Landracing Forum
Thrust-powered Land Speed information => Discussions on absolute land speed records => Topic started by: tallguy on August 23, 2014, 04:48:02 AM
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Just two quick questions for the North American Eagle team . . .
1. How fast do you plan to go in October this year at Alvord?
2. I'm interested in volunteering for onsite help -- such as clearing small
stones from the racing surface -- and could bring all my own supplies
such as camping equipment, food, etc. Is this something that might
be possible? I'm certainly willing to discuss it, but would not be stubborn
if the answer is "No. It's too complicated and problematic."
Alvord is a lot closer than Hakskeen Pan, South Africa.
Thank you for any information you can provide, and best of luck to
the team!
tallguy (a retired mechanical engineer -- in Northern California)
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We expect to be at the Alvord from about Sept 15 to 23. The first few days are course layout, setup the pits, clean the track, get organized. If all goes well we will make our first pass on the 17th. We will make runs as the weather and winds allow. If all goes well, we'll set a new mark for women by exceeding Kitty O'Neils record of 512 MPH. If all continues to go as planned, we would like to exceed 634 MPH to lay claim to being the worlds fastest single engine car. We don't know if the lakebed will hold that sort of speed but we won't know until we try. We've had very little financiall support at this point in time so we're really struggling with how to do this on a shoestring budget. That is nothing new, as we have run this entire project for 16 years with very little support.
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Fingers and everything else crossed for you from over here in the UK Ed.
Cheers
Robin
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Ed, best wishes from members of the SRC for sucess with these 2014 goals.
Malcolm
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Looks like Ed's NAE will spend another year in the shop.
No runs this year. Better luck in 2015. Go fast USA!
This is from his website and Facebook page.
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???
https://www.facebook.com/NorthAmericanEagle (https://www.facebook.com/NorthAmericanEagle) last update 09/13 pointing to ---> http://www.landspeed.com/ (http://www.landspeed.com/) last update 09/13
I don't see what you're referring to.
Mike
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http://www.landspeed.com/project/updates/304-sept-6-2014
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Ah! Thanks, Joe!
Mike
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I flew down to the Alvord two weeks ago on advice from the local rancher. He told me he had been on the lakebed and thought it was pretty rough. When I
got there, the ranchers son met us on the lakebed and we spend a couple hours checking it out. From the South end, it is smooth to about the 3 mile then
gets rough for a bit then smooths out but at about the 4 mile it starts getting rougher and turns into a wash board. At the 7 mile it starts getting soft
and by the 8 mile it was so soft the truck nearly got stuck. That meant we could not run anywhere near the speed we ran last year so there is no point
in hauling everything down there with nothing to be gained. The rancher is keeping me posted so if the conditions improve, we could still get out there as
late as end of March 2015. Other than that, we're just concentrating on having the Eagle ready to run as soon as we get a track.
We have a spot at SEMA, so you can expect to see us there.
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Ed, I was sorry to learn about the postponement of further runs at Alvord due to
bad lakebed conditions. Best of luck to you and the NAE team.
Having said that, I was wondering . . .
If lots of money and (therefore,) people were available, would there be anything
that could be "artificially" done to improve the lakebed and make it suitable for
high-speed runs?
For example: watering, rolling (with a pavement roller, formerly commonly called a
"steamroller"), dragging? Perhaps enormous amounts of all of these things??
The reason I ask is that I have a growing fear that somebody from England or
Australia may bump the land speed record beyond 800 mph soon. I don't know
what the "ultimate" design capability of the NAE is. After all those years of hard
work, etc., maybe some kind of fundraising campaign (based on this fear) would
be appropriate, perhaps tapping into the patriotic feelings many people in North
America have. Personally, I hope you break the record and get into the record
books. After that, it doesn't much matter to me if Bloodhound or the Aussie
Invader break your record. Even if your record had been recently established.
I invite comments on all this. And with Ed & Keith's approval, I would be happy
to help with such a fundraising campaign. I don't have much money, but I do
have some available time and a creative mind.
Tallguy (in northern California)
retired mechanical engineer
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Still monitoring the lakebed to see if the conditions improve. Maybe in March/April?