The producers at TV’s The Gadget Show wanted to create a spectacular show for the popular channel FIVE programmes 200th episode. Having dreamt up some new challenges the Gadget Show needed a team who could create 2 awesome projects to complete 2 awesome challenges... Set 2 land speed records! Thats where Robo Challenge come in.

The producers got straight on the phone to the only company they can rely on to produce 2 amazing pieces of engineering that could be designed and built with in a tight budget and even tighter schedule. The first record was for the fastest fan assisted bicycle.

Based on a previous project Robo Challenge designed and produced, the new bicycle would be powered by 6 EDF’s (electric ducted fans). Each fans would provide 6kg’s of thrust and would draw an amazing 100 amps! Thats a total of 36kg of thrust and 600 amps! All this power was harnessed to a bespoke frame which attached to a Dolan road bicycle and provided enough power to smash the record with a top speed of 72 mph!

The second project was to produce the fastest power tool powered vehicle! The Robo Challenge engineers were really up against it with this one, with just 2 weeks to design and produce the drag racer the team crammed it full of gadgets! 6 Husquvanna chainsaws were used to power the dragster which sported some custom made extreme exhausts. The paddle shift gearbox sped up the gear change to just 15 milliseconds! Thats not all, an LCD display showed the driver the engine rpm & temperatures for accurate telemetry.  To complete this light weight dragster we produced a bespoke carbon fibre body as used in Formula 1 cars. This high tech, high strength to weight ratio material was perfect to make the stream line body and once finished weighed just 6 kgs!

We arrived at Santa Pod Raceway and completed a successful practise session until there was a problem with the starter coil in one of the rear engines. With out the custom made spares to hand we had to set the record on 4 out of the 6 engines. We were nervous but on our first attempt we did it. Reaching a top speed of 73 mph Robo Challenge had produced another world record breaker!

You can watch some behind the scenes pictures and video at Robo Challenge TV. You can also watch this adrenaline fuelled special episode of the Gadget Show here.

If you have a project which requires a bespoke solution, please contact the team at Robo Challenge. Our staff are experience in a huge range of specialist engineering solutions from CNC machining & carbon composites to bespoke software and pic programming.