Superb! A triumph for the men in sheds!

103 years and weve only managed an extra 12mph?

Thats a brilliant noise when it starts its run as the turbine winds up. A real Thunderbirds are go noise

103 years and weve only managed an extra 12mph?

good point. I mean, how hard can it be?

Good effort and I hate to be negative but…..

How can this

only go a few miles an hour faster that the 1906 last record holder:-

The fact it took 103 years shows how difficult it actually is. Perhaps those sneering at the result would like to produce their own car and beat it.

I wasnt sneering it was a genuine question, i was hoping a forum know it all would tell me the answer.

I do love responses like that! You're implying that we are not experienced or knowledgable enough to have an opinion, but sitting in your lofty heights you know so much more to know we are wrong. I'm assuming you know it's so difficult because you've tried? Didn't think so. I've got a degree in industrial design and worked on automotive design in the past – your superior insight is coming from where exactly?

No sneering, just incredulity that a carbon fibre bodied beast like that, that has at the very least been shaped using CAD software to be as slippery as possible (even if they couldn't afford wind tunnel time)with all the advances in bearing and tyre technology to reduce rolling resistance could not make more difference. Putting the power plant with the same output from the 1906 car into a slippery lightweight modern shell should have made a bigger difference than they got without any progress in engine technology.

I suspect they "went big" with their ambitions and built a heavy beast of a car, designed to be pushed along with a shed load of power, only all the power didn't turn up to play.

I suspect they "went big" with their ambitions and built a heavy beast of a car, designed to be pushed along with a shed load of power, only all the power didn't turn up to play.

I suspect you are right. You don't need tailfins on a car doing 140mph. I bet they were expecting a lot faster. I mean – how fast did the fastest steam train go

Fastest steam train – The Mallard 126mph

I was thinking the same thing…..the Mallard wouldn't have been far behind it at all and apparently from the text below (that I scabbed off the internet) it did it with a total weight of 240 tons (admittedly on a slight decline):

The record run of the "Mallard" on July 3rd, 1938 was made with a six car streamline set plus a dynamometer car, with a total tare of 240 tons. The Mallard was chosen because it was one of the four engines with Kylchap exhaust at that time. These engines had freer running qualities and higher speed than standard A4. I believe that the Mallard was the first A4 fitted with Kylchap exhaust and had had about three months of service at the time of the speed run. The run started from Barkston triangle, running southbound. The Mallard pulled the train over Stoke Summit at 75 mph, then accelerated downgrade at a gradient of 1:178 to 1:200 over six miles distance to attain a speed of 114 mph. It eventually reached a speed of 125 mph, with a peak at 126 mph for a few seconds. After that it ran at a speed of at least 120 mph for another three miles. By then the inside big end showed sign of overheating and the engine had to run light back to Doncaster for repair.

A German steam train apparently got within 1/2 mph of The Mallard on level ground, so they claim the record should really be theirs.

Does make you wonder if they were expecting it to go a fair bit quicker.

Just found this from their (the Inspiration teams) website:

The late entrepreneur William Lear ventured into the arena of steam powered vehicles during a 1969 program sponsored by the state of California that intended to bring about ecologically friendly steam powered city busses. For this application Lear turned to Barber-Nichols Engineering to design a steam turbine and although the city bus program ultimately failed, several turbines were built in support of the program.

In 1985 one of the Lear turbines found its way into a car which had been brought to the Bonneville Salt Flats of Utah, USA for an attempt at the steam powered Land Speed record. Over the course of several years the car progressed from 110 MPH to a measured speed of 145.607 MPH.

The official speed set by Bob Barber stands at 145.607 MPH but is not recognized by the FIA. However, we at the British Steam Car Challenge recognize this speed as the record to exceed.

And this suggests it should have done 170mph:

Vehicle Details
Length 7.663 m
Width 1.700 m
Tall 1.700 m
Weight 3 tons
Engine Two stage turbine
13,000rpm max turbine revs
Transmission Rear wheel drive
Horsepower 268 kw 360 hp
Top speed 274 kph 170 mph
Fuel LPG Liquid Petroleum Gas
Burners 3 Megawatts of heat
~1500 kettles
~23 cups of tea per second
Boilers 12
Over 3km of tubing
Superheated
Steam Flow rate 40 litres per minute
Temperature 400°C
Pressure 4000kN/m-2 40 bar
Chassis Steel space frame
Steering Rack and pinion to front wheels
Body Front section carbon composite
Rear section aluminum panels
Front tyres Goodyear Speed Eagles 23 X 15
Rear tyres Goodyear Speed Eagles 28 X 15
Water capacity 140 litres distilled water
1,000 litres (1ton) of water used every 25 minutes
Gas capacity 60 litres
Air system 30,000kN/m-2 300 bar
Batteries 4 X 90Ah batteries

Oh and there's a bit of technical stuff here:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4076811.stm

You're gonna need a bigger kettle.

I must agree that even before I had read the comments, I was surprised that a steam powered car couldn't achieve higher speeds than that. But fear not CountZero, I will give the challenge some thought ……. just as soon as I have resolved the outstanding issues with my time machine.

Bet the 1906 car was more exciting to drive 🙂

good to see that they did it though