This Inside Look At The Target550 Land Speed Effort Is A Peek Into The Unforgiving Realm Of The Streamliner


This Inside Look At The Target550 Land Speed Effort Is A Peek Into The Unforgiving Realm Of The Streamliner

Fittingly, as I type this the backdrop behind me is a white out. This video looks inside the Treit and Davenport Target500 land speed streamliner and it is both a glimpse at the mechanical and the human end of the effort to reset the wheel drive land speed record. The car has been appearing at Bonneville for the last couple of years and will be making what the team hopes are legitimate attempted to reset that record on Lake Gardiner in Australia during 2018.

Les Davenport is one of the best known alcohol crew chiefs in the drag racing world and he is one heck of a driver himself having taken this car to speeds nearly 400mph. The lead man on the project is Marlo Treit who has been heading to Bonneville for nearly 70 years now. He’s the man who is central to this video and central to the operation of the car.

Building one of these behemoths is an enterprise in an unto itself. The physical proportions of the thing are insane and then all of the raw materials, labor, and money, that go into it would make small countries envy the build budget. The reward? You go 385mph while figuring the car out and everyone questions if you will ever go any faster than that.

One of the amazing and difficult factors in a car like this is how much things change while you are building it. Sketches of this car began in 1998, it was completed in 2012. Along those times lots of cars like the Speed Demon and others showed up with an admittedly more high tech approach and have owned the salt since. Does that mean that Target550 won’t meet it’s goals? Certainly not but it does make this absolute monster of a machine look a little more blunt force trauma than others of late.

We love this car and seeing it in person is breathtaking. Seeing and hearing it run are even better than that.

Press play below to see an inside look at Target550 a crazy cool streamliner


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6 thoughts on “This Inside Look At The Target550 Land Speed Effort Is A Peek Into The Unforgiving Realm Of The Streamliner

  1. Chevy Hatin' Mad Geordie

    Awesome video, awesome car and awesome constructor.

    Best of luck in 2018 and every reader of BangShift is rooting for you!

  2. Dale Epp

    Wow….what a totally cool project. No stuffy British accents in this crowd, just a bunch of “southern California hot rodder coolness”.

    Being a Canadian I’m a bit partial to Les Davenport – a fellow Canuck.

    Jim Hume is not as well known as he should be. Since the 70’s his fabricating and metal shaping work on pro dragrace cars was at the same level as Lil’ John Buttera, Pat Foster and Tom Hanna. He built many funny cars for the superstars of drag racing’s Golden Era. He’s a pure artist at all he does.

    I sure hope they get that record. Thanks for keeping us up to date Brian!

    Dale Epp

  3. ratpatrol66

    Went to open house at Jim Humes house to look at this beast. What a killer machine! It was great to see and hear it on the salt last year. I can’t wait for Speedweek 2017!!!

  4. DanStokes

    Not to take ANYTHING away from this effort but I’d love to see a similar article on Seth Hammond’s lakester. It is absolutely amazing and the most beautiful vehicle I’ve ever seen, ranking up there with the Delahays. Breathtaking. As you can tell, I’m in love!

    Hope to see everyone in Impound again this year – I have an invitation to come and now I’m working on logistics.

    Dan

  5. Emmett

    This is REAL hot rodding. Not to take anything (well,maybe a little) away from the Brits with their amazing JET powered wheeled device, but if it ain’t gas(fuel) powered, with the WHEELS making it go fast, then it’s not a car. I guess that leaves out Breedlove and Arfons, etc too.
    So strapping a rocket to a set of wheels is nice, but with pistons, the engineering is way, way harder. Any 450+ mph is more of an achievement. The gear heads know that. If the Brits, or anybody, wants to set a LSR, just fly a jet fighter with its wheels down at top speed a 1/4″ off the ground.
    “PISTONS OR BUST”

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