SpaceX has already given out details for its ‘Hyperloop Pod Competition II’, and it will be held between the 25th and 27th of August this year. It is open for new applicants (students/teams) and for those who had appeared in the last one.
The competition aims at encouraging students to innovate and boost high speed transport on the ground. This time there will be only one criteria for judgement as opposed to multiple ones in the previous one. The criteria is maximum speed with successful deceleration.
The official blog post from Elon Musk’s company read:
“Based on the high-quality submissions and overwhelming enthusiasm surrounding the first competition, SpaceX has moved forward with Hyperloop Pod competition II, which will culminate in a second competition on August 25-27, 2017, at SpaceX’s Hyperloop track. Hyperloop Competition II fucus on a single criterion: maximum speed.”
So far the official blog has listed 24 teams from across the globe. This includes a team named ‘Hyperloop India’, a team of students from BITS Pilani, Rajasthan, India.
No projects from the previous can be used as it is. Returning teams are supposed to either refine their existing models or build a new one.
SpaceX has also facilitated a test run for each of the teams before the competition at the track.
The aim of the competition is to build a pod that can travel 300-700 mph. This seems far from even a far cry, considering the fact that the winner of the competition in February had reached a maximum of 55 mph. However, as innovation history may have it, it will not be surprising if the next competition ousts the previous one by a mile.
