JET SOAPBOX TRIKE!

The Sapheria Bluebird is a team project based on a VXR GFoS soapbox (as in like the ones used in the Red Bull soapbox derbies on the telly), with three wheels (two front, one rear), and a Jetcat 160 RXIB jet turbine that makes 16,000rpm of thrust, and has an exhaust velocity of 1,590km/hr at 650 degrees Celsius. It has electric power to get it up to speed before the jet kicks in and, fired, it produces 92Db at 20 metres away (95Db is the limit for most F1 race-tracks), and has an onboard fire-extinguisher (just in case), and a drogue shoot that’s ejected out the back to slow it down. At the moment they don’t know how fast it goes because they haven’t found anywhere long enough to run it (Elvington perhaps?), but they’re hoping to soon.

The project’s been done in conjunction with West Suffolk College in Bury St. Edmunds, and is to be used as a living (kind o’) teaching textbook to teach/inspire young people to look into careers, and allied careers, in engineering and motorsport as well as new technology for the future.

The Sapheria Bluebird is on show in the main reception of West Suffolk College from the beginning of the Autumn term for all to see, but you can get more info from www. formulagravity.co.uk