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Super Mileage in Montreal
Posted 31 Oct 2011 in Uncategorized by evierich
We just got back from an engineering conference in Montreal, this was a great way to show off the car and the work that we’ve done.
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Disassembly
Posted 11 Jan 2011 in Uncategorized by evierich
Now that plans have been made for improving the design of the car and parts have been designed, it was time to take the car down to the bare carbon fibre. This however proved to be more difficult than previously anticipated and led to many surprises along the way. Here are some of the things we encountered as we took everything apart.
- The exhaust pipe could not take the heat of the engine and melted the braising holding it together, leading to a major failure.
- The engine put out much more heat than expected, which melted many of the wires.
- Removal of the wide-ban O2 sensor showed significant carbon build up, indicating the engine was running very rich.
- When removing the oil system we noticed a very black oil and a large amount of engine sludge, the cause of this is still unknown however a broken piston ring is suspected.
Now that the car has been disassembled the next step is to analyze the results that we found and begin the necessary body modifications to achieve a tighter turning radius and to improve aerodynamics.
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Winter Schedule
Posted 02 Dec 2010 in Uncategorized by evierich
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FunFest
Posted 20 Oct 2010 in Uncategorized by evierich
We spent the day on booth street at the National Science and Technology FunFest, showing off our car to the public. It was a big hit and drew large crowds the whole day. Despite the high winds which almost took the cover off the car we managed to keep it together in one piece and got a chance to show everyone how we made our car. We also got a chance to explain what we think the future has in store for the modern automobile, as well as talk to some very interesting people and hear there views on the matter. Here are a few photos from the day:
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Track Test
Posted 02 Jul 2010 in Uncategorized by Lihang
We were able to get the vehicle onto the track last week at Capital City Speedway and tuned.
Here are some media files from the testing courtesy of David from the Gazette:
Pat almost getting run over:
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Driver’s Hatch Fabrication
Posted 18 Jun 2010 in Uncategorized by Lihang
Here are some pictures from fabricating the driver’s hatch
Start by sanding male mold
Imperfections highlighted. Nip/tuck?
Body Filler…
Painted black to show imperfections
More sanding…
Painting with high fill primer
After fiberglass female mold is completed. There appears to be some stickage
Waxing female mold
Cutting carbon fabric
Wetting out carbon fabric
Lay up
Vacuum Bagging
Hatch seperated from mold and on vehicle to check for fit
Acrylic windows cut out
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Engine pictures
Posted 18 Jun 2010 in Uncategorized by Lihang
Here are some pictures from assembling the engine:
Piston, courtesy of Synergy Models & Prototypes
Valve
Piston Rings, ready to be annealed
Annealing
Annealed
Machining rings to final OD
Checking valves for leak after grinding
Heat treating valve stems
Hardened valves on engine head
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Testing the vehicle at 1AM in the halls…
Posted 18 Jun 2010 in Uncategorized by Lihang
These were taken from about 2 months back when we were testing the rolling chasis without the engine.
Pat lying comfortably
Driver’s view
Rolling down the hall
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Lucky #13
Posted 14 Jun 2010 in Uncategorized by Lihang
Hi everyone,
Just got back from the 2010 SAE Supermileage competition in beautiful Marshall, MI. It was our first time at the competition, and we took 2nd place out of 20 something teams on our only completed run with 1496mpg. A whole bunch of unlucky events occuring a week before we left for the competition delayed our testing until 2AM of the day we left for competition. Including:
- Two fried ECUs
- broken testing laptop
- Missed package deliveries for the new fuel pump and ECU
- Two fried ignition coils
We didn’t have time to tune the engine because the ECU didn’t come in until the night before we left, and we were only running the engine on 1 spark plug because we only had 1 coil left.
Our luck seemed to continue at the competition where we popped a tube on the last lap which took us 45 min to repair, and a fuel leak which we measured to be around ~5.5g (we used a total of 17g of fuel for the run) while running the pump for 35 seconds.
Despite all these unfortunate events, our team still persisted and took home the 2nd place trophy. Everybody at the competition was awesome, special thanks to ETS, Ryerson, Laval, Binghampton, SDSMT, and NYU-Poly for lending us their parts and tools! Even though we were competitors, they were still very eager to lend a helping hand.
Within the next week or two, we will tune the engine, fix the fuel leak, and do a few trials at the local race track to see what numbers we can expect for next year’s competition. Stay tuned!
