will make the adventure so much more exciting. It will present different approaches to the same problem: going faster than anyone has ever done before. The wonderful and unique thing about this sport is that there really are no constraints on car design – a very far cry from the over-regulated and over-argumentative world of Formula 1, where all the best technology is kept secret and design is so constrained that they have to paint the cars different colours to tell them apart! In contrast, we are looking to inspire a new generation of engineers and to share everything we do with the outside world. When it comes to information, we see this as your Record as much as it is ours, and having other competitors for the Land Speed Record will make the whole event richer, more colourful and more diverse.

So who is out there at the moment? There are 3 teams that we know about, but of course we did 20 months of work in complete secrecy so there may be others. All we can say is that we have at least 3 competitors – and that’s a good thing!

The North American Eagle

The longest running team is the North American Eagle, which is taking a novel approach to building a jet car by starting with an old military jet fighter. The slightly spooky thing about their choice of donor aircraft, an ex-NASA F-104 Starfighter, is that it had the tail number 763 – the number in miles per hour of the current record. I’m not superstitious, but that’s quite a coincidence! In overall project terms, the NAE team has tried to minimise their financial and organisational risk by avoiding the need to build a car from scratch. The trade-off in this approach is that they have inherited the engineering risk of trying to convert a vehicle that was not designed to run along the ground. The team has fitted 3 sets of wheels, with a centre set added to take the bending loads out of the fuselage, and are still trying to assess the F-104’s aerodynamics on the ground. However, any big changes to the aerodynamics of the Starfighter fuselage will be a major challenge for the team. You have to admire the low-budget, keep-it-simple approach of the NAE, but technically it’s a pretty risky approach.

The Eagle team has been working away for some 10 years now and has already had some success. The car has run at the Black Rock Desert (where it was limited both by the poor surface and poor weather) and at El Mirage, where the limiting factor was the short length of the track. The Eagle reportedly achieved between 300 and 400 mph in its latest test session and we are now waiting to see when and where they can run next. As discussed above, we welcome the competition and remain keen to offer help and advice wherever we can. Visit www.landspeed.com for more information.
 

Fossett LSR

Steve Fossett, the American Adventurer who went missing last year in a light aircraft (the aircraft wreckage was discovered a year later), was in the final stages of preparing for an assault on the World Land Speed Record when he disappeared. He had bought Craig Breedlove’s old Spirit of America, which ran against Thrust SSC in 1997, and had the car virtually rebuilt to improve both its speed and safety. Andy Green, together with SSC team members JV ‘Trackmaster’ Franck and Run Controller Jayne Millington, spent a day with Fossett and his team in 2007, sharing their experiences and offering support and encouragement for what looked like being a much-improved record car in the making. Ten days later Fossett went missing, but his team was able largely to complete the car. They are now looking for a new owner/sponsor and we are very much hoping to see the car run again soon.

The Fossett LSR car (they have kept the name up to this point, in memory of Steve’s LSR ambition) has used Breedlove’s old chassis and engine (both refurbished), but virtually everything else has changed. Suspension, steering, wheel base and track, systems, brake parachutes, wheels – all have been greatly modified or entirely replaced. The car retains the recognisably sleek and business-like shape of its former life and still looks fast even when it’s sitting still. This car is close to being ready to go and could easily get to a new record before we do. Let’s hope it does – and that we do too. 
 

Aussie Invader 5R

Rosco McGlashan is a great character who has been pursuing the LSR for many years. His Aussie Invader 2, which was based on Richard Noble’s single-jet-engined Thrust 2 concept, was badly damaged when it hit a timing light at over 500 mph. Rosco greatly improved the design in his next car, the Aussie Invader 3, but after weather delays in 1996/7 Rosco’s task had become hopeless – the 633 mph record that the AI3 was designed to break had now become 763 – the car was not that fast. Time to give up? Not for Rosco – time for a new car!

The Aussie Invader 5R is a rocket car that is intended to push the record way beyond Thrust SSC’s just-supersonic mark. We don’t know much about the car, but we’re looking forward to learning more as the design evolves. The -5R will benefit from the high power-to weight ratio of rocket technology. However, with any supersonic car one of the big challenges is making sure that the car is stable throughout the ‘transonic region’ around the speed of sound, where the airflow is part supersonic and part subsonic and the aerodynamic loads can change dramatically for a speed change of only a few miles an hour. BLOODHOUND SSC is relying on the precise control of the EJ200 to ‘tiptoe’ through this speed region during its test runs, checking the airflow and loads as we go. Rockets are generally on-off devices and it is difficult to build one that that can vary the thrust to order. Rosco may have to find a different solution to the problem of speed control but, knowing him, he’s probably already working on it.

Let’s hope that the BLOODHOUND launch will encourage Rosco’s potential sponsors to back an all-Australian bid. There’s never been an Aussie holding the title of ‘Fastest Man On Earth’. Rosco could be the first – go for it, cobber. Visit www.aussieinvader.com for more information.