British team Jet Reaction is setting its sights on achieving a new world record at the Bonneville Salt Flats when it tries to reach 400 mph using a heavily modified motorcycle->ke4227 that, believe it or not, will be powered by a jet engine sourced from a helicopter.

The bike will be built by engineer Richard Brown, who believes that his 20-foot custom motorcycle can reach speeds in excess of 450 mph on a perfect run and weather conditions permitting. But he and Jet Reaction are only “settling” for 400 mph in a crusade of sorts that began in 1999 when the team’s old bike rocket, the Mach 3 Challenger, reached 332.887 mph but didn’t qualify as a world record due to homologation purposes.

The record now stands at 376.36 mph, a number that Jet Reaction believes it can easily topple during its run at the Bonneville Salt Flats in September 2015.

Jet Reaction will be one of a handful of teams that will be vying for the same record so just because it’s got a bike that can supposedly hit 400 mph, that doesn’t mean it’s going to be the only one that can do that.

Jet Reaction’s custom motorcycle is still in the middle of its own development phase so more updates should be available as the world-record run nears. For now, though, check out these renderings of the bike courtesy of Richard Brown’s design and engineering team.

Continue reading to read more about Jet Reaction’s pursuit to break 400 mph at the Bonneville Salt Flats.

Why it matters

World-record attempts are always fun to keep track of because you don’t really know what to expect from the teams that are looking to stake their names into the history books.

Take Jet Reaction for example. I heard about their previous attempt back in 1999 and the frustration that came with not being able to confirm it as a land speed record because of homologation requirements. So the company has somewhat of an axe to grind this time around.

To its credit, it does appear that the company has its act together and is working on a bike that can literally blow off the salt at the Bonneville Salt Flats. It’s even set its sights set on the 400-mph threshold, which has rarely been accomplished in a world-record setting.

It’s going to be interesting to see how Jet Reaction can live up to the seemingly absurd expectations it has set for itself. Having a lot of competitors on the field isn’t going to help matters, too, so if it really wants to stamp its name into the record books, it’s going to have to do it convincingly and emphatically.

That’s a task that’s far easier said than done, but if there’s a company that has shown it’s ability to talk a lot of talk leading up to the world-record run, it’s Jet Reaction. Whether it can back up that talk is an entirely different thing.

So let’s give the team enough time to develop it’s machine and when the time comes that it’s ready to roll, we’ll see if Jet Reaction’s bite is as fearsome as its bark.