Group aims to build 1000 mph supersonic car
BBC: The British team that claimed the land speed record in 1997, taking a car through the sound barrier for the first time, is planning to go even faster.
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Comments
To develope and run a jet & rocket powered car at 1050 MPH is an impressive feat. I hope the British are able to pull it off.
An outstanding engineering feat would evolve designing, assembling, and successful running a rocket and/or jet powered hypersonic velocity car, with a terminal velocity of, say, 3600 MPH, 1 mile/second. I am not familiar with the geography and size of the salt flats where record breaking cars are tested, however, if such could be accomplished, I am sure that even those who have no interest in science and technology would be dually impressed.
Undertaking an R&D program to successfully push a wheeled car to 3600 MPH would no doubt involve technological hurdles to be overcome. Perhaps the wheels of such a car would need to be made of some ultra-high tensile strength refractive alloy which has a vapor deposition or ion beam deposition of carbon in the form of a diamond layer. Diamond, at least, has excellent thermal conductivity in addition to being the hardest known ordinary material. However, it is brittle and many engineering materials used in infrastructure projects are considerably more tough than diamond. Thus, great care would need to be taken with respect to the thickness, crystalline orientation, and other aspects of any diamond layer instilled on the rolling surface of such wheels.
The wheels of such a vehicle might optionally be made of some ultra high strength carbon fiber composite material coated with vapor or ion beam deposited carbon in the form of a diamond layer.
It might even be possible to one day fabricate wheels out of carbon nanotube materials; a material that might be required to produce load bearing wheels capable of rotating at 1 mile/sec while contacting the ground.
I can imagine that a powerful high specific impulse rocket fuel might be required to bring the car up to terminal velocity. Perhaps good old liquid oxygen (or LOX) and kerosene could do the job.
Either way, speed record breaking cars are fun science and engineering that can catch the attention of just about anyone.
Posted by: James M. Essig | October 24, 2008 12:57 PM