JCB Fastrac has reached 166.7 kilometers per hour
A special JCB Fastrac recently achieved the new speed record in the tractor sector. The tractor notched up 103.6 mph, that corresponds to 166.7 km/h, at Elvington Airfield, near York, with TV presenter and engineering guru Guy Martin behind the wheel. It smashed the previous 87.27 mph record set in March 2018 by Top Gear’s […]
A special JCB Fastrac recently achieved the new speed record in the tractor sector. The tractor notched up 103.6 mph, that corresponds to 166.7 km/h, at Elvington Airfield, near York, with TV presenter and engineering guru Guy Martin behind the wheel. It smashed the previous 87.27 mph record set in March 2018 by Top Gear’s Track-Tor.
JCB and its Fastrac renewed the “need for speed”
A team of JCB engineers has been working on the secret project to develop the tractor over the past few months and JCB Chairman, Lord Bamford, praised their important achievement. He said: «We’ve long harboured a dream to attempt a speed record with the Fastrac and the whole team has worked tirelessly to achieve this amazing result. I’m extremely proud of what they have achieved in such a short space of time. It is British engineering at its best and it also really does highlight the skills and innovation we have in our engineering team. They have done a truly fantastic job».
It was Lord Bamford’s idea to develop a tractor which had a high road speed capable of field work and the speed record achieved came exactly 28 years to the day since the first production model rolled off the line.
JCB WHEEL LOADERS HIT HALF A CENTURY
The secret behind it? 735 kW DieselMax JCB
JCB is no stranger to land speed records. In 2006, its DieselMax streamliner set a new diesel land speed record when it reached 350.092 mph on Bonneville Salt Flats in the USA, using two JCB DieselMax engines. It’s a record that still stands to this day.
Based on the Staffordshire maker’s Fastrac farm tractor, the record-breaking tractor is in particular powered by JCB’s 7.2 litre, 6-cylinder DieselMax engine produced at its factory in Derbyshire. Capable of delivering 735 kW and 2,500 Nm of torque, the Fastrac had been “lightened” and had its aerodynamics enhanced with the help of Williams Advanced Engineering. Guy Martin said: «It had been a great day with the JCB at Elvington, proper job with also some right proper engineers. She felt rock steady on the runway, job’s a peach».
