Bloodhound, the land speed record car bidding to set a new supersonic land speed record of around 800mph in South Africa next year, has been shown in ‘desert spec’ ahead of a series of high speed tests.  It’s the first time the Brit-built car, which was rescued from the administrators earlier this year, has been seen with its tyre-less machined solid aluminium wheels: the ones to be used for the outright record attempt.  The long-promised testing shakedown will take place on a specially prepared 20km (12.4-mile) track at Hakskeen Pan in the Kalahari Desert, near the Namibian border. To test the installation of its Rolls-Royce EJ200 Eurofighter gas turbine engine, the car was late last month successfully given a “dry crank” at its Gloucestershire HQ which involved having the exhaust output of a smaller jet engine blown into its intake to rotate the moving parts of the main motor. “It involves turning the engine without activating the ignition,” says engineering director Mark Chapman. “It’s like a last look under the hood.” In South Africa, the Bloodhound team plans a series of 13 runs to test high-speed aerodynamics and stability, especially a 400mph-plus transition phase when steering authority delivered by the front wheels’ grip on the track surface changes and the front wheels become rudder-like aero devices. Engineering director Mark Chapman expects the car to exceed 500mph in these initial tests, although he says high speed is not the biggest issue this time. “The 200mph testing we did at Newquay Airport in October 2017 was all about accelerating the car, about checking that we could generate thrust from standstill,” he says. “The car was only at full power for about two seconds.” “In South Africa this time our EJ200 engine will develop its full 54,000 horsepower for nearly a minute, but the main emphasis will be on stopping. The biggest engineering challenge of all is stopping a car as fast as this without running out of desert. “We’ll be testing a two-parachute braking system, and of course we have friction brakes that work best below about 200mph. On top of that, we’ll do handling tests and investigate stability changes. And we have to see how well the team can perform under pressure in heat that might hit 40deg C.” Engineering millionaire Ian Warhurst, whose “seven-figure” investment rescued the project from receivership early this year at the last minute, says the project will seek financial and technical backers in earnest once the first South African testing is successful. “I’m very optimistic about the future,” he says. “We have a great deal of interest from potential backers, once the car has run. It was always clear, given the history of this project, that first of all we needed to show we can make things happen.” Bloodhound will be driven by former RAF jet pilot and current record holder Wing Commander Andy Green, who, back in 1997, became the only person ever to drive a car at supersonic speed on land when he took his Thrust SSC to a new mark of 763.035mph. The team members believe they can achieve 800mph as a first step.  The record attempt is scheduled to take place late in 2020, but the team has set no timetable for their other, much tougher objective of achieving 1000mph on land. “We’ve divided our aims into two separate phases,” says Warhurst, owner and CEO of the project’s supporting company, Grafton LSR. “We’ll concentrate on the record first, and when we’ve achieved that, we’ll use the data and knowledge gained to make a judgement about whether to go for the second phase.” The test track at Hakskeen Pan been specially prepared on a dry lake bed by 317 members of the local Mier community. Working by hand, they have removed more than 16,500 tonnes of stone in preparation for Bloodhound’s runs.  Thirteen parallel tracks have been laid out, because the car’s unique aluminium wheels – which don’t have tyres because the rotational speed would throw them off the rims – penetrate the track’s hard surface as they run, and “up to 13” runs are planned for this first trip to South Africa. The new Bloodhound ownership team is maintaining its role as an attraction to STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) subjects for school-age students, by making its results and research findings publicly available. “This is the first land speed record attempt of the digital era,” says Warhurst. “Digital platforms can share data in real time from hundreds of sensors on the car, allowing budding engineers to see exactly how the car is behaving as it dices with physics.” Warhurst is funding the current preparations himself but is depending on the upcoming tests to attract new backers, especially title and livery sponsors. For now, the car is painted all white, but Warhurst believes when it “does something”, interested corporate and technical partners, currently waiting in the wings, will come forward. The project moved from its old base near Bristol and is now based in
Origin: Bloodhound shown in ‘desert spec’ ahead of high-speed tests