On August 12th 2018, Danny Thompson laid down a 450.909mph record run at the Bonneville Salt Flats using the Challenger 2, a vehicle originally built by his father, Mickey Thompson, in 1968. This run, averaged with a 446.605mph pass he made the previous day, gives the Challenger 2 a new AA/FS record of 448.757mph, and makes it the world's fastest piston driven vehicle.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ci6GYi8S-2Q
Berk yeah. Awesome end to an epic adventure. Well earned. Respect.
Sounds like traction is a big problem
Man, to have been there when it happened. I've seen a car do 420, and even a mile away, you can see that it's really flying,
YES!
YES!
YES!
That is beyond cool.
This is a neat article about the car. It's got some good "under the skin" pics of the car too.
The exhaust pipes are estimated to have 200lbs of thrust. Cool!
Dry blocks, so the nitromethane itself provides all the cooling the engine needs? That's neat.
Such a cool, wild event. My mom's ex did this when I was growing up, I'd love to go to the Salt Flats one day and see it for myself.
After what happened to his family, breaking this record in the car his Dad built had to be emotional.
I just noticed the cockpit is between the engines. Could you imagine the noise?
Are those NHRA motors? Anybody got any details on the motors?
Rog
Engine info here:
http://www.mickeythompsontires.com/news/about-the-challenger-2
50 gallons of fuel in one pass!
It makes sense, it's just one of those things you don't think about.
The whole 450 mph run - from the cockpit - is on his website. Mucho steering input around 430 mph! Start to shutdown at terminal speed of 459 takes 1 minute! Lots of wheelspin at first, Danny has said that driving a powerful car at Bonneville is kind of like driving in winter slush.
That is very cool. Congratulations all around.
Just heard that George Poteet ran 452mph this morning, with a 464mph exit speed, then this afternoon Vesco did 463 and 470! Don't know if they've done return runs yet, though. Some crazy fast speed this year.
Here's one of the runs--- a friend was there and posted this on the Facebooks:
If you guys are interested in seeing the results, you can find them here- http://www.scta-bni.org/sw-race-results.html but they are a little delayed- the timed runs from yesterday that Stuart pointed out where posted some time this morning (after 7:30 and before 11am).
So to explain a little-
the AA FS car is displacement over 501 cu in (two engines would make up that size), Fuel (not gasoline, but any blend of HC's), Streamliner (all wheels covered) that Thompson had
B BFS is displacement between 373 and 439 cu in, Blown, Fuel Streamliner for Speed Deamon
And 3 T is a class 3 turbine- over 2200lb any turbine, wheel driven. for the Vesco car.
That's amazingly fast for al of them.
I've posted this before- but if you EVER get a chance to work on a team that goes out there, DO IT!!! It's one of the best things you will EVER DO. The video that Joe just posted reminds me of some great things- the most significant- if you are up so early to see the sunrise, and are in line to run- that means just one thing- you are making a run to back up your record. After that, you have the best breakfast ever while you sit and watch other cars go by.
You'll need to log in to post.
