Latest news from the team.
October 2008 - Greenpower National Final
The national final took place on Sunday the 19th of October at Goodwood. Martyn Brookes drove the car and took first place immediately, setting the fastest lap, unfortunately our batteries had spent the previous cold night in our rental van and we were running with less voltage than we normally would so we couldn't keep this pace. The car finished in 3rd position but ran the full race duration without stopping. We now have a long break before the Corporate challenge starts the next season of racing in 2009. Between now and then we want to test and refine the car and hope to run much quicker and more reliably next year.
Thank you to everyone who has been involved with building the car and supporting the team throughout the season.
September 2008 - Eastern Regional Heat
On Sunday the 14th of September the car raced at Bedford Autodrome, we repaired a puncture that we found in a rear tyre before the race. After starting well and climbing to third position the car hit the rumble strip, this caused the car to flex and loosen our chain. The chain was subsequently thrown off several times causing us to pit every time and finish in fourth place. Despite this frequent problem the car was running very quickly and in the later laps we saw a great race between our car and TSR-4 who took first place. We now know that we are as fast as all competition and need to work on our reliability to ensure that our car stays on the track for the final 2 races of the season.
September 2008 - North West Regional Heat
On the 10th of September we took the car to Aintree after swapping our nuVinci gearbox for a Shimano Alfine. In the first lap there was a break in our throttle wire that caused the car to stop, after a repair in the pits we ran the car throughout the race and finished in third place. The car was running much quicker than before and the Shimano gearbox will now stay in the car.
July 2008 - Midlands Regional Heat
On Tuesday the 1st of July we competed at Rockingham in the Midlands Regional Heat. The car ran for the full 90 minutes, we started in third but after a few laps took 2nd place and held this comfortably throughout the event. Before the next race on the 16th of July we will swap our motor and fit our windscreen which has now arrived.
June 2008 - Western Regional Heat
On Sunday the 22nd of June four team members attended the Western Regional Heat at Castle Combe. After a couple of technical problems during the first lap that caused our electrical system to fail we managed to finish in 3rd place. The car hit 42mph and frequently crossed 40 on the main straight.
We are very pleased with the way that the car is now running but still have several improvements to make before we compete in the October final.
April 2008 - Corporate Challenge
Bentley's press release following our first race...
Bentley Racing Green
Crewe, Monday 28th April 2008… A Bentley Motors apprentice team has won a special "Spirit of Greenpower" award for its performance in the Greenpower Corporate Challenge which took place at Goodwood race circuit yesterday. The Bentley apprentice team designed, engineered and built the electric powered car which they entered into the Greenpower Challenge as well as a season of "F24+" racing.
The Bentley team achieved their goal of completing the four hour race, despite some technical difficulties in the first section. The award was given in recognition of their excellent team spirit which they showed in overcoming these initial technical challenges.
Having taken the initiative themselves to compete in the Greenpower challenge the apprentices have devoted weekends and evenings for the past ten months taking full responsibility for all aspects of the car's development. Three team members acted as drivers on race day, the rest of the team provided essential back-up support in the pits.
April 2008
We have run several tests and drivers are becoming familiar with how the car handles. We hope to run once more before Friday when we will load our vehicle and head to Goodwood for the Corporate challenge on Sunday.
March 2008
The car ran for the first time today on the car park at Bentley Motors before suffering a problem with the drive shaft, we will replace the drive shaft and run again as soon as possible.
January 2008
We have now managed to obtain both the carbon fibre body and the suspension beams we will be using, By the end of the month we also had our machined components from our tool room and the steering rack we have imported from America, Our drivetrain partner ATC Nuvinci have also provided a special race spec gearbox which will provide us with a low weight CVP gearbox system, Electronically we have a "phase 1" system being built with some of the features we expect to be in the completed car.
November 2007
The prototype body is now complete and is currently with our carbon fibre experts at "SPA". We hope to have the finished carbon body early in December. In the meanwhile a chassis rig is being built to simulate our body to review both suspension and drive train designs.
October 2007
The prototype fibreglass body is currently being modified extensively to accept all of our equipment, Suspension components are being produced in SLS and electronics are being ordered as we speak!
