Yes, you read that right! We didn’t mean the affable JCW machines from Mini Cooper. As it is, 166kmph can be easily done on a JCW. We’re talking about the current trending keyword in India, JCB. The yellow and black machines that we all have seen ploughing down one highway or the other or assisting a farmer in his field is in the news again. Guy Martin, the Isle of Man TT guy (no pun intended) piloted a regular JCB tractor on a secluded track to a top whack of 166kmph. Well, the regular is just for the sake of saying it. There were engineers who stuck a few aerodynamic bits on this mobile brick house as well as removed a few heavy parts to make this as sleek as possible. While the details are sketchy at this moment, here are a few bits and pieces that we could glean.
The JCB Fastrac was driven on the Elvington Airfield strip in the UK. The JCB’s engine puts out close to 1,000hp and 2,440Nm and apparently, there were no modifications done to the powertrain. Williams Advanced Engineering was roped in to fine tune the JCB and make it as lighter and go-faster farm equipment in the process. Guy Martin was quoted as saying, “It had been a great day with the JCB at Elvington, proper job with some right proper engineers. She felt rock steady on the runway, job’s a peach.” Yeah, we agree with you, Martin! The job’s got to be a peach when you have driven some crazy machines before on the toughest track of them all.
JCB is no stranger to all this either. The excavating company has had several records to its name. More notable is the 563kmph average speed that a Dieselmax streamliner achieved in 2006, at the Bonneville Salt Flats. These machines are crazy, we tell you. We’re pretty stoked and are waiting for the day when an actual JCB machine transforms into one of those weird Transformers vehicle.
