Archive for June, 2009

Another Busy Week

Tuesday, June 30th, 2009

The launch grows ever closer. Interestingly, the launch of our Endeavour should coincide exactly with the launch of the Space Shuttle Endeavour. Fifty quid says one of them doesn’t make it in time…(well, you know NASA)

This week, Affinity was displayed at the Judge Business School Alumni Weekend, where members of the team met Sir Paul Judge. We also exhibited at the CUEN annual conference, which this year was focused on solar power. She then had a lovely weekend down at the Science Museum in London, where sticky-fingered children attempted to poke and prod things as a celebration of the Centenary of the museum. Over 3,500 people attended, 3257 of whom asked “is that a spaceship?”

Clare College Alumni Day was also graced by CUER, while after a week of incredible and almost continuous (24-7) effort, Endeavour was painted white thanks to Stewart at Cambridge Precision. CUER are now offering a prize to the first person who finds Kento’s body clock.

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CONGRATULATIONS, CLASS OF 2009

Saturday, June 27th, 2009

Graduations were held this week, amidst much pomp and ceremony. There were gowns and golden hoods, flat hats and plastic tubes with ribbons round…the sun shone, then it rained (most auspiciously) and the proud mums and dads numbered in their thousands.

It’s been a hard four years, and this last year has, for most, been one of the toughest. Receiving a degree from the University of Cambridge is an outstanding achievement, and to get through finals while building a solar car on the side is doubly so.

A well-earned congratulations, therefore, goes heartily out to:

Richard Barnwell, B.A. (Hons) (Cantab) M.Eng (Cantab)

Lucy Fielding, B.A. (Hons) (Cantab) M.Eng (Cantab)

Richard Hall, B.A. (Hons) (Cantab) M.Eng (Cantab)

Laura Hughes, B.A. (Hons) (Cantab) M.Eng (Cantab)

Anthony Law, B.A. (Hons) (Cantab) M.Eng (Cantab)

Hannah McMillan, B.A. (Hons) (Cantab) M.Eng (Cantab)

Michael Probyn, B.A. (Hons) (Cantab) M.Eng (Cantab)

Evan Scouros, B.A. (Hons) (Cantab) M.Eng (Cantab)

Jonathan Smith, B.A. (Hons) (Cantab) M.Eng (Cantab)

Kento Taoka, B.A. (Hons) (Cantab) M.Eng (Cantab)

Chao Yu, B.A. (Hons) (Cantab) M.Eng (Cantab)

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Official Name Revealed

Friday, June 19th, 2009

After weeks of debate, voting, and bickering, we have finally chosen a proper name for the CUER 2009 WSC entry: ENDEAVOUR

It has a brilliant background and history, as follows:

The original HMS Bark Endeavour was the ship in which James Cook
travelled on a journey of scientific exploration to Terra Australis
Incognita.
 
Endeavour is the callsign of the Apollo 15 mission, which carried the
first lunar rover to the moon and indeed was the first moon mission to
focus properly on scientific experiments rather than simply exploring.
 
The Space Shuttle Endeavour was constructed in 1987 to replace the
Challenger, making it about the same age as we all are. Its launch was
delayed last week, so it seems that, appropriately, things called
Endeavour tend to be behind schedule. Woop.
 
The Endeavour was the name of a solar research ship in Rendezvous with
Rama by Arthur C Clarke, and also appeared in Pirates of the
Caribbean: At World’s End, for some more modern pop-culturey
references. I would suggest that we go ahead and call the car the
Black Pearl, but quite frankly I’m tired of name votes. 

The Australian Endeavour Awards are a series of scholarships that
allow students from overseas to travel to Australia to carry out long
term scientific study. I suppose that’s a bit of a link to
internationality…being from Britain…etc.
 
HOWEVER. The thing that finally swung it was a dream I had a while
back, which some of you may remember, about solar-powered boats taking
over the world. Now it just so happens that there IS a company in
Florida that produces electric – though not yet solar – boats, based
in a marina that looks remarkably similar to the one in my dream. And the name of that company is………Endeavour.

Oh yes.

- Lucy

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All Systems Go…sort of

Monday, June 15th, 2009

It’s been a packed week. Fairings are being constantly sanded on Coe Fen, and some beautifully lightweight rear wheels arrived from BBS. The car is slowly starting to look like a car!

Also this week, National Instruments held a training day for CUER members, and we received a visit from Lord Watson of Richmond. Affinity had her own bit of limelight at the annual CUTEC Conference in the Guildhall in Cambridge.

Finally, the motor test rig was finished, and the motor spun on it for the first time! Good effort, Rich and Jonathan!

You may have noticed blog posts getting shorter and fewer. That’s because we’re all up to our eyes in eco-car. Anyone who has time to be blogging gets made to do sanding. So we all make sure we keep busy!

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Lower Shell Finished!

Thursday, June 11th, 2009

Yesterday saw the finishing touches to the lower shell out in St Neot’s. Kento – that was an amazing job – well done! Additional thanks to everyone else who helped out. It was probably lucky that we got used to staying up until 4am writing our projects…most of us are still on Tokyo time.

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The Saga of the Upper Shell pt 2

Sunday, June 7th, 2009

The Taming of the Mould

Part 2

Part 1

Rob told our heroes that in order to free the beautiful shell, they must first tame the mould. He took them to a large workshop, and showed them the ribs belonging to the mould. They had to put all the ribs back together in their proper shape and screw them down before daybreak. But alas! On trying to fit the ribs of the mould together, Kento and Lucy discovered that two pieces were missing without which the great monster would never be trapped. Undeterred, Kento ventured into the forest until he met a lumberjack. The lumberjack – Mark – helped Kento cut replacements for the missing pieces out of wood which were, as it turned out, 2mm too thick. But the lumberjack was good and kind and sanded down the bits until they fitted with the rest of the ribs – even though he got completely covered with dust and looked utterly ridiculous.

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Nearing the end

Sunday, June 7th, 2009

All M.Eng year presentations have now been completed, marking the end of four tough years at CUED. Everyone else finishes in the coming week…and then we won’t have any excuse not to spend all our time in the Hopkinson, will we, guys?

Guys?

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Carbon Capture and Storage

Friday, June 5th, 2009

Carbon Capture and Storage

A lot of noise has been made recently about Carbon Capture and Storage technology, most recently with the UK Government backing the building of four new coal fired power stations subject to them implementing Carbon Capture and Storage (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8014295.stm).

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Chassis Welding Completed!

Thursday, June 4th, 2009
The highly-awaited 'Angel of the South' was turning out to be a bit of a disappointment...

The highly-awaited 'Angel of the South' was turning out to be a bit of a disappointment...

The team were very excited to get the new chassis back to the workshop today. It has taken shape amazingly quickly over the last week at Formet’s factory in St. Neots. The Aluminium space-frame structure weighs only 18kg – an improvement of 9kg from Affinity’s steel chassis. This puts the team on track to achieve a vehicle weight of around 174kg. Well done Charlie! Only…two-ish months behind schedule – surely a new record for speedy completion!

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