presume you mean this one?? saw it at Pendine Sands at the weekend..

2013-06-22 025 by GUZZINEIL, on Flickr

It’s a stretched Suzuki Hayabusa. The guy bought it I think without an engine, then stretched the basic chassis to fit in a flash type boiler, and steam engine.
Keltruck are the main sponsor of the project.
A friend and fellow volunteer at the collection has been involved in consulting on the steam layout.
The record at present doesn’t actually exist, because it’s never been done before but they’re aiming at the low hundreds–I think about 120mph to start with.
A.

There is a small team in this country of ours who are working towards winning the steam powered motorcycle land-speed record.
It may sound like a joke but getting a boiler and heat source small enough but still powerful enough to move anything is quite an act of engineering.

I simply detest the kind of lousy PR these kinds of crashes create. And no, I never said anything about “banning air shows,” I just feel they should avoid the inherently risky acts.
And since I was the owner/driver of a highly modified Porsche 911SC track car until recently, it’s even possible that I understand a bit about motorsport.

Actually I agree.
Having seen the way the media react when someone is killed on your favourite airfield last year, I can tell you it’s like a feeding frenzy and they respect no one.
An attractive young women and her half witted side-kick of a cameraman still probably don’t know how close they came to getting harmed on a dreadful Sunday afternoon. Well, actually they probably do because they must treat so many people with complete contempt that they must have sensed how hated they are by now.
I imagine they have no friends (or concept thereof) so they have no clue to how high emotions run when this sort of thing happens.

Very sad about the lady in Dayton though.

I’m not afraid of death, just the manner of it’s arrival.
I’ve seen plenty of it in my time, and it ain’t always pretty–in fact, hardly ever.
I also know from experience that the dead can’t hurt you, only the living can do that.
I confess though, and I’m not ashamed to admit it, there’s been plenty of times when I’d have welcomed it coming to me.

Well Charlie, no flaw as far as I’m concerned, my experience says that experience beats everything–and endless driving day after day does produce an edge. I was much better back then than I am now. London terrifies me these days, whereas back then, I drove around the capital (and most other big cities) without a second thought.
And surely that’s why the statisticians who work for insurance companies decide that more experienced drivers have lower premiums..??
That goes for company car policies too by the way.
Most company vehicle policies don’t include anyone under 25 years of age.
Although they can be insured if an extra premium is forthcoming.

But Linc
I know that Police driving course you did long ago still stands you in good stead. I live with someone who did it too–and it shows.
I know I don’t always have much good to say about them but I rate their drivers.
A.

Andy – crap? Well maybe but there are exeptions to every rule and you have quoted one. My experience is different.

My suggestion might well be that the company car driver thing is a myth.
Has it ever occurred to you that someone who drives tens of thousand miles per year (in my case I once drove 85 thousand miles in a year) is going to be honed to a very fine edge–and therefore largely competent??
My experience of the worst kind of motorist are old people who can’t see, women who won’t see, and anyone who thinks texting and driving is a good idea (sadly often women more than men). My guess is this, if or when I get wiped out on two wheels (and let’s face it, I’ve been living on borrowed time for years in that respect) it won’t be by a company car driver, or the mythical ‘white van man’ but some semi-senile old git who thinks it’s still 1953 and drives fifteen miles per year to the garden centre, or some bint texting to say something important (like the local wine bar is closed) which can’t wait five minutes.

As well as the points I made in the previous post above, the company car thing is largely dead because the tax liabilities are now so onerous on company cars that many firms now don’t even provide them–coupled of course with the insurance problems.
many firms now pay a motoring allowance to employees to use their own car, therefore passing the insurance liability to the employee because they have to make their own arrangements.