Record breaking has always had a fascination for us Brits. Twice in the past, we’ve held the triple - land, water & air speed records. In the 30’s that honour was won by Bluebird, Miss England II and the Supermarine S6B, while in the 50’s the feat was repeated by John Cobb and the Railton Mobil Special, Donald Campbell and Bluebird K7, and Peter Twiss in the Fairey Delta FD2.
Since those heady days, only the LSR has remained, although even that was in American hands for most of the 60’s and all of the 70’s until Richard Noble came on the scene with Thrust2. The air speed record has long since been the preserve of military projects with the X-15 still being the fastest publicly known winged aircraft (ignoring the space shuttle on re-entry that is!), while Ken Warby has held the water speed record for Australia since 1977 in his jet powered Spirit of Australia. Undeterred, and no doubt mightily encouraged by the efforts of Richard Noble and Thrust SSC, here’s a brief run down of some of the Brits taking aim other classes of record.
No stranger to speed, Alex runs a thriving specialised engineering and dynamometer test facility close to Ford’s main UK manufacturing plant in Essex. It’s not at all unusual to see a variety of high performance race engines being put through their paces at Alex’s facility, one of the latest being a Ferrari for a customer restoring a classic Grand Prix car. Exciting as this may sound, it’s still a far cry from early days as a highly respected International class racer of motorcycle sidecars.
When business took over from pleasure, Alex decided to pursue his sport via straight line racing and set about building the UK’s fastest motorcycle using Norton’s highly efficient rotary as the basis for his streamliner. Following a classic cigar shaped design with the engine behind the driver, the by then turboed and nitrous boosted Norton did the business by claiming a mark of 200.09mph in 1991. The performance was limited more by the length of the runway than lack of power.
Determined to go one better, it was back to the drawing board for a more radical approach, and one that could see Alex claiming not one, but two LSRs. Since the advent of jets in the early 60’s the class for wheeldriven records has been somewhat overshadowed, and as if to emphasise the difficulties, the current record of 409.986mph is only marginally higher than the record set by Bob Summers in Goldenrod in the mid 60’s. Alex intends to push that mark up to around 450mph before targetting Dave Campos’ motorcycle LSR of 322.158mph using sustantially the same vehicle.
Again, the basic layout is a cigar shaped streamliner with the engine at the back, but what an engine! Rather than the multiple bike engined route favoured by many, Alex has secured himself a couple of Rolls Royce Gnome engines from a military helicopter. This nestles in a space frame chassis connected to a Formula 1 type carbon fibre tub for the driver, which in turn carries suspension and steering for the dual front wheels mounted side by side. At the back the outrigged wheels are suspended on a Formula 1 type transaxle and suspension and the whole lot clothe in the aformentioned carbon fibre streamliner panels. Alex is being assisted on the aerodynamics front by Andrew Clarke who in turn has been taken under his wing by ThrustSSC aerodynamicyst Ron Ayers as he continues his training.
Now for the clever part! Having taken the wheeldriven LSR, the intention is to unbolt the rear transaxle and replace it with another smaller unit providing chain drive to a single rear wheel. Likewise, up front, the dual wheels will be replaced by a single, making this a turbine powered motorbike. Should be quite a sight.
Another Brit aiming to take the wheeldriven LSR is Richard Whittlesea, who was bitten firmly by the record breaking bug after trip to Bonneville for the annual (when it doesn’t rain) Speedweek event.
Richard works installing jet turbines on oil rigs and power stations and the like, and while away on one contract began designing a lightweight streamliner powered by a highly tuned motorbike engine. Back home, and more more on the design and cost of the likely powereplants provided a bit of a shock. To be successful, the small capacity ‘screamer’ type motorcycle engine would have to be fitted with all kinds of exotic and expensive parts, so it soon began to dawn on Richard that for the same price, he could build something far more potent. Then fate took a hand.
Richard presented his ideas to an audience of fellow record breakers at Coventry Road Transport Museum, where Thrust2 now lives, and as a result got taking to Colin Wilson. Colin had built a streamliner very similar to Alex McFadzean’s Penetrator but powered by a Kawasaki engine. Planning to work abroad for a while and develop plans of his own for a bigger bike, Colin sold the rolling chassis to Richard, who swiftly ditched plans for a class record holder and decided to go for the big one - the outright wheeldriven LSR. Like Alex McFadzean, the need for a lot of power and light weight led Richard towards the Rolls-Royce engine, and so it was that two British teams found themselves heading for the same record with basically the same layout.
Richard’s car is simpler in that it has a tubular spaceframe chassis throughout, while the rear wheels will not be outrigged, but mounted very close together within the rear body, courtesy of an ultra narrow rear drive unit. Only time will tell which one of them succeeds in bringing back to the UK a record last held by Donald Campbell with proteus engined Bluebird.
Diesels used to be considered as big smelly things in buses and trucks, but no longer. Now a serious part of everyday motoring, it’s no wonder that motor racing applications for oil burners are popping up all over the place again, including record breakers.
Kristan Hosea was introduced to record breaking by friend and neighbour Malcolm Pittwood and after considering single seaters for a while decided that the LSR was what he wanted to do. Colin Wilson’s design to pursue other opportinities for a while did not only benefit Richard Whittlesea, because sitting back in Colin’s workshop was yet another unfinished streamliner, this one designed for a crack at the British LSR in order to raise funds for his ultimate bike.
Through Malcolm Pittwood, a deal was struck and the space frame and GRP bpdied streamliner made the short trip to Kristan’s base in Derby. Now painted a vivid blue rather than it’s original purple and pink finish, plans are in hand to fit in with a turbocharged diesel engine from a major motor manufacturer who wishes to remain quiet right now. The team are aiming initially for the official record of 215mph set by keke Rosberg (yes, that Keke Rosberg!) driving the Volkswagen ARV at Nardo in Italy. But that’s not really good enough, because a number of US based teams have already been knocking on the door of 250mph and there are even a couple of highly modified trucks who have beaten 220mph - imagine one of those in your rear view mirror! So, with the power promised by their supplier the team are taking aim at 325mph when the hit the salt flats with their diesel. It’s a long way from anything used in a London bus.
Other projects abound. There are at least two jet powered boats planned, the most outrageous of which is Peter Webb’s ninety foot long, twin Rolls Royce Avon motivated, White Knight which plans to ride the surface on four suspension linked hydropads. Model tests have proved the theory, but as many others have found, getting the cash to do it is something far more difficult than coming up with the ideas.
A school at Bexhill in Kent took a class LSR for electric vehicles with a highly professional project that attracted the attention of Lotus. They have plans for a car to beat the outright electric record, while Donald Campbell’s nephew Don Wales has given his name and driving skills to another electric project masterminded by Nelson Krushandl. Painted blue and bearing the famous Bluebird name, like others, the team are still struggling to raise the necessary finance to run the almost completed car.
Recent unconfirmed reports state that the Bluebird electric has been dismantled and stored since the team still cannot apparently generate the money required to run it. The inventor of the new battery system, Nelson Krushandl, is keen to ensure that it gets the necessary level of funding to begin developing the concept commercially, so it can only be assumed that he would rather not run it at all than run it in an undeveloped and underfinanced state.
They’ll have to be quick, since this is one of the fastest growth areas in record breaking and although the giant Japanese Kenwood Company built their own streamliner, they were beaten to it by Bonneville privateer Lloyd Healey who took the record over 200mph for the first time.
To complete the full set, as it were, of motive power types, Malcolm Pittwood is persisting with his long term plans to take the steam driven LSR curently held by the Barbour Nichols team with a car now in the Harrah’s auto museum, Reno. There are two ways to use steam - either as a turbine to drive the wheels, as with the Barbour Nichols car and the ultra successful Stanley Rocket outright LSR holder from 1906, or as a pure thrust driven vehicle. Malcolm has adopted the latter approach and already has a steam rocket powered device sitting in his garage. Trouble is, the only outfits allowed to generate superheated steam under pressure, do it for commercial use (cleaning tanks and pipelines etc) and are strictly licensed because of the danger involved. When Malcom can persuade one of these suppliers to back him , he’ll be away. Just in case you think this sounds daft, Art Arfons brother Walt built a similarly powered dragster in the 60’s which proved frighteningly fast, but very unstable. With those problems licked, Malcolm is ready to prove that steam isn’t just for railways.
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