LONDON-The Bloodhound land speed challenger is likely to be back out on its South African lakebed track early next week. Engineers are now satisfied they understand why a heat alarm has been triggering on the car when it runs. Bloodhound was in the middle of trying to post a speed of 550mph (885km/h) on Friday when the sensor system alerted driver Andy Green that temperatures might be too high in the engine bay.
He aborted, pulling up early having reached only 481mph (774km/h).
Something similar occurred on Wednesday as well, although right at the end of the run when the vehicle was slowing down. But by Saturday afternoon, the British Bloodhound team had split open the upper-chassis of the car for inspection, including of that troublesome sensor, and concluded there was nothing seriously awry.
Known as a “firewire”, the sensor is essentially two parallel wires running through a plastic sheath. This wiring criss-crosses the engine bay. When it gets too hot, the plastic melts and the two metal cores touch, triggering the alarm. Engineers could find sections of firewire that had bubbled and warped, indicating they had experienced heating, but separate temperature strips in the bay revealed that nothing had approached the level of a fire risk.
Chief engineer Mark Chapman told BBC News: “The temperature stickers on the walls of the bay tell us it wasn’t really hot enough in there that firewire would normally trigger. So, it’s possible there may have been some local heating, but it could be as simple as the firewire touching the hot engine casing. We’ll replace it and then get back out there.”