Warby Motorsport & Spirit of Australia II

G'day Guy's

Nice to see some people chatting about the Unlimited Water Speed Record, both Dad and I are making some good progress on our new Challenger "Spirit of Australia II" which has only been under construction for 18 months now,

The Hull is basically done, the deck will go on last, now we are fitting the hull out, like the steering , seat ,and dash in the capsule the rudder & Fuel tanks is being made, dad's carving the air intakes out, we can just about see the finish line on this build ( if we get on our tippy toes) , :bump:


Here is a link to our website

Spirit of Australia II

Regards
Dave

Thanks for posting that Dave !:hurray:

I can't wait to see some testing :hurray:

December 2013

December has seen excellent progress on Spirit of Australia II. The engine cowl plug has been made and a mold taken of it. the cockpit has been final fitted, The 2 fuel tanks have been finished and trial fitted in the boat, beautifully fabricated by Barry Pryor from Taree , both tanks have been baffled and sumps added.

Construction has started on the nose and battery box / steering hatch area on the front of the hull, we are on track to start putting the deck on the boat in mid March, this will complete all the woodwork needed on the boat, before the deck is added the boat will be filled with a closed cell foam for floatation .

Later in the year Warby Motorsport will announce our team for our World Water Speed Record Challenge, this will include some of the original 1977-1978 Spirit of Australia world record team, we are very pleased have back on the team for Spirit of Australia II

Dave Appleby and Rob Blackadder ( both former RAAF support crew from the 1978 317.60 MPH world record run) have now taken over systems management and engine management programs on Spirit of Australia II, Their expertise and experience will play a vital role in out up coming test runs and record attempt.

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http://warbymotorsport.com/Updates.html

Checked out the site today. Great new pics of the boat. It just seems soooooo narrow. Is it more narrow than SOA 1? It certainly looks to be a fast design. I'd love to hear more about your decision to eliminate the wing and it's impact on high speed handling. Was it decided that the wing on SOA 1 was limiting it's potential?

I received an email from Dave today with a couple of the latest pictures..

G'day Paul,

Dad is currently down here in Aust helping with the build on the new jetboat, and won't make it to Tavares this year sadly mate,

We hope to have the website updated soon with the jetboat project, as we have been flatout on the build and engine program is well underway....here's a peek of where we are up to, not long now til we test, end of the year is looking good

Regards
Dave

http://i730.photobucket.com/albums/w.../WarbyNew1.jpg

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I was hoping Ken and Dave would have one of their boats in Tavares for the get together, but they are both in Australia working hard on the project.

Wouldn't it be cool to be in Australia for the run the end of the year if things stay on schedule????

Sounds like a fabulous idea. I do have some family there....

Book It!!!!!

THE CHALLENGE To set a new Unlimited World Water Speed Record

Warby Motorsport is proud to announce their new World Water Speed Challenger "Spirit of Australia II" which is now well under construction in Australia. Ken Warby & son Dave have been working on the new project for some time now and they have the original Spirit of Australia plan's out from 1970 plus all the wind tunnel testing information from the mid 1970's that was done by the late Professor Tom Fink & Ken on Spirit of Australia. The team has made some modifications to the design and had the design re-tested. This took sometime to get the answers they wanted to get the speeds they need to take the world water speed record to a new level. Then, with updated information, they set about building the brand new Spirit of Australia II. Ken & Dave realized that the J-34 Jet engine used in Spirit of Australia, and Aussie Spirit, would not get them to the speed they want with the new boat. Ken is probably one of the most experienced persons with afterburners on J-34s in the world and he has owned, built and raced many types in jet cars. Ken did experiment with an Afterburner on the J-34 in a boat, but it was found to disrupt the stability of the boat too much, one of the factors that killed Craig Arfon's. It was also found that a small percent loss of engine revs would cause the burner to blow back through the engine and stall it. A stall at near 300mph would cause the nose of the boat to rise due to a massive loss of the “nose down” moment of inertia caused by the thrust being above the center of gravity. The sudden instability would cause the nose of the boat to rise and a back flip (like Campbell and Arfons) would occur.

However, the bottom line was the fact the a Westinghouse J34 puts out 3400lb of thrust and with the added weight of the new reinforced cockpits, it was not going to be enough and a burner was not an option. Even if it was, the best result that Westinghouse ever got out of a burner on a J34, was 4200lb/thrust. Many drag racers have quoted figures such as 6000lb and even 8000lb, but those are just fantasy numbers for the media and they couldn't prove their claims. Warby Motorsport have tested j34 engines with drag burners in a test stand and only got a little over 4000lb/thrust. When breaking world speed records you deal with real facts, even though a spare jet engine and burners are sitting in the shed from the drag race days, there will not be one on Spirit of Australia II.

After forty years of using Westinghouse J34 engines in both boats and cars, the end of an era had come. Hence the need for a better engine.

Ken & Dave needed smooth delivery of thrust from a jet engine and an engine not too heavy for the new boat. They looked worldwide for the right engine, England, USA and even Russia, to get an engine with the right thrust to weight balance for the job and the search ended in Italy when they acquired two fresh Roll's Royce Orpheus 803 Jet engines. They are ex Italian Air Force engines out of a Fiat Gina G-91 jet fighter, which are around twenty years newer in technology then the old J-34s. These engines were stored in air sealed container's especially designed to transport jet engines and they were then shipped to Australia.The new Rolls Royce Orpheus engines not only put out a genuine 5000lb thrust, they also are 300lb lighter than the old Westinghouse J34s and that is a big plus.

With the hull design updated and engine search now done, the boat is now well underway, with current world record holder and world water speed record challenger father & son working side by side on Spirit of Australia II With Blowering Dam at near full capacity, we are looking forward to returning to Tumut, catching up with friend's, and breaking a new world water speed record

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