Landracing Forum
Thrust-powered Land Speed information => Discussions on absolute land speed records => Topic started by: Mooseman on March 29, 2009, 10:14:01 PM
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Please delete this if it is inapropriate I am not meaning to push any buttons . I was just reading old threads and noticed that there seems to be a dislike of Unlimited land speed record attempts especially those done by teams outside america. I am not trying to cause an argument or push anyones buttons . It just got me wondering thats all .
As someone who would love to oneday go for a world speed record of somekind oneday , I found it strange some of the things I have read in past threads.
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mooseman i cant speak for everyone but most of the lsr people i know are wheel driven racers---jet and rocket vehicles (and prop driven....sorry franklin) dont race at any scta event and there is no place in the rule and record book for them.....most anyone you included can set a record with a minimum expense vehicle ---my wifes bike cost 3000 dollars and broke the fuel record at bonneville and el mirage in 08.......its kind of like top fuel dragsters at nhra fun to watch but only a handful of people have the money to get involved--the ultimate land speed record is like that --as far as goofing on the foreigners are concerned ...you wont find a group of people more patriotic than the people in lsr and more honest i might add--- just some thoughts willie buchta
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Willie, you couldn't have said it better.
We shouldn't dis-courage efforts of sincere , knowledgeable, individuals like the F104 guys in Washington or certainly the next British attempt by Noble/Green et al, but there's been a lot of recent CRACKPOT posting regards never-could wanna-be 100,000 squirrels in a cage (made that one up - POSSIBLE???) or: big light on the back that when you turn it on Newton's law applies, efforts by people in their DREAMS. A lot of 'em posting well-known dead projects to the point of BOREDOM.
Don't get discouraged, Mooseman, there are honest efforts out there -just examine them a bit for sincerety and believability.
Let me assure you -sincere efforts will get help and support like you won't believe from this website!
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Willie, you couldn't have said it better.
We shouldn't dis-courage efforts of sincere , knowledgeable, individuals like the F104 guys in Washington or certainly the next British attempt by Noble/Green et al, but there's been a lot of recent CRACKPOT posting regards never-could wanna-be 100,000 squirrels in a cage (made that one up - POSSIBLE???) or: big light on the back that when you turn it on Newton's law applies, efforts by people in their DREAMS. A lot of 'em posting well-known dead projects to the point of BOREDOM.
Don't get discouraged, Mooseman, there are honest efforts out there -just examine them a bit for sincerety and believability.
Let me assure you -sincere efforts will get help and support like you won't believe from this website!
I can fully see what you mean , I can understand it being a bit hard to believe when someone comes on and says some far fetched not so thought out idea . I am 20 years old and don't have any racing experiance yet but I oneday would love to have a go at the unlimited land speed record. Seriously though I fully see what you mean .
I was talking to somebody the other day and I said "Hey I should make some little scale models of differant body designs and strap rockets to them and see how they react at speed" then a couple of days later I was watching a documentary on the thrust ssc team and it turned out they had the same idea .
From a fan view point land speed racing to me reminds me of people who climb mountains , what do they get out of it , not much really but they can say to themselves that hey they did that . You know sort of like a personal achievement .
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Maybe you could strat with this that is is for sale on the DLRA forum
Gray
http://www.dlra.org.au/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1016
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Moose, it is OK to dream that dream,, most of us did until reality set in... so we race the stuff we can because we either cant raise 20 million bucks or don't have that much in our wallet. :-o
Most of us enjoy watching the chase to the ultimate speed on the ground but it is easy to get tired of boisterous claims, especially from those that have not even tried any of it. LSR is what you make it, it is a participant sport.
Be safe, have fun and then go fast :wink:
Hope to see ya on the salt 8-)
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YUP! I agree............Ed
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Haha thanks for answering my question , I haven't been on here long and have allways been fascinated by land speed racing even though I am actually a drag racing fan . I just didn't quite understand some of the negative comments directed towards some of the unlimited attempts but now that I see where you guys are coming from it makes sense now . I am deffinitly going to have to get into this land speed stuff eventually this is really cool stuff .
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YUP! I agree............Ed
Goodluck to you guy's!
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Moose, a little insight from someone who came close to trying with a viable effort and had to pack it in. (for those who do not know, I was program manager and chief engineer of the Fossett LSR).
The absolute LSR (Steve called it the ALSR, some took exception and thought it should be the ULSR; the term "Unlimited" is applied to several other classes of wheel driven vehicles, so "Absolute" makes more sense), is a rarely pursued record. More people have died attempting it than have held it, although this includes a lot of pre-war fatalities.
First, understand that most people on this board are interested in the ALSR, it just doesn't dominate their overall LSR experience. IM<HO, the lack of direct interest from the wheel-driven LSR participants is a lack of relativity. Wheel driven LSR uses subsonic aerodynamics, and is dominated by the need for downforce to create traction and internal combustion power to match this traction. Distance vs. speed is long and acceleration and deceleration are slow relative to the ALSR. Most wheel-driven LSR is on the salt of Bonneville, which is a variable surface whose characteristics dominate the design of the vehicles. Combined with the fact that many people here can, and do, build their own LSR vehicles on minimal budgets and race for no recognition other than personal satisfaction and you can see how disconnected the niche of the ALSR is to them.
The ALSR is different. It is dominated, even conceptually, by supersonic aerodynamics, the need for stability over downforce, and truly obscene speeds leading to far higher acceleration and deceleration levels than most drivers would be comfortable with. There is no such thing as a survivable crash at speeds of 600+ mph let alone 1000. Everything, wheels, tires, bearings, structures, aerodynamics, engine types, systems, etc. etc. etc. relates only slightly to wheel-driven LSR. There are many racers and fabricators in wheel-driven LSR that are smart enough to be rocket scientists in the ALSR if they spent their lives on it and not on WD-LSR.
And that's one of the rubs. It takes TIME (far more than money) to learn things. Most of the people that post on these boards have spent their lives on WD-LSR and many are really good at it. Unfortunately, this doesn't make them good at ALSR technology. They are interested, it's just not what they do.
The second rub is harder. Again, IM<HO, the ALSR is a "Catch-22": Those who know what questions to ask and how to solve them are not going to do it and those that want to do it don't know what questions to ask let alone how to answer them. This is not to put down anyone currently trying to break the ALSR from Noble, to Schadle, to McGlashen, to Stakes, or even me. I do not have any credibility (other than the established supersonic air vehicle design database) to stand on a soapbox and proclaim myself the omniscient judge of all things ALSR. If anyone does in this sport, it would be Noble. Although I don't agree with his last two record breakers and his current design- he set the last two records. QED, he knows what he is doing. I do have strong opinions about how it should be done, referenced to the existing design database, and I am critical of efforts that ignore this.
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Thank you very much for that post , I look forward to reading your future posts .
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If anyone does in this sport, it would be Noble.
Eric,
Richard (Noble) was the guy who got the right people together - John Ackroyd on the Thrust II (1983 record with himself on the wheel), Ron Ayers (Thrust SSC - Andy Green set two records in 1997 - the last was breaking the sound barrier) and Gwynne Bowsher (he was on both cars) plus some other. Also it is so that without Andy the Thrust SSC may be never set a record.
The ALSR or ULSR or outright record (as the British call them) had to be seen in the historie......
In the twenties when Segrave set the record with the Sunbeam (Tiger) he used a car which was used at the race track - it was not a special construction.
From there on the LSR was set by special construction like the Bluebird (Campbell) Babs (Thomas) Slugh and Golden Arrow (both Segrave). After 1935 we had the Monster cars like Thunderbolt and Railton as the record holder.....the racer starts the "technology" and "science" in the LSR historie.
The wheel driven records was coming to a limit....see the increase of the wheeldriven record since 1947!
Than in the sixties the jet age start...there was cheap surplase jet engines lying around (!) which gave a very cheap power to weight rate......and the engineering was sometimes more sheer luck than high tech......the Three Wheeler SoA was at first undriveable and went after some big trouble into the windtunnel...not before......
Like No Risk No Fun Breedlove and Arfons pushed the record to a new level and from there on again the increase of the record was very less up to 1997 when Andy packed another some miles on.
Looking on the racer which set the record in this time you can see that the cost and science increase in a very progressive curve.
The SoA and the Green Monster was still Hot Rodder built in the backyard.......the Blue Flame was the first real trust powered science car......and with the Blue Flame the ALSR split away from the low budget record which a Hot Rodder could afford.....also the size of manpower which was now necessary was outside of every Hot Rodder teams.....there are teams which shows a exception - I mean
Ed Shadle (NAE) and Rosco McGlashan (AI).....but if you see how long they are working now on the project due to the missing budget and may be manpower, too......this two teams are keep alive by volunteers.......
With all this historie it is may be easier to understand while the ALSR isn't anymore so interest for the normal record breakers at the salt, sand or pavement........they still looking on the ALSR.....but there is always the note in the background.......this is far out of the range what they can afford.
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moose
The greatest dreams are always unrealistic. do it anyways.
mike
www.mikecharlton.com
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moose
The greatest dreams are always unrealistic. do it anyways.
mike
www.mikecharlton.com
Those are the words I like to live by .
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I've been sitting in the background on this site for a while now, and feel Confident to post, (there are some very clever members on here) And I Don't want to look to silly :oops:
I agree with ALL the replies to this thread.....From some very knowledgeable people
BUT....
without the dreamers we wouldn't have the likes of Seagreave,Cobb,Campbell,Breedlove,Gabelich,Noble and Green.
What I'm trying to say is Dreaming doesn't cost a penny, Do lots and lots of study, LISTEN to ALL that give advice to you, and you won't go far wrong.
Maybe just maybe you'll become a record breaker in time :-D
Don't ever stop dreaming!
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If you have an hour or so to sit in front of your computer this coming Thursday you might
be interested in our webinar. If you go to our website, www.landspeed.com, you can sign
up for the online seminar. We talk a little about the vision that started this project and
some of the technology behind it all..............Ed
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I've been sitting in the background on this site for a while now, and feel Confident to post, (there are some very clever members on here) And I Don't want to look to silly :oops:
I agree with ALL the replies to this thread.....From some very knowledgeable people
BUT....
without the dreamers we wouldn't have the likes of Seagreave,Cobb,Campbell,Breedlove,Gabelich,Noble and Green.
What I'm trying to say is Dreaming doesn't cost a penny, Do lots and lots of study, LISTEN to ALL that give advice to you, and you won't go far wrong.
Maybe just maybe you'll become a record breaker in time :-D
Don't ever stop dreaming!
Here Here :-D nuff said
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This forum has minimal censorship and there is a wide rage of opinions on most subjects. Sure, there are some negative ones about the absolute record. This is a sign of a healthy discussion.
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...Although I don't agree with his last two record breakers and his current design- he set the last two records. QED, he knows what he is doing. I do have strong opinions about how it should be done, referenced to the existing design database, and I am critical of efforts that ignore this.
Sorry to resurrect a very old thread but...
What don't you like about Noble's last 2 cars and Bloodhound?
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Just before Blue answers, might I suggest that any American will not like the two cars from Britain that have annexed the ALSR for over 30 years - (you had it for long enough in the sixties and seventies by the way) - the latest BLOODHOUND SSC may achieve a 1000 mph two way average that will stop all of the remaining current record contenders. [A British view! :wink:].
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Wasn't it Adm Rickover who stated "Paper submarines work best?" :)
Seriously, I have little doubt that Bloodhound will go fast when it is finished.
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Wasn't it Adm Rickover who stated "Paper submarines work best?" :)
Seriously, I have little doubt that Bloodhound will go fast when it is finished.
I am very confident, in fact close to 100%, that Bloodhound will perform to the same level of speed vs. it's design goal as Thrust 2 and TSSC. Dinner at the salt flats cafe to the first one to come up with the actual design goals of all three cars vs. their actual performance. A bottle of good whiskey to the first who can go back through BSSC's own web site and find out where their current drag and mass predictions put them vs. their original design goal.
Now before anyone gets their nose out of joint over the fact that no car ever went as fast as its design, yes, that's my point. Designs need margin: weight margin, structural margin, drag margin, thrust margin. In that order. Think about it: if we have weight to spare, ANYTHING else can be fixed. If we don't, it gets very hard very quickly. Next is structures: speed does us little good if we turn into a debris field at that speed. Drag may stop us from setting a record, it's not lethal to the car. Higher than predicted drag can be fixed with more thrust, that requires more engine and more fuel which weigh more, which adds structural load which requires more weight, which requires more fuel to accelerate, which is more weight, etc.
Weight matters. That's the first priority of the ALSR. This is a problem of acceleration and deceleration regardless of drag. The common denominator is weight. F=ma or a=F/m and d=F/m It's got to get up to speed and down from speed in the available course.
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...Although I don't agree with his last two record breakers and his current design- he set the last two records. QED, he knows what he is doing. I do have strong opinions about how it should be done, referenced to the existing design database, and I am critical of efforts that ignore this.
Sorry to resurrect a very old thread but...
What don't you like about Noble's last 2 cars and Bloodhound?
The things that can be directly traced to their actual vs. planned performance. In order:
1. Heavy
2. No margins
3. Blunt
4. Complicated
5. Expensive
They're in that order because everything at the top of the list limits everything below, but not vice versa.
Try this:
This was rev 6, we're now on rev 8.4 which is significantly more advanced. USAFA did the CFD, and we are under drag and completely stable through our design point. I won't say how fast it is designed to go, it does have a 25% weight and a 50% drag margin at this point to make 1100 peak, 1050 average on a 5.9 mile course. It would cost less than a couple of the last high dollar wheel driven cars have. It is light, 4X structural margin, sleek, simple, and (relatively) cheap. It is fully area ruled, which was much easier than anticipated. At 70% definition, it is under weight by an additional 13% vs. goal, 38% vs. 1100. Every time we touch the design, it gets simpler. It is well within the financial resources of anyone like George Poteet.
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Well now that's very interesting. A bit hard to tell from the picture but that doesn't appear to be an air-breather.
To reach 1100 (about 491 m/s) in 6 miles (about 9656 m) requires acceleration of about 1.3g. Not too much. If 5.9 is the total length of the course then obviously the acceleration has got to be higher.
If your vehicle has a rest mass of 3000 kg (realistic?) you'll need 37 kN to accelerate at 1.3g, excluding drag.
With p = 1.225, A = 1.0 (Bloodhound state just under 2.0; so is 1.0 realistic?), Cd = 0.15 (Bloodhound state 1.32, so obviously something's wrong here), and V = 491 we have about 22 kN to overcome drag.
Total thrust of around 60 kN.
The Bloodhound site states 212 kN combined thrust, so either the rolling resistance is nontrivial (even discounting the greater mass of the car) and/or the frontal area and/or the CdA are way different.
I'd calculate the impulse but I don't know how...
Go for it! :) But tell me where I'm going wrong first. Thanks.
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All:
Your maths are beyond me, but I think a bit of clarification will help one and all. A few of you have described the course a 5.9 miles. I wonder if that's the length of the course from one end to the other - or from one end to the end of the timed stretch at the other end. It seems that accelerating to and braking from 1k mph in less than six miles is pretty danged unlikely, especially if we want car and driver to be viable for a return run.
What's the length of the entire course - from start line on one end to start line on the other end?
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Maybe that the majority here are into wheel driven, piston powered vehicles because we're hot rodders at heart. :wink:
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All:
Your maths are beyond me, but I think a bit of clarification will help one and all. A few of you have described the course a 5.9 miles. I wonder if that's the length of the course from one end to the other - or from one end to the end of the timed stretch at the other end. It seems that accelerating to and braking from 1k mph in less than six miles is pretty danged unlikely, especially if we want car and driver to be viable for a return run.
What's the length of the entire course - from start line on one end to start line on the other end?
Sorry - not sure if you're talking about the course in South Africa that is going to be used for Bloodhound...if you are it is 12 miles and Bloodhound is designed to accelerate to 1000mph in 5.5m, through the measured mile and then decelerate in another 5.5. There is no safety overrun! When I queried this they said they will know from building the speeds up during the 40-50 runs they are expecting to do, if the car (and driver!) are performing the way they expect so it's not quite a risky as it sounds. It does mean though that when they are going for a max. run there is little margin for error.
Circa 2-3g accel and decel seems to be the plan. Rosco in Aussie Invader is planning on double that...gulp.
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For those reading this thread who are new to the outright LSR, the following statement from one of Blue's earlier posts is wrong and needs correcting.
More people have died attempting it than have held it, although this includes a lot of pre-war fatalities.
Parry Thomas was the first fatality in 1927 by which time the record had been increased over 30 times by more than 20 drivers. Early records were the subject of some confusion before proper two way runs were sanctioned over the same measured mile or kilo but even so those numbers immediately invalidate his statement. Frank Lockhart also died while Lee Bible killed himself and an unfortunate photographer. Post war Metvelev driving the word's first jet LSR car in 1954 either died or was badly injured depending on which sources are correct about his accident. Then there were Glenn Leasher and Athol Graham. Again, depending on which records you include from the early days and allowing for a slight overlap when thrust power finally took over from wheel driven for the outright LSR, the record has changed hands over 60 times with relatively few fatalities. It's the water speed record that is statistically really dangerous although even then the fatality rate is around 25% - bad to be sure nowhere near "more dying attempting it than holding it".
Robin
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Another go.
Bloodhound state a fully-fueled mass of 7868 kg. They further quote 90 kN thrust for the EJ-200.
Way back in 1687 Newton came up with F=ma. So, from rest, running on jet power only, a fully-fueled 7868 kg Bloodhound will accelerate at not more than a = F/m or 90,000 N / 7868 kg = 11.44 m/s**2, or about 1.17g.
The web site quotes 6227 kg dry with driver. So, if both the rocket and the EJ-200 are running at maximum thrust of 212 kN, just before the fuel runs out (ignoring aero drag!) the acceleration cannot be more than 3.47g.
At peak speed, using the BH SSC tech data (Cda = 1.3, V = 469 m/s), overcoming drag will consume 142 kN. That leaves about 70 kN left over to accelerate the 6227 kg. Again, a = F/m or a = ~11.3 m/s**2 or about 1.15g.
If you look at the mass breakdown, the EJ200 weighs 1200 kg (or 20% of the dry weight). The jet fuel tank, fuel, and intake structure weigh about 550 kg. So if you toss the jet overboard you've reduced your fully-fueled mass by at least 1750 kg, or 22%. If you then substitute a gas pressurization system for the "APU" (and the associated APU cooling system) you might shed a further 360 kg or so, leaving you at 5700 kg rather than 7800+.
Currently, the rocket propellant is specified as about 200 kg and HTP mass is nearly 1000 kg. So add some mass back in to increase the fuel burn beyond 20 seconds... to get it to 40 seconds, presumably you'd double that. So you are back up to 6500 kg or so, assuming some modest reduction elsewhere.
But what do I know? I'm a telecom guy and web forum lurker... but this stuff is cool :)
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_speed_record_for_railed_vehicles
The unmanned absolute land speed record is an interesting 6,400 mph. Manned it is a mere 632 mph ...
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Just to be clear, we have designed for 5.9 miles of course 0-1100-0, both ways, through the same geographical timed mile (FIA legal) with a turn of under 30 minutes.
Everyone else considers this impossible. We considered it a requirement.
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Since 1997, the (manned) land speed record is in excess of 763 mph.
Driver: Andy Green
Owner: Richard Noble
Name of Vehicle: Thrust SSC
Tallguy
Northern California, USA
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Another go.
Bloodhound state a fully-fueled mass of 7868 kg. They further quote 90 kN thrust for the EJ-200.
Way back in 1687 Newton came up with F=ma. So, from rest, running on jet power only, a fully-fueled 7868 kg Bloodhound will accelerate at not more than a = F/m or 90,000 N / 7868 kg = 11.44 m/s**2, or about 1.17g.
The web site quotes 6227 kg dry with driver. So, if both the rocket and the EJ-200 are running at maximum thrust of 212 kN, just before the fuel runs out (ignoring aero drag!) the acceleration cannot be more than 3.47g.
At peak speed, using the BH SSC tech data (Cda = 1.3, V = 469 m/s), overcoming drag will consume 142 kN. That leaves about 70 kN left over to accelerate the 6227 kg. Again, a = F/m or a = ~11.3 m/s**2 or about 1.15g.
If you look at the mass breakdown, the EJ200 weighs 1200 kg (or 20% of the dry weight). The jet fuel tank, fuel, and intake structure weigh about 550 kg. So if you toss the jet overboard you've reduced your fully-fueled mass by at least 1750 kg, or 22%. If you then substitute a gas pressurization system for the "APU" (and the associated APU cooling system) you might shed a further 360 kg or so, leaving you at 5700 kg rather than 7800+.
Currently, the rocket propellant is specified as about 200 kg and HTP mass is nearly 1000 kg. So add some mass back in to increase the fuel burn beyond 20 seconds... to get it to 40 seconds, presumably you'd double that. So you are back up to 6500 kg or so, assuming some modest reduction elsewhere.
But what do I know? I'm a telecom guy and web forum lurker... but this stuff is cool :)
Yes all good as an approximation but I'm not sure of the point you are making?
Bloodhound uses both jet engine and rocket as a combination to give optimum controllability and the power needed. The jet engine will be used by itself to take the car up to around 400mph. The Bloodhound team have concerns about Rosco's pure liquid-fuelled rocket...getting the mix right is very tricky and the acceleration is double Bloodhound's - it could all go wrong very, very quickly.
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Just to be clear, we have designed for 5.9 miles of course 0-1100-0, both ways, through the same geographical timed mile (FIA legal) with a turn of under 30 minutes.
Everyone else considers this impossible. We considered it a requirement.
I'm not qualified to join this debate, but . . . .
Where does '5.9' come from? Others are planning to use courses 10-12 miles long. Perhaps they consider designing for 5.9 miles as unnecessary rather than impossible?
Ditto for 30 minutes turnaround. That's a generous 100% allowance for something to go wrong. Although, as Thrust SSC found out, pushing the 60 minutes FIA requirement too close can cause you to miss out on an official record whilst running at record speed.
Glad to see you are designing for 1,100 mph though. That takes the pressure off the build timetable, since the record you have to beat will be only a little over 1,000 mph. :?
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Two points.
First, a look at the thrust required to accelerate to a given speed over a particular course length given an expected vehicle mass, in response to remarks that BH SSC would accelerate at 3g. But really just an opportunity to fool around with equations of rectilinear motion again :)
Second, a casual look at the potential effects (mostly, on vehicle mass) of eliminating an air-breathing engine from a particular LSR design, in response to Blue's post of a representation of what looks like a rocket-powered ALSR/ULSR design concept.
If you have the resources to conduct O(60) runs then yes, one might put the ability to control thrust high on the requirements list. Or maybe even if you may not have those resources. McGlashan has recently posted that he's looking for ways to initially run at reduced thrust.
Hope that helps.
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They are expecting just over 2g accel and 3g decel in a 'perfect' run...
http://www.bloodhoundssc.com/project/adventure/breaking-record (http://www.bloodhoundssc.com/project/adventure/breaking-record)
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Just to be clear, we have designed for 5.9 miles of course 0-1100-0, both ways, through the same geographical timed mile (FIA legal) with a turn of under 30 minutes.
Everyone else considers this impossible. We considered it a requirement.
Are they planning to run at Bonneville? How cool would that be?
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Nice discussion on the consideration for weight and acceleration on the upcoming Bloodhound and Aussie Invader speed record attempts. Certainly thrust powered land speed record vehicles have some advantage here over wheel-driven vehicles. I just took a look back at the 1/4-mile runs we made with The Blue Flame in 1970 on the Bonneville Salt Flats. We were just beginning our first test series, recording a standing start elapsed time of 6.724 seconds, just under 2 Gs. Not too shabby, considering the "Standard 1320" top fuel dragster record at the time was 6.430 seconds. That was with our "detuned" rocket motor, since we were working with a 700mph maximum speed limit ordered by Goodyear, the tire supplier (and tire owner). Sounds like the new guys are working around a similar acceleration profile.
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A couple reasons why we have not considered running at Bonneville, is the salt crust is to thin for a 14,000 lb vehicle on aluminum wheels (no rubber). The second reason was brought to the attention of racers by Richard Noble is the aluminum wheels on salt becomes to unstable at high speeds and allows the vehicle to yaw enough to get one into trouble. The third reason is (in our case) the salt is so corrosive and eblading to our aluminum fuselage that it would probably tear the aluminum panels off the vehicle. The dirt track, such as El Mirage, Edwards AFB, Alvord Desert and others will absorb the shock wave and reduce the lifting capacity created as you reach Mach 1 speeds. Our CFD analysis conducted by our aerodynamics team (these guys are pretty sharp) indicate we will have about 800 lbs of down force up to near 700 mph at which time we develop about 800 lbs lifting force above 710 mph. CFD similations at transonic speeds vary with such things as air density, temperature, surface rolling resistance, surface density and other factors. It's not easy is it!
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The dirt track, such as El Mirage, Edwards AFB, Alvord Desert and others will absorb the shock wave and reduce the lifting capacity created as you reach Mach 1 speeds.
El Mirage record is 308.605 mph. Could the Eagle do that in 1.3 miles?
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We cannot get onto full throttle at the beginning of the run because we suck so much dirt into the inlets up to about 100 mph then I can roll it into full throttle then into afterburner. I have a 4 stage AB so I slip it into minimun AB and when I feel a good light, I slip the throttle all the way forward to full AB. That means I give up the first mile just getting into full power. In my runs last fall at the Alvord, I didn't go into full AB until the 2 mile. At the 4.5 mile I was at 450 Knots (515 MPH). At the 5 mile I pulled the throttle back to idle, deployed the speed brakes, fired one parachute then applied the magnetic brakes. I was fully stopped at 7.8 miles. This year, I'll go into full AB at the 1 mile then see what we can get out of it at the 5.
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We cannot get onto full throttle at the beginning of the run because we suck so much dirt into the inlets up to about 100 mph then I can roll it into full throttle then into afterburner. I have a 4 stage AB so I slip it into minimun AB and when I feel a good light, I slip the throttle all the way forward to full AB. That means I give up the first mile just getting into full power. In my runs last fall at the Alvord, I didn't go into full AB until the 2 mile. At the 4.5 mile I was at 450 Knots (515 MPH). At the 5 mile I pulled the throttle back to idle, deployed the speed brakes, fired one parachute then applied the magnetic brakes. I was fully stopped at 7.8 miles. This year, I'll go into full AB at the 1 mile then see what we can get out of it at the 5.
Don't you need the accel and decal to be symmetrical to be in the right position for the return run?
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Don't you need the accel and decal to be symmetrical to be in the right position for the return run?
I think they could stop slower if they needed to. :-D
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Don't you need the accel and decal to be symmetrical to be in the right position for the return run?
I think they could stop slower if they needed to. :-D
:-D
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We don't need to be all that aggressive about stopping. We were conducting acceleration and deceleration tests to see how we fit into that two way window. Looks pretty good.
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They are expecting just over 2g accel and 3g decel in a 'perfect' run...
http://www.bloodhoundssc.com/project/adventure/breaking-record (http://www.bloodhoundssc.com/project/adventure/breaking-record)
This is where we need to go back to the basic physics. a=F/m and d=-F/m
To accelerate and decelerate to a given speed on a shorter course or a higher speed on the same course, we need less weight. Not more thrust, more engines, and more weight. Less weight, period. The weight required to do the ALSR is much less than assumed by many observers. Rockets beat jets hands down because rockets lose more fuel weight than jets during the run and have less mass at top speed and less mass to decelerate. Deep throttleable rocket engines in the thrust class required are available off the shelf at a TRL of 8+. i.e. one level off the reliability of a production car. The assumption that jets must be used with rockets is analogous to the use of both solid and liquid rockets on the space shuttle. The disadvantages of each type limit the system.
Look at Blue Flame's original specs. The engine design thrust was double what was actually used for the record runs. Even with this handicap, Blue Flame hit the measured mile in a distance that allowed the driver to see the mile entrance from the launch line. Heavy designs cannot do this no matter how much engineering is thrown at them. The post run analysis showed that Blue Flame as designed would have topped out at 870-920 mph depending on the shock drag off the top of the exposed rear wheels (Mach 2.2 relative). Blue Flame was light and simple. It was built using 1960's state of the art steel space frame and aluminum skin. Given today's rocket and carbon construction technology, the same car could be made with 50% greater thrust and Isp with 30% less launch mass. We do the math from this point. Heavy, blunt, and complex vehicles are not in the baseline. When a program starts with a needlessly heavy, complex, and expensive concept it is at a severe disadvantage to a light, simple, and inexpensive design.
5.9 miles 0-1100-0 was our design point, with margin. The analysis has shown the design to be lighter and faster than we have designed for. 4.2G launch, peak at 4.7G at 520 mph as mass is burned off, taper to 3.2G at 1100 mph due to wave drag. Decel profile is symetrical over distance, this requires a multi-stage, fully redundant chute system with each stage capable of surviving the dynamic pressure of the chute two stages above it. Peak G under decel should be under 5.5G.
We're going to hear a lot of howls about these G forces. We interviewed three X-15 pilots and twelve race, aerobatic, and test pilots including Neil Armstrong. Several were candidate drivers for the Fossett LSR. Our G profile is a fraction of that experienced by most experimental test pilots, fighter pilots, and is laughable to unlimited aerobatic pilots.
The assumptions that have limited the understanding of the ALSR for 40 years need to be re-examined. We can do it better, cheaper, faster, and simpler. We just have to want to.
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I agree.
Your last paragraph and last sentence are the most telling.
I'm sure someday someone will come along and build just such a vehicle.
They may even simplify it further. How about a solid fueled vehicle with an even higher 'G' profile on an even shorter course.
Forget about any meaningful steering or driver input. The surface speed of the wheels will lag so far behind the vehicles speed it will effectively be a sled for the entire run profile. The run up to the traps will be measured in mere feet and the drivers job will be to simply press a button to initiate events. You could even test it unmanned prior to inserting 'the driver'. Nothing but the lack of will prevents this from reality and in my cynical opinion is, as the thread title suggests, '...the problem with the unlimited land speed record'.
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You've got my attention. I can't do the math but I can do the logic!
Do you have a design?
Sid.
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I agree.
Your last paragraph and last sentence are the most telling.
I'm sure someday someone will come along and build just such a vehicle.
They may even simplify it further. How about a solid fueled vehicle with an even higher 'G' profile on an even shorter course.
Forget about any meaningful steering or driver input. The surface speed of the wheels will lag so far behind the vehicles speed it will effectively be a sled for the entire run profile. The run up to the traps will be measured in mere feet and the drivers job will be to simply press a button to initiate events. You could even test it unmanned prior to inserting 'the driver'. Nothing but the lack of will prevents this from reality and in my cynical opinion is, as the thread title suggests, '...the problem with the unlimited land speed record'.
When a solid-fuel rocket is lit, it burns until the fuel is exhausted-- no way to shut it off or modulate the power.
Regards, Neil Tucson, AZ
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When a solid-fuel rocket is lit, it burns until the fuel is exhausted-- no way to shut it off or modulate the power.
Regards, Neil Tucson, AZ
In the extreme picture Mister L paints, things happen too fast for useful driver input. The question your post raises is whether a solid fuel rocket with the just right, reliably repeatable thrust profile is readily feasible.
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Blue:
I 'get' your earlier post - simple and light is good but...
If Blue Flame was theoretically capable of 900mph why did it stop at 600?
It would be good to get a Bloodhound engineer to answer but why do YOU think the UK team have gone the complicated/heavy route? They are respected, experienced and are relatively well-resourced - I am sure they would have considered the simple/light way at an early stage. I suspect they have some very good reasons to do with safety and flexibility in being able to run slow, faster, fastest runs without mass-redesign.
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A liquid fueled rocket can be modulated, throttled, or shut off. A single tank of monopropellant (Hydrazine) is sprayed on a catalyst (Silver). Other scenarios exist. Don’t know the energy densities but solid propellant vs. liquid might have similar storage size. Of course a monoprop would have throttle complexities.
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If Blue Flame was theoretically capable of 900mph why did it stop at 600?
This is explained elsewhere, but in summary I think the key issues were:
- Whatever the design speed, in its 1970 configuration (especially the rocket) The Blue Flame's theoretical maximum speed was less than this.
- The tyres available were constrained to less than (something like) 700mph.
- The owners of the vehicle took their toys away.
I presume that the primary aim was to set the record. Having achieved this, there would have been little perceived additional benefit in pushing their own record higher.
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If Blue Flame was theoretically capable of 900mph why did it stop at 600?
This is explained elsewhere, but in summary I think the key issues were:
- Whatever the design speed, in its 1970 configuration (especially the rocket) The Blue Flame's theoretical maximum speed was less than this.
- The tyres available were constrained to less than (something like) 700mph.
- The owners of the vehicle took their toys away.
I presume that the primary aim was to set the record. Having achieved this, there would have been little perceived additional benefit in pushing their own record higher.
After one of the original designers was kind enough to supply the blueprints (and apologies if he's reading, I still have them, in perfect condition, and you'll get them back!!) to a student of mine a couple of years ago, we examined the differences between the development-stage wind tunnel design and the as-built version that set the record, from an aero perspective, using modern tools and techniques. At Mach 1 and on a near-empty fuel load, we are pretty sure lift > weight. Fortunately we'll never really know what would've happened!
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Eric (aka Blue) is clearly passionate about his design and may beg to differ but my view is that there is no such thing as the definitively correct, optimum LSR design since the rules allow you to take a variety of approaches towards achieving the same goal. And thank goodness for that. Whatever self imposed goals you set yourself, the only one that really matters is to beat the existing officially ratified record. So until he manages to successfully address all four major areas of any LSR project, then his design hypothesis based on the conclusions drawn from his research will be just another paper/computer only project. As he and many others before him have discovered, the project area marked “funding” is frequently the one that brings things to a halt. This is a shame because I personally would like to see more competition and a variety of approaches - not less - to add to those we already have. If he can persuade the likes of a George Poteet to adopt and fund his design, that would be terrific.
But whatever he and others think of Richard’s designs, he is correct in saying that the results achieved by both Thrust teams prove that they knew what they were doing. And I wouldn’t bet against his current team either - but then I would say that wouldn’t I? August 16th 2014 was 6149 days after TSSC set the second of Andy’s two records and thus it becomes the longest held outright record ever, beating John Cobb’s previous mark. For those of you who prefer things in whole years and assuming Ed doesn’t up the mark in the meantime, you’ll have to wait until Oct 15th. So – first record over 700mph at 714mph, biggest single increase ever in the history of the record, first supersonic record and now longest held record. Oh, and it’s 31 years since anything other than a Richard Noble team held the record. As Julius Caesar is purported to have said – Vini, Vidi, Vici.
The league table now reads:
ThrustSSC – 17 years
Napier Railton – 16 years
Thrust2 – 14 years
Blue Flame – 13 years
Get the right person in the right vehicle on the right surface backed up by the right amount of money and you too may get to join that list. But as Ron Ayers memorably said with tongue firmly in cheek, “others may go supersonic and beat our record but they will be tourists – we were the pioneers.”
Robin
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Sorry, Robin,
but John Cobb and his Railton hold the record from 1939 to 1963.....and this is a little bit more than 16 years :roll:
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Sorry, Robin,
but John Cobb and his Railton hold the record from 1939 to 1963.....and this is a little bit more than 16 years :roll:
Two records: 1939 to 1947 and 1947 to 1963. Even though it is the same car and driver, Robin's clock resets in 1947.
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WOW!
What a great discussion – just oozing creativity.
While Bloodhound continues to amaze us in its gestation, the Aussie Invader shows that ALSR speed attempts can be made without cubic money – at least at the beginning. Rosco has plunged into the race to 1,000mph on a shoestring budget. What he has shown, though, is that as a project becomes real – it attracts latecomers who prove the in-kind assistance necessary to achieve this lofty goal.
Following this thread, as these two project ramp up, requires an occasional fact correction – not a real big deal.
BLUE – While we built The Blue Flame using 1960s technology, the vehicle was largely a stressed skin monocoque structure (see photos). The spaced tube structure was only aft of the cockpit, to provide easy access to all the items needing continuing maintenance during the record runs.
TRICKY DICKY/MARTINE – Goodyear (who owned the tires) limited our maximum tire speed in 1970 to 700mph to avoid our making ‘banzai’ runs on our first trip to the Salt Flats. The tires and wheels had all been spun up to 850mph by Goodyear in anticipation of the later supersonic attempts. Pete and I wanted to return in 1971 to finish the job – but we had lost ownership of The Blue Flame vehicle and the AGA sponsor said “NO”.
GRAHAM – your student’s analysis using CFD techniques on The Blue Flame CAD solid model was very informative. Great job. However, he did not do an analysis that included the canard wings in the front of The Blue Flame, to trim the aerodynamics. That would also be interesting.
ROBIN UK – Your league table was accurate. But, interestingly, The Blue Flame did retain the kilometer record (the 1970 ALSR distance) for 27 years. Andy Green really smashed that one, didn’t he.
Hopefully, this animated discussion will encourage others to dedicate themselves to attempt the ALSR down the road.
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Sorry, Robin,
but John Cobb and his Railton hold the record from 1939 to 1963.....and this is a little bit more than 16 years :roll:
PP - as TD has already pointed out I said longest held outright record rather than the person who had held the record longest. :-)
Robin
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Dick,
it's such a shame that the AGA wouldn't fund another shot in 1971. On the other hand, if they had Richard might not have got his record :-o
Robin
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Sorry, Robin,
but John Cobb and his Railton hold the record from 1939 to 1963.....and this is a little bit more than 16 years :roll:
PP - as TD has already pointed out I said longest held outright record rather than the person who had held the record longest. :-)
Robin
.........this is manipulating the history.... :|
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Nope - not at all. Cobb is the person who has held the record longest if you add his records together. Andy is the owner of the longest held individual record. Clear, correct and not at all manipulative. :-D
Cheers
Robin
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Blue:
I 'get' your earlier post - simple and light is good but...
If Blue Flame was theoretically capable of 900mph why did it stop at 600?
It would be good to get a Bloodhound engineer to answer but why do YOU think the UK team have gone the complicated/heavy route? They are respected, experienced and are relatively well-resourced - I am sure they would have considered the simple/light way at an early stage. I suspect they have some very good reasons to do with safety and flexibility in being able to run slow, faster, fastest runs without mass-redesign.
1. Blue Flame was one year behind schedule and at half thrust when it got there with engine issues. The team had scheduled a two year build and two years of running. It took three years of build and after a year of running set the record. The sponsor made a business decision to pull the plug on the original schedule.
2. Throttleable rocket engines are available made to order at a TRL of 8+. Using a cluster of 4, we have a thrust range of 2,200 to 25,600 infinitely variable. Rocket thrust can be controlled to 25-50 ms accuracy, the EJ-200 is at 250-400 ms due to fan inertia. It would be better to be 10X faster for controllability. A jet is not necessary for control, and is detrimental for mass. The choice to go with it was because it is a known quantity to the team's knowledge base.
3. Simpler is better, faster, and cheaper. This is a fundamental of all design. When there are limited sponsor dollars available, cheaper should drive simpler.
4. Every design for every purpose in the world is limited by the requirements and the margin assumed. Assume a given requirement, the design can't meet future needs. Assume no margin, the design will never meet current needs.
Every ALSR vehicle designed since 1959 has failed to achieve its design goals. Therefore, we need to design for more than we need. If 800 MPH is the goal, then we need a vehicle whose thrust is greater than drag at 680 MPH. If 1,000 MPH is the goal, then we need a vehicle that can survive a 20% weight gain, or a 50% drag hit, or both, and still make the design point.
It was Colin Chapman who said, "add lightness, and everything gets better".
Words to live by. From a Brit.
Where we have designed to:
Launch mass = 6,250 lb
Thrust = 25,600 lb-ft
Isp = 243 sec
Where we are:
Fuel margin = 65%
Structural margin = 450%
Weight margin = 34% (currently, it's getting better)
Drag margin@1,000 = 50%
Why didn't BSSC go in this direction? The history in 1983 was that a blunt, heavy, and complex car got the record over a sleek, light, and simple car. The fact was that later analysis showed Blue Flame would have topped out at 900+ without stability issues, while T2 would have blown over at 680. Ignoring this, the British went with a more blunt, heavier, and more complex car designed to go 850; it went 771. Fine, it got the record; it didn't make spec: it never would have done 850. This gets lost in the history, yet is critical to the engineering.
Now we have another blunt, heavy, and radically more complex design chasing 1,000 mph with no margin. It will not make spec. I applaud Richard Noble's ability to engage his nation's industry, education, and military support. In this, he has no equal.
It is time for America to get off it's dead tail. When we choose to (big qualifier), Americans lead the world in engineering, technology, innovation, guts, and glory. Over the last 6 years, we have solved this problem with 1/4 the hardware and far less risk. This does not take hundreds of millions of dollars. It is not cheap, it can be done.
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I've said it before, and it remains the singular reason why the United States of America will ALWAYS be second to the United Kingdom -- Richard Noble.
The guy has fired up his country to action three times. Three times. Along the way his devotion to speed deeds have cost the guy plenty, including a marriage, but still he engenders insatiable desire. Precisely what the USA lacks.
I've had no end of discussions and conversations with potential sponsors and owners that always end with "that's nice, but why bother?" or something like that.
The closest personality to RN that we've got is John Force. If we could convince Force to quit drag racing. Fat chance; he's got daughters and a son-in-law to mentor. Don't think I haven't asked him, as well as many others in every motorsport discipline through the years. Most are fascinated by LSR, but no one is interested enough to abandon their well-financed teams and entertaining race schedules.
Until we have an American version of R. Noble, O.B.E., someone who can give corporate or private sponsors a sense of belonging, we are freewheeling in neutral.
At Speedweek's washout, Ed Shadle told me he has get hopes for the NA Eagle runs in October. It's along shot, but at least the team is trying and may still shut the mouths of nay sayers. At least until the Bloodhound rolls out on the African pan.
For the rest, the slog continues. . .
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I don't follow drag racing - but have been hearing of John Force for years. Didn't I read, in a recent Hot Rod magazine interview, that he would/is considering some LSR? Maybe it's not as far-fetched as you think, Louise.
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Thanks for responding 'blue'.
I actually agree with much of your post - simple solutions are elegant but I guess sometimes the quest for simplicity can make it too hard or the contraints too close to being critical. I not just thinking of engineering constraints but also safety. I'm told the BSSC team didn't like the idea of using liquid-fuelled rockets due to the difficulty of getting the combustion right...if you don't it can be very dangerous. I wasn't aware you can get rockets off the shelf - perhaps that's only in the USA?
What's 'TRL +8'?
It is time for America to get off it's dead tail. When we choose to (big qualifier), Americans lead the world in engineering, technology, innovation, guts, and glory. Over the last 6 years, we have solved this problem with 1/4 the hardware and far less risk. This does not take hundreds of millions of dollars. It is not cheap, it can be done.
Careful not to exaggerate...I think US engineering can undoubtedly be world-class...Apollo & the Space Shuttle were truly fantastic achievements but a long way from being from simple and elegant. Dare I mention the US Supersonic passenger plane? Concorde was more elegant I would suggest (both aesthetically and technically).
We are indeed blessed with Richard Noble's leadership and contagious enthusiasm but UK engineering can also be world-class.
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Blue:
I like your thinking.
What Propellant combo gives you the Specific Impulse of 243?
Cheers,
Dave.
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I've said it before, and it remains the singular reason why the United States of America will ALWAYS be second to the United Kingdom -- Richard Noble.
I've had no end of discussions and conversations with potential sponsors and owners that always end with "that's nice, but why bother?" or something like that.
For the rest, the slog continues. . .
"why bother" is the main sentiment of the public too.
The challenge of the absolute record has outstripped the ability of most and the resources of everyone but the Noble team - a design is relatively easy to propose (how many semi-serious ones have we seen come and go in the last decade alone... at least half a dozen?) but any non-Bloodhound design that actually makes it to the playa for a red hot go is going to have to be the one funded by an obsessed multi-millionaire. Multi-millionaires obsessed by records are increasingly few and far between, I'd say, but maybe it'll happen and we can enjoy the excitement of it.
Bloodhound SSC is an education project that happens to have a batshit crazy vehicle as its focus. Most people tend to miss this. Noble is a smart man, without this aspect, he would never have gotten things off the drawing board. It's what the government support is for, its why companies want to be involved. It's not some frosting on top of the cake, it's a bigger task than breaking the land speed record. It will be both his most enduring legacy and the only reason his obsession with the LSR has been able to continue. Smart, smart man. There are a few other efforts out there that have tried to paint the very tip of their iceberg as an educational project in a knock-off attempt, assuming a few school visits and some stuff on the web will do the trick. This is nonsense and is totally transparent and ineffective. Passing lip-service is not going to cut it. Only Noble's team were in a position to pursue this, and to echo Louise again, only Noble could've sold it with the conviction that comes with having achieved what nobody else could. He knew that without this new focus, there would be no project - win win. Success breeds success, it's the reason someone like Elon Musk can propose some way-out-there stuff all the time for Tesla or SpaceX - he's done what he said he would do in the past, and keeps doing it while others talk.
I should add that anyone truly passionate about education that is not involved with the Noble team can think of a hundred better projects to spend that amount of time and money on to inspire schoolkids to pursue STEM studies and careers, there's only room in the playground for one mental rocket car and well done to them for their fantastic achievements, everyone else is just working out how to even follow the dust cloud at the moment.
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When Richard called me a few years ago and told me about the Bloodhound project, he outlined his idea of reaching out to the kids. I told him we have had a "classroom page" on our site for years and kids can read about LSR, challenge the test and our webmaster would grade it and give feedback. I also told him about our STEM program in conjunction with Sally Crossfields STEM program for aviation. We've given lectures (presentations) to students of physics, math, aviation trades and a host of other classrooms and to general assemblies. So as it goes, we've been doing that all along with no recognition given to the NAE team for their efforts. Yes, I agree that the apathy by the average citizen and people of power, both private industry and government, have given us very little support. The are some companies that have really stepped up in support through technology, services and products and without them we would still have a pile of aluminum. We've conducted 44 test runs over the 16 years of this project and reached a speed of 515 MPH on a shortened track last fall. This year, we expect to exceed that speed by more than 150 MPH with an eye on setting the stage for an assault on the 763 mile mark set by Richard and Andy. This is an incredibaly difficult feat and doing it on a shoestring budget with all volunteers makes it that much more difficult but at the same time, much more rewarding than some people can even imagine. We kicked off a fund raiser to get enough money together to run our event this fall and just trying to cover the expense of having Mike Cook bring his timing system to the desert is going to be over and above the money we currently have in the bank. So, how are we going to do this? Damned if I know but we're going to do it somehow!!!
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Why didn't BSSC go in this direction? The history in 1983 was that a blunt, heavy, and complex car got the record over a sleek, light, and simple car. The fact was that later analysis showed Blue Flame would have topped out at 900+ without stability issues, while T2 would have blown over at 680. Ignoring this, the British went with a more blunt, heavier, and more complex car designed to go 850; it went 771. Fine, it got the record; it didn't make spec: it never would have done 850. This gets lost in the history, yet is critical to the engineering.
[/quote]
Blue,
please stay by the facts:
Thrust II - John Ackroyd - the designer of the Thrust II - raised the front a little but, otherwise the racer had no chance to break the Blue Flame record....he done his calculation....and he was aware that at a speed higher than 655 mph the car starts to flip....but also he knew, that the car had not enough power to reach 655 mph....so they took the risk and won....
Thrust II was designed from Ackroyd with the possible speed of 650 mph....the reached 649+ mph...on the point
Thrust SSC - 850 mph....this speed was calculated for the SPEY 205 engines, this engine went never out of the box. For all 65 runs the SPEY 202 engine was in the racer - with the SPEY 202 the calculated speed was 770 mph - and reached 771 mph...on the point
Was there something wrong? May be, as Pete Farnsworth from Blue Flame fame asked in 1998 (at the State Line conferenz room) "Why built the British locomotives, when you can set records with less weight..."
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What Propellant combo gives you the Specific Impulse of 243?
A table of specific impulse values for various liquid oxidizer + fuel (solid or liquid) combinations is here (http://www.braeunig.us/space/propel.htm#tables).
HTPB + nitrous oxide, perhaps? Cryogenic handling not required, that's got to be an advantage...
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What Propellant combo gives you the Specific Impulse of 243?
A table of specific impulse values for various liquid oxidizer + fuel (solid or liquid) combinations is here (http://www.braeunig.us/space/propel.htm#tables).
HTPB + nitrous oxide, perhaps? Cryogenic handling not required, that's got to be an advantage...
Yes, I'm well aware of Isp tables. For comparison they usually assume 1000 psi chamber pressures exiting to 1 atm. Isp values will vary with chamber pressure. As such, any combo on that list could yield an Isp of 243.
I was more interested in his Propellant combo.
Dave
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I've said it before, and it remains the singular reason why the United States of America will ALWAYS be second to the United Kingdom -- Richard Noble.
I've had no end of discussions and conversations with potential sponsors and owners that always end with "that's nice, but why bother?" or something like that.
For the rest, the slog continues. . .
"why bother" is the main sentiment of the public too.
The challenge of the absolute record has outstripped the ability of most and the resources of everyone but the Noble team - a design is relatively easy to propose (how many semi-serious ones have we seen come and go in the last decade alone... at least half a dozen?) but any non-Bloodhound design that actually makes it to the playa for a red hot go is going to have to be the one funded by an obsessed multi-millionaire. Multi-millionaires obsessed by records are increasingly few and far between, I'd say, but maybe it'll happen and we can enjoy the excitement of it.
Bloodhound SSC is an education project that happens to have a batshit crazy vehicle as its focus. Most people tend to miss this. Noble is a smart man, without this aspect, he would never have gotten things off the drawing board. It's what the government support is for, its why companies want to be involved. It's not some frosting on top of the cake, it's a bigger task than breaking the land speed record. It will be both his most enduring legacy and the only reason his obsession with the LSR has been able to continue. Smart, smart man. There are a few other efforts out there that have tried to paint the very tip of their iceberg as an educational project in a knock-off attempt, assuming a few school visits and some stuff on the web will do the trick. This is nonsense and is totally transparent and ineffective. Passing lip-service is not going to cut it. Only Noble's team were in a position to pursue this, and to echo Louise again, only Noble could've sold it with the conviction that comes with having achieved what nobody else could. He knew that without this new focus, there would be no project - win win. Success breeds success, it's the reason someone like Elon Musk can propose some way-out-there stuff all the time for Tesla or SpaceX - he's done what he said he would do in the past, and keeps doing it while others talk.
I should add that anyone truly passionate about education that is not involved with the Noble team can think of a hundred better projects to spend that amount of time and money on to inspire schoolkids to pursue STEM studies and careers, there's only room in the playground for one mental rocket car and well done to them for their fantastic achievements, everyone else is just working out how to even follow the dust cloud at the moment.
Oh Graham, this is the problem with the ALSR!!! You are, in my opinion the world leader in understanding Compressible Ground Effect Aerodynamics. Your knowledge and understanding in this field is second to none but, what do you do with that knowledge?? You keep it locked away on the premise that there is only room in the playground for one mental rocket powered vehicle! The world can embark on the amazing adventure inspired by the challenge of developing an iconic program focused on the promotion of science and technology, first laid down by BloodhoundSSC, who’s primary objective is to excite and inspire a new generation of British engineers.
Upon my becoming aware of Bloodhound I realised that the problem was not confined to Britain, but is far greater than that and actually a serious Global crisis. The whole World needs to stimulate the uptake of students into science and technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) to create an upturn in the choice of STEM subject’s at school level.
Other than the maiden flight of Concord, there has never been a program as iconic since that of the Apollo lunar landing in 1969. These amazing achievements inspired the World. The concept of a program to design and build a vehicle that would be capable of travelling across the surface of the Earth with a target speed of 1609kmph-[1000mph] has already captured the imagination of a Nation and is set to inspire the World across all generations, over 45 years on!
Australia’s expanding population is placing immense strain on the electricity power generation and transmission facilities network, which is in need of expansion and replacement. The road networks are also in need of urgent attention. Problem is, there are too few engineers to accomplish these tasks. Global awareness of the environment has brought about an urgent need for greener smarter solutions to meet our ever increasing requirements.
Research into solar, hydro and wind turbine power supplies offer alternative solutions.These companies have the resources to create their own programs in an attempt to stimulate their own supply of future engineers but such programs would be lacking the ability to capture the imagination of the younger minds.
Universities Globally are struggling to attract future engineers yet are happy to sit back and expect people like me to pay them to work on projects that will encourage a massive uptake of such which would enable them to flourish!
Australia needs a program that will match the British, a program that will excite, inspire, stimulate and capture the imagination of our future generations, focusing them on science and technology, engineering and mathematics at school level. A program that will ultimately provide our future with the mindset that can counter the effects of Global warming and secure a safe and healthy planet for the future.
The BULLETPROJECT has been developing such a program by designing a vehicle which rises to the challenge laid down by BloodhoundSSC, launching an attempt on the target speed of 1609kph-[1000mph] Our vehicle, the RV1, is the smallest of all challenge vehicles but is casts the largest net in collecting the sciences and technologies needed to make this project a safe and successful one. It will be propelled by rockets, as well as incorporating new and existing technologies to demonstrate the diverse and challenging opportunities available when choosing a STEM career.
A small team of individuals have been working on bringing this program together, enabling this amazing journey to move on through transforming its concepts from the computer screen and turning them into reality.
There is room for more that one ALSR vehicle in the global playground but this can only happen if people would just open their minds and offer a little support. This has to be done or the Universities will have no engineers to teach and our Global infrastructure will crumble around our heads.
Paul
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Hi Paul, thanks for the compliment (though I'm sure it's debatable!), though somewhat ironically you could only draw that conclusion from the volume of work that I've put out in the public arena, so I'm not sure what's considered "locked up". The entire output of my research career is publicly available to absolutely anyone that wants it - I've never done any work in private.
I taught almost 1000 students last year and they all heard about land speed record cars, too. We enjoyed watching some Bloodhound videos on youtube in Fluids class. We had a "who's more calm than Andy Green at 700mph" competition. But Felix Baumgartner was the biggest talking point in class in 2013, and few will forget that we were discussing Bernoulli when NASA announced Curiosity had survived it's fall to Mars in 2012. There are countless great ways to inspire young people to follow through on STEM, and since I asked them at the time, they think Felix's brilliant, stunning, challenging, beautiful, almost completely pointless skydive was the coolest thing ever. It doesn't take a lot of seasoned insider insight to consider what would have been the reach of an effort that did not have Red Bull's financial backing and a barrage of exceptionally savvy media. I'm sure there was only really room for one mega-hyped insane hugely-expensive supersonic skydive in the public consciousness.
Having worked at an Australian university, trust me, nobody (at any university I'm aware of) is sitting back waiting for others to work on projects to ensure engineering enrollments, there's too much money at stake!! Anyway, over the last 6 years I have put an immense amount of time into UNSW's Sunswift solar racing team, we've set two international land speed records and undertake about a dozen local school visits per year, as well as hosting numerous groups at the uni on open days, info days, renewable energy event days, women in engineering even days... I could go on. We run tours and edu sessions with several groups working with schoolkids from disadvantaged backgrounds. We help run the Sunsprint outreach program too for lots of schools, and the Sunswift students have put huge effort recently into meeting with politicians and getting more into the media to promote renewables, sustainable transport, and STEM initiatives of all stripes. As a volunteer student engineering project in Australia, there is no parallel. It's a fraction of what Bloodhound has been able to achieve, but I'm no Richard Noble =) And I already have a way-more-than-full-time job.
Some of the top people in industry and Canberra have been quite taken with the Sunswift project in recent times, so in that little way we're doing our best to influence powerful people to take research and science seriously in Australia - it's only off the back of our achievements though, not just our intent. Now, many of our 200+ core alumni are heading up RE companies, working for Tesla, designing wind power systems for Google, and changing the world for the better in numerous other ways. Had I followed my passion for supersonic cars, I'd probably have had a handful of project students and a lot of nice computer renders, but we'd certainly have no records, and most likely have had a tiny blip of the educational impact that actually setting actual records has been able to inspire. I think your own passion is fantastic and the work you are doing with young people is brilliant, we need so many more people to follow your lead... but there are also many ways to achieve what you're describing. I didn't mean to disparage your project or approach, but I'm skeptical as to what is achievable in terms of a vehicle (any vehicle, not specifically the Bullet design) seeing the actual light of day given the epic funding requirements. Rosco and Ed are brilliant men who've devoted their life, almost completely, to their dream, on a shoestring. Without bottomless millionaire funding, I believe that a lifetime is what it would take to produce a competitor vehicle as these men are just about doing. I have plenty of respect for your drive and ideas, and I hope you can change my opinion!
I encourage my students to always be doing the new thing - that is the most exciting and inspiring undertaking of all. I love the Bloodhound project and I'm fascinated by all the other designs from the NAE to Bullet to Aussie Invader to Breedlove to you name it, but it is amongst the most spectacular use of fossil fuels ever contrived, and I think my solar car students have found an efficient and cost-effective way to, as you put it, "provide our future with the mindset that can counter the effects of Global warming and secure a safe and healthy planet for the future". There are so many brilliant alternative fuel records out there waiting to be broken, with massive media coverage and huge public good will awaiting. Most importantly for those with little financial backing but looking to actually get their name in the record books, they are considerably cheaper and easier to do than 1000mph - at the end of the day, you have to pick your fights. If the fight is to go 1000mph, truly the best of luck, it is a team vs. money more than a team vs. harsh physics.
If the fight is to bring the next generation through into STEM careers with a 1000mph car as the inspiration, then Bloodhound SSC provides an extensive and fantastic stockpile of educational tools and activities that can be used by anyone, anywhere, and whatever their outcome, that vehicle will run and the kids will love it (assuming a safe finale!). I disagree that Australian or American national pride counts for as much as: a well-staffed organisation with a sound pedagogical approach and effective, extensive, free existing resources to be shared.
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Thanks for responding 'blue'.
I actually agree with much of your post - simple solutions are elegant but I guess sometimes the quest for simplicity can make it too hard or the contraints too close to being critical. I not just thinking of engineering constraints but also safety. I'm told the BSSC team didn't like the idea of using liquid-fuelled rockets due to the difficulty of getting the combustion right...if you don't it can be very dangerous. I wasn't aware you can get rockets off the shelf - perhaps that's only in the USA?
What's 'TRL +8'?
It is time for America to get off it's dead tail. When we choose to (big qualifier), Americans lead the world in engineering, technology, innovation, guts, and glory. Over the last 6 years, we have solved this problem with 1/4 the hardware and far less risk. This does not take hundreds of millions of dollars. It is not cheap, it can be done.
Careful not to exaggerate...I think US engineering can undoubtedly be world-class...Apollo & the Space Shuttle were truly fantastic achievements but a long way from being from simple and elegant. Dare I mention the US Supersonic passenger plane? Concorde was more elegant I would suggest (both aesthetically and technically).
We are indeed blessed with Richard Noble's leadership and contagious enthusiasm but UK engineering can also be world-class.
I would posit that anyone doing a trade study on rockets vs. jets should know what a TRL is.
The Technology Readiness Scale measures how far an idea has come from inception through testing to flight proven. TRL 8 is ground and flight tested. The engines we were quoted (not sponsored, quoted) had a TRL of 9 at 224 Isp and 360 psia chamber pressure. I dropped this to 8 because we planned on the higher thrust rating from a pressure of 460, which was ground and yet to be flight tested. It's LOx/ethanol, torch ignition, film cooled. The film cooling drops the Isp, but increases safety and stability. Using a continuous torch stabilizes the combustion so that deep throttling is practical.
It is the assumptions that worry me about all of the directions Bloodhound has gone in. They assumed rockets were not throttleable, rather than ask a rocket engineer. So they use a jet, which carries mass out the back of the run that a rocket doesn't have. Then add a rocket of untried chemistry, again not consulting the database. HTPB is a binder used in many solid rockets, and is favored by many experimenters of small hybrids for its stability and structure. Amroc tried to scale HTPB hybrids almost 20 years ago and failed because the grain cracks at large diameter. The Falcon fuel grain failure was inevitable and an off-the-shelf chemistry should have been chosen. They assumed that a turbo pump was required for the oxidizer, when every rocket engineer I have ever worked with states emphatically that pumps only pay for their weight and complexity beyond 30 seconds of burn time. A pump means a pre-combustor, and this was replaced with piston engine APU. A series of assumptions that lacked proper investigation led to an overly complex and heavy design that just got heavier and more complex with every passing year.
Now BSSC is in a very bad way, to use a British phrase. Under-designed and over-engineered, overweight by 9%, over drag by 7%, and over schedule by ~3X by the team's own status reports, they now have to replace a single rocket with a cluster of "4 or 5". Look at all of those intricately machined and complex bulkheads in the lower rear structure. Boring 4 or 5 holes for new motors and then going back in with reinforcement is impractical. A new lower aft chassis will have to be designed and built. It has turned into an X-33.
More weight. More complexity. We could start from scratch today and be running sooner and cheaper.
Now let's clarify a little history. The decision to not put the 205's in TSSC was because the actual drag rise showed they would only have gotten another 5 to 7 mph. The drag rise was far higher than had been predicted and even 800 mph was unachievable for TSSC. They had the record, they went supersonic, the car was getting beat to pieces by the shock-plume interactions, it was a prudent decision. It didn't come near the 850 design point and would never have. This, and the 750 quoted for Thrust 2 comes directly from Noble's own book. The knowledge that 680 would have been the blowover point didn't come until TSSC was being designed and they analyzed T2 with the same code.
Concorde was not more elegant. Pretty, yes. The US SST was designed for 40% more range and far more passengers. This would have made trans pacific city pairs possible, something absolutely required for commercial viability. It was cancelled for good reason, another limited city-pair aircraft would only have confirmed what Concorde did: not enough market to support the plane. There still isn't, people simply won't pay the cost of supersonic flight.
Apollo was one of this country's greatest achievements, the Shuttle was a piece of junk. It's failure was in serviceability and turnaround cost. 35 years later Elon Musk is proving that it's better to leave the mass of the lower stages behind and just take a capsule and cargo to orbit. It is in his company that I would point to the superiority of US engineering. In many other companies, bad management trumps even the best engineering on both sides of the pond.
IM<HO, what we need in STEM regardless of how it is inspired is a drive for simplicity. If it can be bent from sheet metal, don't mill it from billet. If it fewer parts, fewer engines, fewer different systems can do the job, then they should. For my own aspirations, I have spent the last several years as part of a wheel driven team designing a simpler and cheaper vehicle than our competition. We keep getting rained out, let's hope for World Finals. My only concern is that we really haven't had enough test time, the car has more than enough power vs. weight and drag to exceed spec. It has margin.
And above all: margin. Without margin, no design ever makes spec.
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On the Concord, Blue is correct. I was employed by a large airline when the SST programs were in the proposals stage. And United as well as the others simply decided there was no way to make money flying them. As BOAC and Air France proved. It was a great project for flying the flag as long as the government was picking up the losses. When the Concord made it's PR flights all over the world, we had one on display at SFO at our wash rack. With a pretty new DC10. After a while we were asked to move the DC10 because it made the small size of the Concord way to apparent. So we moved it and AA brought in a DC3 which was more to scale.
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Now let's clarify a little history. The decision to not put the 205's in TSSC was because the actual drag rise showed they would only have gotten another 5 to 7 mph. The drag rise was far higher than had been predicted and even 800 mph was unachievable for TSSC. They had the record, they went supersonic, the car was getting beat to pieces by the shock-plume interactions, it was a prudent decision. It didn't come near the 850 design point and would never have. This, and the 750 quoted for Thrust 2 comes directly from Noble's own book. The knowledge that 680 would have been the blowover point didn't come until TSSC was being designed and they analyzed T2 with the same code.
I have no idea from where you got your information about the T2 an TSSC....but I was more than involved in this projects....and I know the facts.....
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Thanks again Blue.
I would posit that anyone doing a trade study on rockets vs. jets should know what a TRL is.
I am not an engineer (as is apparent) - I had not heard of the term TRL - no need for the put-down!
I do understand your sentiment about BSSC - it is a complex, heavy beast and I'm not qualified to discuss the detailed design - I'll leave that to others. Some say Apollo was also ridiculously complex, heavy and wasteful.
The initial orders for Concorde were healthy but then the mid 70's oil crisis hit and ruined the economics - all orders were cancelled with only Air France and BA being forced by their governments to continue. I don't believe the US SST was cancelled because of amazing foresight - it was cancelled because it was over-engineered. The SST had a higher cruising speed but then needed considerable titanium parts to withstand the heat. It needed reheat to maintain high speed whereas Concorde only needed reheat during take off and to go transonic. Before the Paris crash Concorde was profitable for BA - for many senior execs and celebrities Concorde was their transatlantic aircraft of choice - they were willing to pay. Poor maintenance by Air France contributed to the crash and Air France wanted a way out anyway, so withdrew. It then became uneconomic for BA to go it alone.
Concorde was a fantastic technological and engineering achievement and when it stopped flying it was the first time in aviation history the world has gone backwards.
I still think the Harrier is better then the F-35! :wink:
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i have to applaud and thank you guys for having this discourse...HERE...
it is a genuine treat to become more informed from genuine healthy dialogue...
Joe :)
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Margin.
Amen to that.
Rarely have we heard, "It went so much faster than any of us thought it would. . . "
Calculate then hope.
In land speed racing even atheists have learned to pray on some days.
At the moment I think we need to pray for sunshine, wind and high pressure over Bonneville.
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The Bloodhound engineers are obviously capable and smart people so it’s a mystery to me as well why they’ve chosen the path they’re on. As Blue points out, the premise of controllability in requiring both a jet and rocket engine is myth. Also, a liquid fuelled rocket engine with a burn time of 20-30 seconds doesn’t need a complex turbopump system to feed the thrust chamber. Not just a personal opinion, this is supported by the authors of every rocketry textbook I’ve read.
I can’t help but wonder if decisions were made with considerations other than purely technical. The project needed to be pitched carefully and it seems to me that to capture the imagination of young people/general public/sponsors/media it needs to appear high tech, contemporary and relevant. A complex 1000 mph ‘car’ made from exotic materials with new technologies and processes, powered by a rocket engine, a jet engine and a F1 engine is probably going to do this. By contrast, a simple basic vehicle using 50-60 year old construction techniques and rocket technology is probably not.
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... can’t help but wonder if decisions were made with considerations other than purely technical. The project needed to be pitched carefully and it seems to me that to capture the imagination of young people/general public/sponsors/media it needs to appear high tech, contemporary and relevant. A complex 1000 mph ‘car’ made from exotic materials with new technologies and processes, powered by a rocket engine, a jet engine and a F1 engine is probably going to do this. By contrast, a simple basic vehicle using 50-60 year old construction techniques and rocket technology is probably not.
You could be right there - in which case it's a laudable aim. In my experience of talking to groups and individuals about BSSC, the complexity does interest and excite the general public - it's so far from a 'conventional' race car it captures their imagination.
I attended a supporters club meeting at the BSSC technical centre this morning and asked Mark Chapman (Chief Engineer) how the car's weight compared to the design goal. He replied they are currently at 7.75 tonnes against a goal of 7.5. He said the excess it wasn't critical for the 800 mph runs next year and they are looking to slim the car for the 2016 1000mph runs. They will be running with 1 hybrid Nammo rocket next year and a cluster of 3 for 2016 and yes he confirmed the very rear of the car would indeed need to change for 2016 to accommodate the cluster.
You guys might be interested/shocked/jealous to know they've spent £17m to date and are expecting on another £8m to complete the car (£10m to end of 2015) and a total of £41m to the end of the project in 2016/17. They currently employ 80 people including the education team.
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Hi Graham, I may have been a little harsh to generalise with my sentiments re “locked away” But it really does appear to look that way from an outsider such as me! The fact you taught almost 1000 students last year is commendable Graham. However, was the question ever asked of those students, what inspired them or what influenced them in choosing a career which would take them through university? As for Felix, the majority of public probably had never even heard of him until approximately a month or so prior to his jump and therefore highlights a fact that it was not this amazing feat that influenced your students thus inspiring them to choose a STEM career, it simply suggests that this was in the public domain at the time the question was asked and should tell you that, given the same media attention, another project/program could be in its stead. I agree it was brilliant, stunning, challenging, beautiful. But, almost completely pointless? I would have to disagree on this. It was a demonstration of how mankind is able to achieve what is presumed by many as impossible; exercising the brilliance and ingenuity of all those who worked on the program to bring Felix home safe!
The Sunswift project, like that run by SAE-Australasia, with their Formula 1000 car are brilliant programs which do inspire the students and assist in keeping them focused on the very difficult tasks which are placed before them. However, Bloodhound and The Bullet Project’s primary objective is to stimulate the uptake at school level, that’s way before they ever dream of Universities and career choices. The ALSR is a secondary objective!! Now I’m not saying UNSW is doing nothing to stimulate the interests outside of the University, what I am saying is that for all your efforts and for all the dollars you throw at your programs, you can only ever reach a minor percentage of the population. Something else is needed if we are to succeed in generating the interest in STEM on the scale it is required.
An Iconic program such as BloodhoundSSC has captured the imagination of the United Kingdom on a level unseen before! That is because it is exciting and unimaginable. To capture the mind of Australia, America, or any other Nation with the same enthusiasm and enormity as Bloodhound has in the UK, each Nation needs to have its own iconic program for the people to get behind and support with National pride. A supersonic showdown would inspire the World giving blanket coverage to target a global market. I too have a more than full time job Graham, I am not interested in getting my name in a record book, I have no wish to be in the public spotlight. I simply recognised that what Bloodhound has created is what is required on a global scale and decided that it was something I could become involved with, give it my best shot and maybe, just maybe, make a difference.
When the world record attempts where held at Daytona Beach, people flocked from across the USA to watch this amazing spectacle. The cars and their drivers where household names. The people did remember, six months down the line who held the WLSR. Unfortunately as the speeds increased the need for longer stretches of land took the sport away from the public gaze rendering it “out of sight, out of mind”. It was only on occasion that the news channels brought us information on a new world record challenger, other than that, it was down to groups of individuals to hold their own meetings and race for their love of the sport. Todays technology offers all LSR enthusiasts an opportunity to give the sport back to the public at large and reignite that which was lost; allowing public interaction once again.
The fight is to bring the next generation through into STEM careers but to say Bloodhound SSC provides an extensive and fantastic stockpile of educational tools and activities that can be used by anyone, anywhere is, in my opinion, somewhat untrue. It is a British Project which is potentially diluted on its journey to other shores. It may be useful for Universities to currently educate their students but it falls short in inspiring those outside of the UK where it is needed the most. To stimulate the minds of those who perhaps had never even given a STEM career option a thought is what I am trying to achieve. To inspire a young mind as the Lunar landings and the maiden flight of Concord did for me.
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Now let's clarify a little history. The decision to not put the 205's in TSSC was because the actual drag rise showed they would only have gotten another 5 to 7 mph. The drag rise was far higher than had been predicted and even 800 mph was unachievable for TSSC. They had the record, they went supersonic, the car was getting beat to pieces by the shock-plume interactions, it was a prudent decision. It didn't come near the 850 design point and would never have. This, and the 750 quoted for Thrust 2 comes directly from Noble's own book. The knowledge that 680 would have been the blowover point didn't come until TSSC was being designed and they analyzed T2 with the same code.
I have no idea from where you got your information about the T2 an TSSC....but I was more than involved in this projects....and I know the facts.....
Thomas / Pork Pie,
Eric / Blue has been very generous with his knowledge and opinions. Perhaps you could share what you know?
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The Bloodhound engineers are obviously capable and smart people so it’s a mystery to me as well why they’ve chosen the path they’re on. As Blue points out, the premise of controllability in requiring both a jet and rocket engine is myth. Also, a liquid fuelled rocket engine with a burn time of 20-30 seconds doesn’t need a complex turbopump system to feed the thrust chamber. Not just a personal opinion, this is supported by the authors of every rocketry textbook I’ve read.
Whilst looking for something else, I stumbled upon the following on the Bloodhound web site (http://www.bloodhoundssc.com/project/car/engines/rocket-engine):
"In the very early stages of the Project, BLOODHOUND SSC was intended to be purely rocket-powered. While this offered certain performance advantages, rockets are not as easy to control as jets, so it was decided to combine both powerplants to gain power and control."
I am only just starting to learn about rocketry, but understand that the approach and technology in general use varies depending on where in the world you happen to be. I therefore speculate that they were unable to find a suitably controllable rocket easily available in the UK.
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In the book published about BLOODHOUND SSC the four prime objectives are written down. There is no mention of land speed record or indeed any similar wording used in any of these four. Only in three is a speed objective mentioned - the 'magic number' of 1000.
I therefore speculate that they were unable to find a suitably controllable rocket easily available in the UK.
Remember Ron Ayers was a rocket aerodynamacist and his fellow engineers/scientists could probably have found some old UK technology if they had wanted. The Brit Barry Bowles used surplus technology in his 'Blonde Bombshell' rocket cars and set a British speed record. Richard Brown developed his own man-safe hybrid HTP/HTPB rockets, which he rode across the salt flats in 1999 at 365 mph peak (on two wheels). The rocket engineer Daniel Jubb (Falcon) probably fitted the image of a 'rocket engineer/scientist' for todays youth, but as has been said by another the up-scaling of the fuel 'rod' did not perform.
Nothing would have been 'easy' to obtain or make, but equally there were UK routes to explore in rocketry.
If you divorce STEM recruitment from a Land Speed Record attempt, then other nations beyond the British shoreline could still bid for the absolute record. Wouldn't it be good if some of the next generation of engineers were to produce an outright bid vehicle for a fraction of the cost of BLOODHOUND SSC programme, to show future employers and engineering business owners that they can spend less to achieve a goal - or spend less to make a bigger profit on any piece of engineering machinery. When do you need rapid prototyping for a one-off piece?
Away from the outright why not produce an unlimited wheeldriven contender for an LSR or an limited streamlined bike or a boat or an electric vehicle that can travel one thousand kilometres under continuous motion ........ :?
Malcolm, Derby, England
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...why not produce an... electric vehicle that can travel one thousand kilometres under continuous motion ........ :?
Malcolm, Derby, England
Working on it :cheers:
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Now let's clarify a little history. The decision to not put the 205's in TSSC was because the actual drag rise showed they would only have gotten another 5 to 7 mph. The drag rise was far higher than had been predicted and even 800 mph was unachievable for TSSC. They had the record, they went supersonic, the car was getting beat to pieces by the shock-plume interactions, it was a prudent decision. It didn't come near the 850 design point and would never have. This, and the 750 quoted for Thrust 2 comes directly from Noble's own book. The knowledge that 680 would have been the blowover point didn't come until TSSC was being designed and they analyzed T2 with the same code.
I have no idea from where you got your information about the T2 an TSSC....but I was more than involved in this projects....and I know the facts.....
Actually, my sources are Richard Noble from the book Thrust, and Andy Green from our personal conversations when he toured the Fossett LSR program in August 2007. Andy, Jayne Millington (sp?), and the BSSC logistics chief (I apologize for not having his name at hand) were all very inquisitive, helpful, and informative. No one mentioned that BSSC had already been launched to beat us if we got the record (VBEG for the Brits!).
We discussed many subjects and innovations that later were used on BSSC including the variable speed brake. From the initial conceptual renderings of BSSC, this feature did not appear until later in the program. Andy and I had a long talk about the benefit of our plan to install a parachute tube cover that would double as streamlining for the blunt aft-facing tubes combined as a variable aero brake that could extend to greater cross section with decreasing speed on a constant force actuator. While BSSC's speed brakes do not have the dual purpose of the ones design for the Fossett car, the concept originated with the Fossett team.
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Thanks again Blue.
I would posit that anyone doing a trade study on rockets vs. jets should know what a TRL is.
I am not an engineer (as is apparent) - I had not heard of the term TRL - no need for the put-down!
I do understand your sentiment about BSSC - it is a complex, heavy beast and I'm not qualified to discuss the detailed design - I'll leave that to others. Some say Apollo was also ridiculously complex, heavy and wasteful.
The initial orders for Concorde were healthy but then the mid 70's oil crisis hit and ruined the economics - all orders were cancelled with only Air France and BA being forced by their governments to continue. I don't believe the US SST was cancelled because of amazing foresight - it was cancelled because it was over-engineered. The SST had a higher cruising speed but then needed considerable titanium parts to withstand the heat. It needed reheat to maintain high speed whereas Concorde only needed reheat during take off and to go transonic. Before the Paris crash Concorde was profitable for BA - for many senior execs and celebrities Concorde was their transatlantic aircraft of choice - they were willing to pay. Poor maintenance by Air France contributed to the crash and Air France wanted a way out anyway, so withdrew. It then became uneconomic for BA to go it alone.
Concorde was a fantastic technological and engineering achievement and when it stopped flying it was the first time in aviation history the world has gone backwards.
I still think the Harrier is better then the F-35! :wink:
The focus on TRL was not meant as a put-down, it was meant to point anyone who would propose a solution to the ALSR to do their research. Rocket engines have been made by many countries and companies in many chemistries. To propose a novel chemistry at a previously un-tested scale requires the resources of a nation. An ALSR program should plan for something off-the-shelf.
Actually, everything from the A-12/YF-12/SR-71 has been a big step backwards in speed. The XB-70 was a victim of its own complexity. The X-33 a victim of too much technology, not enough simplicity. The F-35 should have been canceled 10 years ago. It still beats a Typhoon one-on-one, both are over cost. As a Marine, I love the Harrier; it wouldn't survive 10 seconds after BVR contact with a 5th generation fighter.
Along the way, the 777 ate the A340 alive; 4:1 sales advantage and 10 year old 777's are worth triple the lease rate of a comparable age A340. The 737NG and Next families are 3 to 5% better than the scarebusses, and the 777X is going to anihilate the A350. I'm not a fan of the systems of the 787, however it's in-service reliability is no worse than the A340 was and it's a lot more profitable. Airbus was quite late on the 380 and will never break even on it. For what Europe spent on the A400, they could have had double the number of C-17's carrying twice as much per airframe.
Apollo was simple, rugged, and efficient. Planning in the USSR and here in the early 60's showed the need for two S-V class or one "Nova" class boosters to get us to the moon and back. The Russians failed with 4 attempts with the N-1. We short cut the development and figured out how to do it with one S-V. Wasteful and heavy? No, it had margin. It could actually start on the pad and abort if the start didn't go right. A feature that Space-X uses today and has saved a launch. Complex? Just the opposite. Von Braun proved that there was a trade off between reliability and redundancy. Too much redundancy bred too much weight and complexity which reduced reliability. It was better to beef up basic systems to not fail and reduce the need for redundancy. This left mass margin that was later used to add the lunar rovers to the mission.
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Away from the outright why not produce an unlimited wheeldriven contender for an LSR ........ :?
Malcolm, Derby, England
www.carbinitelsr.com
See you at World Finals.
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...why not produce an... electric vehicle that can travel one thousand kilometres under continuous motion ........ :?
Malcolm, Derby, England
Working on it :cheers:
Thought you might be doing that Graham. Mine was just a gentle prod to the UK electric scene to work on something other than 500 mph speed on four wheels. [I happen to be old school and internal combustion, but with some external combution thrown in as well for steam power].
Malcolm
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Hi Malcolm, you sound like an educated and well informed guy.
Do you have your own project other than the involvement with Bloodhound?.
Thanks. :cheers:
Mike.
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www.carbinitelsr.com
See you at World Finals.
Smart ass comment: you might want to rethink the first part of the first goal...
Our Goals:
1 ~ to break the 500 mph barrier at Bonneville Speed Week 2014 and become the fastest wheel driven car on the planet.
2 ~ to inspire young people in the importance of math and science, showing what can be accomplished in these fields.
3 ~ to develop new power plants that showcase non-government funded sustainable alternative fuels such as natural gas and electric.
4 ~ to develop extremely fuel efficient cars that significantly exceed current fuel mileage records.
More seriously, exceeding 400 mph might be relatively straightforward, but it puts you in a pretty exclusive club. All the evidence suggests the next 100 mph is extremely difficult to achieve even if you have a vehicle that is theoretically capable of that speed.
Personally, I find the current competition for the wheel driven record fascinating. Arguably there are more than 10 serious contenders with a 3 or 4 different approaches. All are probably capable of setting class records, but who will come out on top?
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Hi Malcolm, you sound like an educated and well informed guy.
Mike.
Amongst other things, Malcolm is heavily involved in the Speed Record Club (see http://www.speedrecordclub.com/) as News Editor of their Fast Facts magazine. As such, it is his "job" to be well informed. :wink:
Unfortunately, the SRC web site appears to be about a year out of date ("Latest News" is August 2013), but don't get me started on that.
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Hi Malcolm, you sound like an educated and well informed guy.
Mike.
Amongst other things, Malcolm is heavily involved in the Speed Record Club (see http://www.speedrecordclub.com/) as News Editor of their Fast Facts magazine. As such, it is his "job" to be well informed. :wink:
Unfortunately, the SRC web site appears to be about a year out of date ("Latest News" is August 2013), but don't get me started on that.
I have worked on my own racing and speed projects (steam rocket and turbo diesel) and assembled and drove circuit racing special saloons (sedans) in speed events against the clock; prepared race special saloon cars for others; elected member of the British Racing Mechanics Club; driven for clients whose record attempts I have organised in the UK - including driving the jet car Vampire (google that name!); hold with other journalists UK distance and time records for Volvo UK since 2001; organised most record attempts made in the UK (up to 2011), the USA twice and Tunisia (but failed to get a car to South Africa to challenge the mile record); support the SRC as much as I can, having been Chairman from '94 to end '99; I do not work for Richard Noble or BLOODHOUND SSC (managed one long day for Thrust SSC); will get around to improving the SRC website, but can I suggest the SRC facebook forum for all to make contact with fellow speed enthusiasts; a partner in the UK Timing Association (UKTA) which organises standing mile events on UK airfields. And I watch what all of the contributors to Landracing.com are doing to report to the SRC membership through Fast FACTS. Not sure if well educated matters, but I am pleased to have become friends with some of the best at speed racing around the world.
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Hi All,
I'm comms manager on the BH Project. It's great seeing such lively discussion around the unlimited class of LSR. We're at a very exciting time right now with two / three teams getting close to or already running.
It's interesting that BLOODHOUND's weight and complexity has been raised here as Andy discusses these in his BBC diary: http://bbc.in/1ponVCb
Appreciate your thoughts,
Jules
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Hi Malcolm, you sound like an educated and well informed guy.
Mike.
Amongst other things, Malcolm is heavily involved in the Speed Record Club (see http://www.speedrecordclub.com/) as News Editor of their Fast Facts magazine. As such, it is his "job" to be well informed. :wink:
Unfortunately, the SRC web site appears to be about a year out of date ("Latest News" is August 2013), but don't get me started on that.
I have worked on my own racing and speed projects (steam rocket and turbo diesel) and assembled and drove circuit racing special saloons (sedans) in speed events against the clock; prepared race special saloon cars for others; elected member of the British Racing Mechanics Club; driven for clients whose record attempts I have organised in the UK - including driving the jet car Vampire (google that name!); hold with other journalists UK distance and time records for Volvo UK since 2001; organised most record attempts made in the UK (up to 2011), the USA twice and Tunisia (but failed to get a car to South Africa to challenge the mile record); support the SRC as much as I can, having been Chairman from '94 to end '99; I do not work for Richard Noble or BLOODHOUND SSC (managed one long day for Thrust SSC); will get around to improving the SRC website, but can I suggest the SRC facebook forum for all to make contact with fellow speed enthusiasts; a partner in the UK Timing Association (UKTA) which organises standing mile events on UK airfields. And I watch what all of the contributors to Landracing.com are doing to report to the SRC membership through Fast FACTS. Not sure if well educated matters, but I am pleased to have become friends with some of the best at speed racing around the world.
I messed up. I actually wanted to ask Martine but when I looked at the previous post I saw Malcolm. No harm. Thanks for the info man. :cheers:
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Hi Malcolm, you sound like an educated and well informed guy.
Do you have your own project other than the involvement with Bloodhound?.
Thanks. :cheers:
Mike.
If this was aimed at me - then no I don't...I'm just an ambassador with Bloodhound.
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I messed up. I actually wanted to ask Martine
As you will see Tauruck there are many different people taking an interest in speed the UK and the Bloodhound Ambassadors might be something other major teams could use.
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What other major teams?. You Pommies are in this alone.
Although the Americans went to the moon and back numerous times (and the Astronauts drove big block Fords) the guys into speed records
are gearheads that love pistons, gearboxes and hot rods.
Be careful what you wish for. :-D
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...and the Astronauts drove big block Fords...
It's been a LONG time, but I think that Tom Wolfe in "The Right Stuff" says that the first group of astronauts were given Corvettes by GM (although some/many might have immediately sold them).
Mike
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I should have backed up my statement with proof but I can't remember where I read the Ford thing. I'll try find it.
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I remember very clearly the astronauts and their Corvettes. A current article on the subject is found at http://www.chron.com/cars/article/Astronauts-helped-established-the-Corvette-as-4887779.php#photo-5307759. I was working on several research projects supporting the Apollo mission during the 1960s, at IIT Research Institute, including participating in static testing the rockets at Marshall Space Flight Center in 1964. I was also a car guy, involved in drag racing and sports car racing in small ways (married, with kids). So, the combination of neat sports cars and astronauts certainly caught my attention. T-birds were cool, but never really sports cars. :cheers:
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As evidence that Thunderbirds were not sports cars -- my first car was a 1959 Thunderbird that I bought used in '65. It sported air conditioning, power windows, the Fordomatic two speed trans, and a 352 low-performance (at least I thought so) with one two-barrel carb mounted. It was, alas, a slug off the line, but it had tremendous top end. I don't know what the rear ratio was. Oh, that I had saved it instead of crashing and trading the wrecked vehicle for something else. :cry:
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1955-57 Thunderbirds were sport cars. They had proper V8's and manual transmissions,things the Corvette of that era did not.
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Chuck Weiss raced his '55 Thunderbird in SCCA races at Cumberland, Watkins Glen, & Nassau. He was a Ford Ride & Handling engineer and was responsible for the Mustang II front suspension. He is an encyclopedia of knowledge.
Arkus- Duntov made the Corvette a real sports car.
Regards, Neil Tucson, AZ
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I didn't realize that 55-57 Corvettes were not available with V-8s or manual transmissions.
The things you learn on the internet!
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Funny...I seem to remember that the 53 & 54 Corvette had a 6 with an automatic, but 55/56 on had a V8 and a 3 speed and 57 on a V8 with 4 speed, but I'm old and what do I know? :roll:
Bill
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I'm calling "hijack", who cares fight about it somewhere else!
Sid.
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more hijack
Neil, You know Chuck Weiss? He was here a couple of years ago to review the liner suspension. It did meet his approval.
I havent heard from some of the old guys in a while.
I would love to have his 55 Bird street car. (Perfect restoration)
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Rick;
Chuck Weiss was in Tucson a couple of years ago and he attended Thursday lunch with us "Car Guyz". I had an opportunity to talk to him about his Mustang II front suspension geometry. If Chuck says it's OK, it's OK.
Regards, Neil Tucson, AZ
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People saying nice things about Fords!!!!! :evil:
I'm into this Hi Jack thing.
Give us more. :-D :cheers:
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Another year, (or two, or five, check the original schedule) passed and BSSC is still not running. :dhorse: If they ever run, BSSC will top out at 880-910 mph by their own figures. Coincidentally, this is the speed range that Blue Flame was designed for 40 years ago and later analysis showed it would achieve. Without a complete rebuild of the aft-lower chassis of BSSC to accommodate a cluster of rockets, 900 is not remotely practical. Even with that, the blunt and heavy car will never break 950, let alone 1,000.
We have a design to go 2000 kph (1242 mph), structurally and aerodynamicly sound, analyzed by the US Air Force Academy.
It just takes someone with the will to do it for the US. Everyone in the LSR community needs to reach out to launch an American effort.
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Another year, (or two, or five, check the original schedule) passed and BSSC is still not running. :dhorse: If they ever run, BSSC will top out at 880-910 mph by their own figures. Coincidentally, this is the speed range that Blue Flame was designed for 40 years ago and later analysis showed it would achieve. Without a complete rebuild of the aft-lower chassis of BSSC to accommodate a cluster of rockets, 900 is not remotely practical. Even with that, the blunt and heavy car will never break 950, let alone 1,000.
We have a design to go 2000 kph (1242 mph), structurally and aerodynamicly sound, analyzed by the US Air Force Academy.
It just takes someone with the will to do it for the US. Everyone in the LSR community needs to reach out to launch an American effort.
Blue: can I ask why you seem to be knocking a serious and genuine attempt to set a new LSR by the current holders?
What are your thoughts about NAE?
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There is currently an American effort underway, and I'm supporting it.
It's the North American Eagle. This project was started more than 15
years ago, and the car has gone more than 500 mph so far.
I think it's capable of much higher speeds, as it was designed to go
800+ mph. The team is cautiously running the car, in order to continually
test all the systems, as well as developing new ones.
I have donated money to this project a few times, and intend to keep doing so.
I think the biggest challenge here for the NAE project is financial. It appears
that so far, no major sponsorship has come forward to help. I keep trying to
interest individuals in this, but (so far, anyway) don't know how to approach
a large company to ask for their financial help. I think this task would be
properly done by Ed Shadle, the driver and co-owner.
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Another year, (or two, or five, check the original schedule) passed and BSSC is still not running. :dhorse: If they ever run, BSSC will top out at 880-910 mph by their own figures. Coincidentally, this is the speed range that Blue Flame was designed for 40 years ago and later analysis showed it would achieve. Without a complete rebuild of the aft-lower chassis of BSSC to accommodate a cluster of rockets, 900 is not remotely practical. Even with that, the blunt and heavy car will never break 950, let alone 1,000.
We have a design to go 2000 kph (1242 mph), structurally and aerodynamicly sound, analyzed by the US Air Force Academy.
It just takes someone with the will to do it for the US. Everyone in the LSR community needs to reach out to launch an American effort.
Blue: can I ask why you seem to be knocking a serious and genuine attempt to set a new LSR by the current holders?
What are your thoughts about NAE?
What is disappointing and disheartening about BSSC is the continued advertisement of the "First car designed to go 1,000 MPH" when the team's own numbers show it will never reach that goal. I wish them the best of luck. With the new rocket engines (not yet tested at flight weight, TRL-5) and the constraints of the hardware they have already built, 880-910 is a rational expectation. This is from their own numbers on the progress of their research with drag and weight growth vs their original baseline requirements. BSSC is a "serious and genuine" attempt to set a new ALSR above the current record of 763 MPH.
It will never go 1,000 MPH: too heavy, too much drag, too little power.
For NAE, they have already published a CFD analysis that shows the car's drag equal to the available thrust at 680 MPH. I am the first to argue that the effects of porous playa on transonic separation and shock reflection reduce drag to lower values than would be expected from studying the existing transonic ground effect database. However, a brick is a brick. The drag of the wide rear wheels and the blunt cross section of the much touted mag-lev brakes are too much for the J79 to overcome. Please do not take my opinion, the NAE team's own analysis shows this.
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Another year, (or two, or five, check the original schedule) passed and BSSC is still not running. :dhorse: If they ever run, BSSC will top out at 880-910 mph by their own figures. Coincidentally, this is the speed range that Blue Flame was designed for 40 years ago and later analysis showed it would achieve. Without a complete rebuild of the aft-lower chassis of BSSC to accommodate a cluster of rockets, 900 is not remotely practical. Even with that, the blunt and heavy car will never break 950, let alone 1,000.
...
Blue: can I ask why you seem to be knocking a serious and genuine attempt to set a new LSR by the current holders?
...
What is disappointing and disheartening about BSSC is the continued advertisement of the "First car designed to go 1,000 MPH" when the team's own numbers show it will never reach that goal. I wish them the best of luck. With the new rocket engines (not yet tested at flight weight, TRL-5) and the constraints of the hardware they have already built, 910-940 is a rational expectation. This is from their own numbers on the progress of their research with drag and weight growth vs their original baseline requirements. BSSC is a "serious and genuine" attempt to set a new ALSR above the current record of 763 MPH.
It will never go 1,000 MPH: too heavy, too much drag, too little power.
...
I freely admit that I may be gullible, but I do buy into the Richard Noble 'hype', based mainly on his (and the team's) track record with Thrust 2 and ThrustSSC. He has a dogged persistence to keep going until his goals are achieved. If I were "anti-Noble" (and I'm not saying you are) my main concern would be that there is no serious contender to get to 1,000 mph first, whenever that might be.
That being said, the Bloodhound SSC project was conceived as a reaction to the perceived threat from Craig Breedlove. One of the aims was to maximise the potential of current technology and set a record that will last a generation. It will be the last word on the subject from Richard Noble/Andy Green/Ron Ayers.
The design goal is for a peak speed of 1,050 mph to ensure an average of 1,000 mph over the mile. That is a very difficult target to hit but I have not seen any figures from the team to suggest it cannot be achieved. The remaining difficult technical area is the rocket, which as you say has not been tested in the form needed for BSSC. The other difficulty is money (isn't it always?), which has been given as a reason for the latest delays. It would be really helpful if someone else could set an 800 mph record! That would generate enormous publicity and probably loosen the purse strings in some companies' boardrooms.
If you are correct, a record of 920 mph (say) would not be too shabby and might give others something attainable to shoot at. Up to a point too much weight and drag can be overcome with extra thrust. It all depends how big a firework Andy is willing to sit in front of. :-o
I would predict that BSSC will be the first car over 1,000 mph. I would not like to say whether this will be in 2, 3, 5 or more years time. No-one else is ready to come close.
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Another year, (or two, or five, check the original schedule) passed and BSSC is still not running. :dhorse: If they ever run, BSSC will top out at 880-910 mph by their own figures. Coincidentally, this is the speed range that Blue Flame was designed for 40 years ago and later analysis showed it would achieve. Without a complete rebuild of the aft-lower chassis of BSSC to accommodate a cluster of rockets, 900 is not remotely practical. Even with that, the blunt and heavy car will never break 950, let alone 1,000.
We have a design to go 2000 kph (1242 mph), structurally and aerodynamicly sound, analyzed by the US Air Force Academy.
It just takes someone with the will to do it for the US. Everyone in the LSR community needs to reach out to launch an American effort.
Blue: can I ask why you seem to be knocking a serious and genuine attempt to set a new LSR by the current holders?
What are your thoughts about NAE?
What is disappointing and disheartening about BSSC is the continued advertisement of the "First car designed to go 1,000 MPH" when the team's own numbers show it will never reach that goal. I wish them the best of luck. With the new rocket engines (not yet tested at flight weight, TRL-5) and the constraints of the hardware they have already built, 880-910 is a rational expectation. This is from their own numbers on the progress of their research with drag and weight growth vs their original baseline requirements. BSSC is a "serious and genuine" attempt to set a new ALSR above the current record of 763 MPH.
It will never go 1,000 MPH: too heavy, too much drag, too little power.
For NAE, they have already published a CFD analysis that shows the car's drag equal to the available thrust at 680 MPH. I am the first to argue that the effects of porous playa on transonic separation and shock reflection reduce drag to lower values than would be expected from studying the existing transonic ground effect database. However, a brick is a brick. The drag of the wide rear wheels and the blunt cross section of the much touted mag-lev brakes are too much for the J79 to overcome. Please do not take my opinion, the NAE team's own analysis shows this.
Too heavy, too blunt, won't be fast. All of the exact same things said of thrust ssc.
We have a better design, someone should find us instead, we don't like sour grapes....
It's 2016 right? I could swear I've heard all of this before.
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What is disappointing and disheartening about BSSC is the continued advertisement of the "First car designed to go 1,000 MPH" when the team's own numbers show it will never reach that goal.
Please point me in the right direction...I've not seen or heard anything to say it can't do 1000mph. I've spoken with Chief engineer: Mark Chapman and Chief Aerodynamicist: Ron Ayes - are you really saying they are lying to me?
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martine
I just wish they would say less and prove more, a run or two before blowing their own horn would be nice.
Bill
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What is disappointing and disheartening about BSSC is the continued advertisement of the "First car designed to go 1,000 MPH" when the team's own numbers show it will never reach that goal.
Please point me in the right direction...I've not seen or heard anything to say it can't do 1000mph. I've spoken with Chief engineer: Mark Chapman and Chief Aerodynamicist: Ron Ayers - are you really saying they are lying to me?
Or deluded? :-o
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AFAIK Blue/Eric is a proper aerodynamicist (which I am not) whose views deserve to be taken seriously. I just wish he would back up his assertions with the data from which he draws conclusions.
I would pay good money to witness a debate between Eric and Ron - supported by illustrations from projects they have worked on. :evil:
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AFAIK Blue/Eric is a proper aerodynamicist (which I am not) whose views deserve to be taken seriously. I just wish he would back up his assertions with the data from which he draws conclusions.
I would pay good money to witness a debate between Eric and Ron - supported by illustrations from projects they have worked on. :evil:
I was some years ago a witness of a debate between John Ackroyd and Ron....it was hilarious.....two totally different opinions how to reach the goal of the right aerodynamic....
but I fear, a debate between Eric and Ron....maybe Ron would stand up and walk out of the room :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll:
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martine
I just wish they would say less and prove more, a run or two before blowing their own horn would be nice.
Bill
Not sure I understand your comment...they are building a car, they have thrown open the full details including it's design parameters and expected performance. They are the current LSR record holders. I think a certain amount of horn blowing is allowed.
They've never claimed it's going to be easy and admit there is still lots to do. The original schedule has been put back and back though a mixture of technical problems and finance. In the meantime some 6000 UK schools and hundreds of thousands of young people have had direct involvement in the project. Over 550 'ambassadors' like myself are spreading the word across the UK and beyond.
I have the utmost respect for anyone seriously attempting to break the current LSR. I think some of the teams worldwide that have gone public (there could be others of course) are more serious than others: I believe Rosco McGlashan's 'Aussie Invader 2' is a good'un and he's going it on a tiny fraction of the Bloodhound budget - which is very impressive in itself. I don't believe 'American Eagle' will come close to breaking the record - but good luck to them.
What's the problem exactly?
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Thanks for the post - not being an aerodynamicist, I don't understand much of what you're written - but I get the idea.
What was surprising was the way that pitching moment, drag, and downforce vs. alpha changed with porosity vs. Mach number. Are we smarter than the other teams pursuing this record? Maybe, maybe not. We did ask, research, and answer a fundamental question critical to living or dying through any 1,000 MPH attempt that has still never occurred to anyone else to ask in the last 15 years of teams pursuing the ALSR. We are willing to share this knowledge, in the hope that anyone actually attempting these speeds might live through that attempt.
Why do you think the Bloodhound team are unaware of whatever it is you talk about? They have been there (supersonic on a fluidised surface) and done that after all. Roy Ayes talks about the steering wheels acting more like rudders in a fluid.
As far as BSSC's weight and drag vs. where they need it to be, please re-read their own posts going back to 2008. By their own blogs, BSSC is currently over-weight, over-drag, under-thrust, and there is no fix that will get them to 1,000 mph by their own figures. As I tell all of my students, please don't take my word (or theirs) for it; do the research.
Which Bloodhound posts are these from 2008 - can you point me in the write direction (a link would be nice) so I can read for myself?
As far as power goes - don't forget they are now going to be using a smaller, hybrid rocket developed by Nammo - which can, and will, be clustered together (either 3 or 4) - this is quite different to the older design.
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Martine;
It's Ron Ayres.
Regards, Neil Tucson, AZ
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Martine;
It's Ron Ayres.
Regards, Neil Tucson, AZ
Or Ron Ayers. :roll:
Chief of Aerodynamics for Bloodhound SSC.
I have been an engineer since January 1950(!) when I commenced an engineering apprenticeship at Handley Page Ltd. One of the aircraft that I worked on was the first prototype of the Victor Bomber. During my apprenticeship I was allowed some time off to study for a degree in aeronautical engineering. I subsequently continued my education at the (then) College of Aeronautics at Cranfield, now known as Cranfield University.
In 1956 I joined the Guided Weapons division of the Bristol Aeroplane Company (before it became part of the British Aircraft Corporation) as an aerodynamicist. During my 11 years at that company I held several positions including, for five years, that of Chief Aerodynamicist. One of the principal projects that I worked on was the Bloodhound surface-to-air anti-aircraft missile. Thus you can see that the name of the Bloodhound SSC record car has a provenance! I also was involved with the Rapier tactical anti-aircraft weapon.
From 1967, for over 20 years I was involved in the design and manufacture of printing machines and associated equipment.
During a period of retirement I worked as a volunteer researcher at the Brooklands Museum in Weybridge. While there I found in the archives, a batch of Vickers Armstrong wind tunnel reports from the 1920’s and 1930’s concerning research conducted on the great pre-WW2 speed record cars such as Golden Arrow, Bluebird and the Railton Special. This started my interest in record breaking. In 1992 I had a chance meeting with Richard Noble. He was already planning to repeat his Thrust 2 successes, but this time he had ambitions to exceed the speed of sound. When he found that I had, in an earlier career, specialised in high speed aerodynamics his powers of persuasion ensured that my retirement was over. We set the supersonic record in October 1997.
I subsequently became the aerodynamicist on the JCB Dieselmax project, which achieved an International Land Speed for Diesel cars of 350mph.
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Or Ron Ayers. :roll:
:-D
He's an amazing guy and a true gentleman. I find it quite funny when he attends Bloodhound events to help 'man' the stand...people come up to him and ask the most basic of questions (not realising who he is) but he always gives a straight answer. I only hope I have his energy and enthusiasm when I'm in my 80s.
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Or Ron Ayers. :roll:
:-D
He's an amazing guy and a true gentleman. I find it quite funny when he attends Bloodhound events to help 'man' the stand...people come up to him and ask the most basic of questions (not realising who he is) but he always gives a straight answer. I only hope I have his energy and enthusiasm when I'm in my 80s.
Some years ago I attended a Bloodhound event hosted by the Brooklands Museum. I happened to approach the entrance immediately behind Ron and his wife. He didn't have a ticket (he was a speaker) and the people manning the doors were all for turning him away. Rather than making a fuss he turned around, maybe looking for an organiser for help. I rather firmly informed the doorperson that Ron was a Very Important Person who should probably be revered rather than turned away. After a short pause they were convinced and Ron was allowed in.
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Pork Pie, please state your CV
(PP, what's fastest you ever crashed at?)
Blue,
what problem you got with me, why you bother me.....
you have forgotten this very nasty private mail you sent me some years ago, where you wrote that at first I had to learn proper English (sorry, but been a lurker at this website it is tough to learn a proper English...they use here only words like salt and speed...) and second, that I'm less than an amateur in aerodynamic......
I have nothing to prove......you have to....
About this nasty letter years ago....I didn't start a war here at Landracing....but I forward your letter to Jon Wennerberg.....this time I make you public....and now let me alone
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Blue.
You should be a nicer person.
Not all of us can walk on water. 8-)
Why are you all over Pork Pie?. Try me. My English is better. :-D :-D :-D
You're a joke.
Shame on you. This is a cool forum with great members. Don't screw it up.
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Which Bloodhound posts are these from 2008 - can you point me in the write direction (a link would be nice) so I can read for myself?
I have quoted their prior posts and blogs so many times I am truly tired of it. Given your title, if you don't have the energy to review their blogs that's your issue.
It's a perfectly civil question - the 'blogs' you talk about are where exactly...on the Bloodhound website? Here? Another forum? I'm trying to understand your position but you don't make it easy.
I'm tempted to say: the UK team have had the WLSR for over 30 years now...yet all you do is belittle their efforts...but that would be rude.
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Pork Pie, please state your CV
(PP, what's fastest you ever crashed at?)
Blue,
what problem you got with me, why you bother me.....
did you forgot this very nasty private mail you sent me some years ago, where you wrote that at first I had to learn proper English (sorry, but been a lurker at this website it is tough to learn a proper English...they use here only words like salt and speed...) and second, that I'm less than an amateur in aerodynamic......
I have nothing to prove......you have to....
About this nasty letter years ago....I didn't start a war here at Landracing....but I forward your letter to Jon Wennerberg.....this time I make you public....and now let me alone
Blue send me an answer in a PM.....impolite and nasty as always
[/quote]
You never answered that post, or the request from others on the board as to your sources or knowledge. If you don't want the criticism, please do better research before posting.
[/quote]
...who asked me to my sources or knowledge?.......I can't remember that I was asked.....because they know....it stand in my underline....
....I'm one of the leading historian for Land Speed Records....and I'm a witness of the most of all this records in the last couple decades....
...with "Fred" Kaesmann I done a book about the history of WLSR....this is still to today the standard book world wide....is this good enough
and now, LET ME ALONE............no PM anymore.........................if you answer get your S H I T here on the forum that everybody can read your rude notes....
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Hey PorkPie, you've had credibility & respect in the LSR community for many years with your involvement in racing & as a historian & many of us call you a friend. Don't be drawn into an unpleasant situation by arrogance no matter how highly they regard them self. Look the other way & turn a deaf ear.
Sid.
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Hey PorkPie, you've had credibility & respect in the LSR community for many years with your involvement in racing & as a historian & many of us call you a friend. Don't be drawn into an unpleasant situation by arrogance no matter how highly they regard them self. Look the other way & turn a deaf ear.
Sid.
Sid,
no problem with the deaf ear....I'm deaf so or so and use hearing aids for a long time (only not at the salt.....the racers are loud enough.... :-D :-D :-D :-D)
I only like that he stops to send me PM's......and shows bad manners....
...hope he understand now....
and thanks for the support...also to Mike
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Constructive critical evaluation backed up by data is always welcome. Sometimes I get negative feedback. In these cases I ask for specifics and discuss the problem with the polite and respectful attitude that they might be right. They are correct more often than I like to admit. All most always we have a decent relationship after that point. Many times I thank them for the advice.
A very small percentage of the population are knuckleheads and that tactic does not work. In those instances I use the delete button on the computer or turn and walk away if it is a personal conversation. It is best to stay above negativity as mentioned in the previous post.
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Well put 'Wobbly'.
I am an outsider in as much as I'm not an engineer, not a racer and live in the UK - but I have an interest and do help with Bloodhound as an ambassador. When Blue stated things like 'they will never reach 1000mph' etc I simply wanted to know why he thought that - I am not in a position to argue technically but it seems Blue is not prepared to enter in a dialogue and lower himself to explain a little of why he says that - and that is his prerogative of course.
I genuinely wish all competing teams the best - I hope they keep safe - in fact some in Bloodhound would quite like the existing record to be broken by another team and then for Bloodhound to break it again. It would make more of a media story which would only be good for WLSR racing in general.
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I "second" that idea. For quite some time, I have been following the progress of the
North American Eagle. I think the team's goal is to break the land speed record, and
then "retire" from future attempts. If Bloodhound or the Aussie Invader breaks the
record first, bumping the speed to about 900 mph, then the NAE may be history, unable
to break this new record.
For this reason, and also because both Bloodhound and AI are aiming at 1000 mph,
I hope that NAE is the next ALSR holder. I think they want to get into the record
book(s), then quit. I'm hoping this happens, and believe that it won't much bother
them if their record is later broken by others. In fact, it's likely that I will contribute
some money to all three of these teams eventually, even if it may not be at the same
time.
I'm a fan of all these (thrust-powered car) teams, and, to a somewhat lesser degree,
all the other land speed teams and individuals. I think land speed racing is great, and
wish all participants eventual success --even knowing that sometimes it takes decades
of trying, and sometimes it will never happen for an individual. But I appreciate the
effort nonetheless.
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Don't worry PorkPie, nobody that's serious about land speed record racing needs to take any real notice of these things, especially when there's a pattern that makes it not particularly personal. Years and years of masturbatory self-deification - and pompous snarking at others - don't actually help anyone set their own speed record with their own design, as well we have seen! So some will preserve and celebrate a glorious history, some will help make that history, some will follow a sport with positivity and admiration and support, and some will just disappear without a trace in a loud grumpy pile of despair with the worst case of the "ifonlythey'dlistenedtomeeeeeee!"s ever. So, onwards and upwards =)
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Bloodhound P.R. -- "mind-blowing speeds of 500+ mph".
The only thing mind-blowing to me is the budget.
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2016! Back to the future Stan!
Sid.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_speed_record_for_railed_vehicles
The unmanned absolute land speed record is an interesting 6,400 mph. Manned it is a mere 632 mph ...
My (unmanned) vehicle was a piece of copper wire. The payload was an electron (or a hole), which went significantly faster
than 6400 mph. Sometimes I question the wisdom of people trying to break the absolute LSR (at a high risk of physical danger) . . . but I still continue to find it interesting and exciting.
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Bloodhound P.R. -- "mind-blowing speeds of 500+ mph".
The only thing mind-blowing to me is the budget.
Some minds are more easily blown than others. To the average person, 200 mph is almost inconceivably fast.