There is something symbolic about the Bloodhound SSC project being based in Bristol Docks, alongside Isambard Kingdom Brunel’s S.S. Great Britain, the world’s first iron-hulled, screw-driven ocean liner. When it was launched in 1843, the Great Britain was the largest ship afloat and designed to be the fastest across the Atlantic. Now, in a dockside building, a small team of technicians is preparing to assemble Bloodhound, expected to be the fastest vehicle on land.
Bloodhound is designed to make Andy Green, the fastest man on earth, go even faster. Green, whom we recently interviewed, broke the sound barrier in setting the land speed record at 763.035 mph with ThrustSSC on October 15, 1997. No one has challenged that in the nearly fifteen years since, and it’s just as well. Bloodhound, which is aiming for 1000 mph, is running late.
The man behind the project, Richard Noble—also an LSR holder with 634.051 mph in Thrust2 in 1983—sees 1000 mph as a nice tidy target. No more justification needed, although we can see why the team refers to the effort as an “engineering adventure.” Those who say that his is an impossible dream make the challenge even sweeter, in Noble’s eyes. But as he points out, Bloodhound is at the leading edge of an admittedly very specialized technology, as complex—and nearly as fast—as a modern jet fighter but with the absolute requirement that it shall not leave the ground.
As well as undertaking a formidable engineering task, Noble has had to raise the finances and procure some pretty exotic componentry for Bloodhound. He pursues sponsors and supporters with the determination of a British bulldog. He was only able to secure the EJ200 jet engine from an RAF Typhoon (Eurofighter) by persuading the U.K. government minister responsible that Bloodhound would encourage a new enthusiasm for science and engineering in schools, and by setting up an education program to accompany the car’s design, build, and preparation. With that in place, Rolls-Royce aero engines came on board. “Without Rolls-Royce we would be nowhere,” says Noble.
Resources remain tight. Bloodhound is a $28 million project—peanuts in terms of aerospace budgets—but Noble is still some $6 million short. That shortfall and several rethinks regarding the aerodynamics have delayed actual construction and testing. When the project was launched in 2008, it was expected to start high-speed runs in 2011, but only now are the final-spec components being produced and delivered to Bloodhound HQ in Bristol. Rollout is scheduled for December, with initial low-speed tests to be carried out on an airstrip in the U.K. before the car is shipped to South Africa for preliminary runs on the dry lake bed at Hakskeen Pan next summer. The 1000-mph bid is tentatively planned for summer 2014.
The car has gone through 10 design evolutions since 2008. The original plan had been to position a small, simple, 440-pound rocket above the jet engine, but it became clear that more thrust would be needed to overcome aerodynamic drag at ultra-high speeds. The team settled on a hybrid rocket, using solid fuel activated by liquid hydrogen peroxide, which would itself weigh some 900 pounds and destabilize the vehicle when fired from that high position. So the jet and rocket were switched around—the jet is now on top, suspended in a steel-and-aluminum spaceframe, with the rocket beneath.
But there was another problem. No commercial or military rocket of this type and size was available, so Noble had to commission a design. It will start testing in September.
The rocket brings its own complications. Supplying the high-test peroxide at the required rate (1 ton in 22 seconds) requires a very special pump. Bloodhound has installed an 800-hp, 2.4-liter Cosworth V-8 from a Formula 1 car for that sole purpose. Rockets are a one-shot deal, so there is the question of how to swap the super-heated expired unit with a fresh one in the hour allowed between official land speed record runs. The engineers are looking at torpedo ejection systems from submarines.
Meanwhile, at Hakskeen Pan, 300 local residents have been literally sweeping the desert in preparation for the first high-speed tests of this 44-foot-long, 7.1-ton monster. Bloodhound, with about 47,500 pounds of thrust will need a clear 10 miles for its record runs, and even small stones could damage its three-foot-diameter, solid-aluminum wheels, which will rotate as quickly as 10,620 rpm. Clearing eight square miles by hand is a massive task to be sure, but it’s one that the government of South Africa’s Northern Cape Province has been happy to undertake. It thinks, and hopes, that Bloodhound will draw attention and bring business to this impoverished area as an adventure sports location.
We’ll have more updates as Bloodhound moves forward—quickly, we hope, both through space and time.
For more on Bloodhound SSC, head to the project’s online home.