The land speed record

Wednesday, October 19th, 2011 at 7:00 am

The Herald reports:

A New Zealand entrepreneur wants to build the fastest car in the world. But now the hard work starts – raising $30 million to make it roll.

Jetblack is the brainchild of Wellington residential property developer Richard Nowland and has the support of the government-owned Industrial Research, which says it is contributing expertise and staff time.

A fibreglass replica of the 13m black vehicle was unveiled at the Cloud in Auckland as part of the effort by NZ2011 to show off local design and technology.

The land speed record stands at 1227km/h and Nowland hopes to break it in the rocket-powered vehicle within five years. Its power will come from two California-built hybrid rockets similar to those used on Virgin Galactic’s passenger spacecraft.

Good luck to him. It is hard to imagine travelling that fast on land. 1227 km/hr means every second you would travel around 341 metres. This is just below the speed of sound.

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Posted in Fun Things | 30 Comments »

A speeding Key

Monday, October 5th, 2009 at 5:35 am

The Dom Post reports:

Prime Minister John Key was driven at more than twice the legal speed limit across battered Samoan roads so he could have a shower before seeing tsunami damage.

Journalists travelling with the speeding motorcade report fearing for their lives as they careered at more than 100kmh to deliver the prime minister from the airport to the high commission.

The legal speed limit is 40kmh.

John Key’s office has said New Zealand police who were part of the motorcade claim the maximum speed it reached was 64kmh during his visit. The motorcade later slowed after Mr Key’s staff expressed concern at the speed.

“Staff were uncomfortable with the speed, which NZ police inform us reached a maximum of no more than 40 miles per hour,” spokesman Kevin Taylor said. “Samoan authorities were notified of the concern at the end of the first movement, and the speed of the motorcade was reduced in subsequent movements.”

But journalists driving with the motorcade agree it reached speeds of more than 100kmh, with one reporting 120kmh – three times the limit.

What got Clark into trouble wasn’t the speeding per se, but her insistence that she had not even noticed they were driving at 170+ km/hr as she was so engrossed talking to Jim Sutton, and then leaving the police officers out to dry.

I’m pleased to see the staff noticed the speed, and asked for it to slow down. That will or should mean that it does not become as big an issue.

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Posted in NZ Politics | 80 Comments »

300 km/hr!

Saturday, May 31st, 2008 at 9:20 am

Top Gear host Jeremy Clarkson is under attack for admitting he once drove over 300 km/hr on a public road.

Is anyone surprised? It is classic Clarkson.

He was driving a Bugatti Veyron, which has a top speed of 407 km/hr. That is one third of supersonic speed!

Sadly the fuel tank only lasts 12 minutes at that speed, but on the plus side you can travel 80 km in those 12 minutes! This is not a bad thing though as after 15 minutes the tyres have melted!

The acceleration is very nice – reaches 100 km/hr in 2.5 seconds which is equal to 1.2G. And it can brake at 1.3G. It can go from 400 km/hr to a stop in under 10 seconds.

I wonder how much one costs to buy?

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Posted in Fun Things | 28 Comments »

New Speed Campaign

Friday, April 25th, 2008 at 10:38 am

A copy of the new anti-speeding advertisement from the Ministry of Transport

Hat Tip: Stephen Franks

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Posted in Humour | 136 Comments »