Its crowdsourced rival, Hyperloop Transportation Technologies, is also racing to be first to flawless the same system.
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In a white paper posted online in 2013, Elon Musk – the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX – discussed how a Hyperloop system that could reach a speed of 1200km/h.
U.S. firm Hyperloop One said that it had completed its first public test of the system – which travels through low pressure tubes – at 100mph on Wednesday.
Although today was just a startup company’s attempt at the Hyperloop’s supposed track mechanism, the Las Vegas, Nev., first trial run was successful, and even picked up new investors and parters to aid in production.
Hyperloop One, formerly known Hyperloop Technologies, announced its name change on Tuesday, hoping to differentiate itself from Hyperloop Transportation Technologies (HTT), which has also made considerable headway in research and development of such a transportation system.
The first ever Hyperloop Transport System test was done in North Las Vegas, Nevada last May 11.
During the about five seconds’ test, “the test vehicle went from 0 to 60 miles per hour in about one second, generating a force of about 2.5 Gs”, Josh Giegel, the company’s senior vice president of Engineering told Xinhua. Sections of giant empty tubes sit nearby, each 3.3 meters in diameter and branded with the Hyperloop One logo. Hyperloop One plans to have a fully functioning Hyperloop transport system by 2020. Currently, massive steel tubes for this future Hypeerloop test track lie around in the site. We accelerated that vehicle to two G’s, got it up to about 105 miles per hour.
Hyperloop One hopes to be moving cargo as soon as 2019 and predicts it will be ready for passengers by 2021. Because the sleds will glide, passengers will feel only feel the initial acceleration, similar to the start of an airplane ride.
The Hyperloop, the brainchild of Elon Musk, the billionaire technology entrepreneur, seeks to become the fifth mode of transportation, after road, rail, sea and air.
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According to proponents of Hyperloop, the new transportation technology could effectively reduce the journey between Los Angeles and San Francisco to just 30 minutes.
