Through Brett Boughton our education co-ordinator, the Aussie Invader team were invited to present “Engineering the World’s Fastest Car” to the WA branch of the The Institute of Engineers Australia.
The presentation revolved around Rosco and Ben Parry our Senior Design Engineer, talking about the engineering challenges which we will need to be overcome to bring the Land Speed Record to Australia and why we believe we have the winning design.
Rosco gave a 10 minute historical overview of significant LSR cars from Craig Breedlove’s Spirit of America in the 1960’s to Richard Noble’s current contender-Bloodhound SSC.
Ben, elaborated on the engineering demands posed by Aussie Invader as the car needs to withstand extreme stresses and accelerations at supersonic speed. Engineering discussion focused on wheel design, bearings, lubrication, brakes, engine mounts and control systems.
The talk was well received and Ben revealed for the first time our revolutionary wheel design that we believe will allow Aussie Invader 5R to reach speeds of 1,000 mph (1,600+ km/h). At this point in time no wheel has been built that would be able to take the enormous forces exerted on it at those speeds.
We will soon publish more about the new wheel design on our website.
About the Speakers
Rosco McGlashan OAM was well known to many in the audience, being Australia’s fastest man on land and many had seen him when he was a professional jet and rocket car driver, having dedicated over 40 years of his life to racing and trying to be the fastest man on earth.
Ben Parry is Aussie Invader’s Senior Design Engineer and his list of credentials is no less impressive and also no stranger to speed or engineering challenges. Ben has a background in automotive engineering with specialised knowledge of engine design and development. In addition, Ben has considerable experience with high performance motorcycle and car design gained at Lotus and Triumph Motorcycles along with time spent developing high volume production cars like the Ford Focus and Mondeo.
Thanks must go to our man Brett & Michael King of the Institute of Engineers Australia for their efforts to get this presentation organised.
