Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Bonneville bitsa in chain reaction


Rick Pearson reports:
Disaster struck the Speed Scotland team today as a chain snapped and damaged our last good engine/gearbox. Smashing the casing. Given we have no further spares with us, it looked like the dream of a record for Scotland was over for 2010... but the team were not prepared to give it up that easily.
So we tracked down a guy with the right engine casings that we needed, and a machine shop so he could adapt them to our requirements and he agreed to work all night until they were done. I’ve hopped on a plane from Salt Lake City out to the West Coast to collect the parts and am now sat in a hotel waiting for the flight back the other way with half an engine in my “hand” luggage. There are gearbox parts coming in with UPS from Texas which should arrive as I land back tomorrow morning and the crew are currently tearing the car and the old engines apart to gather enough parts to put one good engine back together and in the car in time for a full-bore pass sometime on Thursday. We will not now be able to afford the luxury of stepping up the speed gradually, so I’ll be getting in the car with the turbo turned up high and giving it one big run down the Salt and see if we can crack the magic 300 and perhaps even threaten that 313mph record...
Never surrender! Fingers crossed for us please.

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