The Bloodhound SSC and the education programme
The Bloodhound SuperSonic Car (SSC) is the latest attempt on the World Land Speed Record. The car, capable of touching 1,000 mph, will race in 2015 and 2016 on the Hakskeen Pan, in the Northern Cape of South Africa.
Ian Glover, 1K Club President, said: “Britain has held the record for 30 years, continuously. American and Australian teams are also competing to build the world’s fastest car.”
The international education initiative, led by Richard Noble and Andy Green, is a showcase of high-tech engineering and manufacturing. Its main aim is to inspire children, teenagers and young adults and get them into science, technology, engineering and mathematics by displaying fascinating applications of such disciplines. Over 5,400 primary and secondary schools across the UK have signed up to use the free curriculum ready Bloodhound resources in their classrooms.
“It’s a car, so it appeals to everybody. It goes beyond gender, ethnicity and age. And all our research and results are online. Few other engineering projects are able to do this. We do it because we want students to use data for real applications and research,” said Major Morgan.
Components for Bloodhound SSC have been manufactured by more than 200 suppliers from across Europe are being delivered to the Bloodhound Technical Centre in Bristol for assembly throughout 2013 and 2014.
The Northern Cape Government employed over 300 South Africans to help build the world’s fastest race track on a dried out lake bed called the Hakskeen Pan. Between them they cleared 6000 tonnes of stones by hand from 47 million square metres of desert, the equivalent of a two lane road from London to Moscow.
Bath University’s Formula Student racing car
Yesterday, undergraduate and postgraduate students from the University of Bath presented their Formula Student racing car at Westminster.
Entirely designed, built and tested in 18 months by the most experienced team of students Bath ever assembled, the 150 kg car will compete against 400 university based teams at events around the globe all year round.
Students have pledged to maintain excellent standards and already found half of the £75000 required to build a new car for the next season.
Major UK manufacturing companies such as Caterpillar, BP and Cosworth are the main supporters of the project and are involved in several stages of the creation of the vehicle helping UK students to prove themselves among the best in the world.
For 5 years, Team Bath Racing had the fastest UK built car, and is now reaching out for its first undisputed victory for the 2014 season.
