something a little different

found this site, it may be of interest to some

lehighlandyacht.com




Friday, April 22, 2011

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Wind-powered land yacht to try for 2011 speed record
By Jenn Cohen
Issue date: 11/10/08 Section: News

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Two Lehigh students are building a wind-powered land yacht with hopes to break land speed records.

Edward Stilson, '11, and Luke Yoder, '11, plan to take their vehicle to a competition in Nevada in 2011 with the help of other members of their club, the Land Yacht Speed Record club.

The craft will use a large, rigid wing to capture wind power and will not use any internal motors, Stilson said. He said the craft is similar to a sailboat and uses some of the same concepts that allow a plane to land.

"It's amazing what you can do with the powers of nature," Yoder said. He said the research done to build this craft could have an impact on clean energy research done in the future, though wind-powered automobiles are probably not feasible.

So far, the club has built a tire testing rig which allows it to analyze results live and to test all types of tires, Yoder said. He said the tires counter side forces from the wind. The less drag from tires, the faster you can go, he said.

The two hope that their work with tires will give them an edge over the competition. Stilson said the main competitor they know of is a corporation.

Stilson and Yoder started the Land Yacht Speed Record club last year in December. They started the project with the aid of Joachim Grenestedt, a mechanical engineering and mechanics professor, and became intrigued by the complexities of building a land yacht.

This year, the club has started to build a one-third scale model of the craft, which it hopes to test in March 2009 at the competition site in Nevada, Stilson said.

The model will be steered with a remote control, giving direction to the front wheel and to a rudder-like wing at the back of the craft. The full-size land yacht will be steered by a driver inside the craft, Yoder said.

The race site will be a dry lake bed in Nevada, which will provide a large, hard, flat surface for the land yachts, Stilson said.

The final craft will weigh about 1,600 pounds and be about 25 feet tall, Yoder said. Such size is necessary because the wing has to be very large in order to capture enough wind power to move the land yacht to high speeds, and the bottom portion of the land yacht must be very wide in order to keep the craft from tipping over, he said.

No, ......no real adventures, lots of problems relating to

weather, upgrade [didn't work too well] ran out of money,

my planets didn't align. So have now to redesign big time

over next 12 mths. A lot of things had been wound down

to achieve rebuild. They now demand attention. Other than

that all is suffer-able ....I'll be back!!

I must admit...just to you landy.......

I aint ever gonna wear one of them thingy **** suits !!

I think I would like to build something thet would challenge ,

the existing AUSTRALIAN LANDYACHT SPEED RECORD