Inside the team behind new land speed record attempt

On an industrial estate near the M40 in Banbury, engineers are attempting to build a new vehicle capable of breaking a land speed record that has stood for two decades.

In May, construction machinery manufacturer JCB announced it would be attempting to set a new world land speed record with a car powered by hydrogen.

The vehicle in question, the JCB Hydromax, is being built with help from experts at Banbury-based firm Prodrive - which has a prestigious motor sport history.

Later this year, the car will take to the iconic Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah to try to break the current diesel engine record of 350.092 mph - set by JCB in 2006.

Simon Dowson, from Prodrive, said everyone at the north Oxfordshire firm was "very proud and honoured to be part of such an endeavour".

"For all of the team here at Prodrive, it's really about the fact that you're going to do something that very few have the chance to do," Dowson, who is the race team principal for the JCB Hydromax, said.

The 9m-long (30ft) car will be powered by two standard JCB four-cylinder hydrogen-powered engines, which already feature in the firm's construction vehicles on general sale.

"What we've done is taken two of our 74 horsepower engines from our construction machines, we've laid them on their side and we've turned the power up," Lee Harper, chief engineer at JCB, explained.

He said the finished car would have about 1,600 horsepower in total.

"Then to showcase just what we can do, we've powered them [the engines] with hydrogen, a zero carbon fuel," Harper said.

"So this will be one of the first zero carbon world land speed records ever set."

Dowson said that simulation work done over the past few months had shown a new record "should be achievable".

"But it is a natural surface out on the salt, so you never really know what conditions you're going to get," he then prefaced it with.

The glassy surface of the Bonneville Salt Flats has attracted drivers from all over the world for more than a century, as they try to go faster and faster.

It was where, two decades ago, the JCB Dieselmax, driven by RAF Wing Cdr Andy Green OBE, broke the diesel engine land speed record.

The new Hydromax car will also be driven by the now-retired Green - who said at a launch event in May that he would be "amazed" if it didn't break the record.

If that were to happen, Dowson said it would be a "significant achievement" that would be "well up there" with previous Prodrive triumphs.

"Across the whole factory, everyone's involved in this programme and is pushing hard to make it a success," he added.