A little over a month ago, we reported on tubes for SpaceX’s Hyperloop test track starting to show up at the company’s headquarters in Hawthorne. Now they already have the entire 1-mile track up along the road ahead of the pod competition.
It doesn’t mean that the track is ready since it’s not as easy as a connecting a bunch of sections of tubes together. The system needs to be able to create a near-vacuum from 0.02 psi (~99.8% vacuum) to 14.7 psi (pressure at sea level), but it’s still impressive to see what is likely currently te most advanced hyperloop test track project.
And it’s not in the desert, but along Jack Northrop Ave right next to SpaceX’s headquarter and Tesla’s Design Studio in the middle of Hawthorne in California.
They still have some time to complete the track considering the competition will take place during the weekend of January 27-29, 2017, but access to the system will be available sooner for some test runs.
The Talking Tesla podcast recorded a video of the entire track yesterday:
As mentioned, the track is for the SpaceX Hyperloop Pod Design Competition in which about 2 dozen teams of students and engineers are creating hyperloop pods to compete and try to achieve the greatest speed and control on the 1-mile track.
The only other Hyperloop test track currently in construction is Hyperloop One in North Las Vegas. They plan for it to be ready in early 2017 so it will be interesting who will have the first operational hyperloop test track. Though to be fair, Hyperloop One’s, while not much longer than SpaceX’s, will be a full-scale system that will be able to fit a real pod. Unlike SpaceX’s 6-ft in diameter tube, which is only good for the test pods.
Nonetheless, both projects are interesting to follow.
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