Land speed record

I would like to know if Chuk Williams ever found a suitable engine to use for his land speed record attempt. Dan

Certainly.

Chuk was very close to the land speed record when he crashed in 2014 ... the only reason that he wasn't going faster was because the Bonneville officials use a qualification system whereby you can't exceed a certain speed until they judge your run and determine whether to certify you to run even faster. As it was, the engine appears to have had quite a bit of "go" left in it and, as I recall, a few of us ran the numbers and calculated he probably could have reached about 175 mph.

The PSL engine (PSL = Planing Steam Launch) was designed to push a modern boat hull up to a plane. It is a converted 3 cylinder Chrylser two stroke with counterflow cylinders and a poppet valve head.

Regards,

Ken

Ok, I thought he was after the 200 + MPH record. Dan

That speed would have been within reach if the originally promised power plant had ever been made operational. As it was, the PSL engine was on hand, would fit into the vehicle without needing to modify the chassis, and the relatively high thermal efficiency allowed for a more compact boiler and burner -- which also had to fit into the car.