Auto Technology

WSC 2013 New Technology Concepts

Posted on April 1, 2011 by Lucy Fielding

CUER is currently working hard to prepare for the upcoming 2011 World Solar Challenge. Manufacture of the new car has begun and is making excellent progress. However, solar car teams must, by nature, be long sighted – we must look to the future. It will typically take 2 years for a concept to make its way from drawing board to workshop and so even now we are busy with concept generation for the 2013 entry. Many ideas will be taken forward to next year’s research stage and this year, a decision has been made to radically change the focus of our designs.

So far, the Cambridge solar team has been following the status quo of solar racing – build the fastest car we can – and this entails building a car that looks rather similar to many other fast cars. However, the University of Cambridge has traditionally been the birthplace of novelty and innovation: the jet engine, evolution, the electron  - and we at CUER hope to carry on this tradition by focusing our research on developing new and exciting concepts that harness the power of the sun.

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Design Contest

Posted on March 29, 2011 by Lucy Fielding

At Cambridge University Eco Racing we design, build and race cutting edge solar powered cars. Our racing cars showcase sustainable engineering and demonstrate the potential of electric vehicle technologies. A big part of what we do is promoting these values in the community. To achieve this, CUER runs outreach events at local schools and across the country, aimed at educating and inspiring the next generation of engineers and scientists.

Our cars are developed to race in the biennial ‘World Solar Challenge’, the ‘Formula One’ of eco-friendly motorsport, which is a 3000 kilometre race across the Australian Outback. In 2009, we entered the race for the first time as the only UK team. This year, we have developed a much improved car and, in May, we will be unveiling our new design at a special event in Cambridge.

To celebrate our new design, we are launching a competition, for school pupils aged from 6 to 14, to design a car for the future. Unlike our car, the designs will not be restricted to solar power, but we will still be looking for some exciting and innovative ideas (no idea is too silly!).

Entries will be judged, in three age categories, by…
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MPPTs – what’s in a name?

Posted on January 14, 2011 by Lucy Fielding

Following on from the article on solar cells, we continue to disperse the dense fog surrounding electrical engineering to reveal the technology behind CUER’s most-loved acronym* – the MPPT.

First off, let’s get the formalities out of the way. ‘MPPT’ stands for ‘Maximum Power Point Tracker’. This may have been mentioned in previous blog posts, possibly in an attempt to clear away the aforementioned fog. It’s not entirely certain why they thought it would help. It’s unlikely that the response to this revelation was “oh, Maximum Power Point Trackers – they track the maximum power point! Of course! It’s all so clear!” No, this is a PR challenge even Ronseal would struggle with.

However, unlike the average Ronseal customer (or perhaps not?) we are in a position to understand the relationship between the photons reaching a solar cell, and the amount of useful energy we can get out of it. However energy on its own is not a useful measure. A solar array could provide 1kJ of energy – in fact, they all will, if you wait long enough – but an array that produces 1kJ in 0.5s is better than one that produces it in 20s.

Power, then, is…
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Posted in Anatomy of a Solar Car, Auto Technology, Electrical, Renewable technology | Leave a comment

Ansys Seminar

Posted on December 14, 2010 by Lucy Fielding

On the 7th December, several CUER team members loaded Endeavour up onto the trailer and took her for a day out at the Heritage Motor Museum in Warwickshire. She enjoyed herself immensely while her handlers attended the Ansys Hybrid Electric Vehicle seminar. With this event being so relevant to what we do, as well as being hosted by one of our long-term sponsors, this was an opportunity we could not afford to miss. The event focused on how Ansys software could be used in all aspects of car design, including battery chemistry and EM-field modelling – not just aerodynamics (hands up all those who knew it was even used for aerodynamics). This was also a great opportunity to show off Endeavour once again and gave us another chance to talk to people in the automotive industry who are interested in what we do and have plenty of technical expertise to share with us.

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Aerodynamics and the Car of the Future

Posted on October 3, 2010 by Lucy Fielding

Aerodynamics (more generally known as fluid dynamics) is one of the more ‘user-friendly’ aspects of design. Most people have some instinctive understanding that cars (and anything else that moves) need to be ‘streamlined’. We don’t need to run a simulation to conclude that a torpedo is more aerodynamic than a brick. It’s obvious, we say. It’s common sense.

It is probably because of this everyday familiarity of the concept – or at least the language – of aerodynamics that BMW chose a slightly different approach in their latest ad campaign, in an attempt to sound hi-tech:

Is This The Car of The Future
Posted in Aero, Anatomy of a Solar Car, Auto Technology, Renewable technology | Leave a comment

Anatomy of a Solar Car

Posted on September 22, 2010 by Lucy Fielding

One of the things that we felt was lacking on the original CUER blog was interaction with our readers. Although we built up quite a good regular readership, we got very few comments or feedback (perhaps our writing was just that good?)

It’s possible that this was due to

a) disinterest, or

b) a lack of understanding.

Option (b) is particularly disheartening. Science and engineering are wonderful, exciting, vibrant, ever-changing subjects, and yet so much of that wonder can be drowned out by the increasing complexity of technology. This is a huge barrier for us, since a large part of what we do is geared towards improving public understanding and appreciation of solar vehicle engineering and energy issues.

Therefore, in the spirit of simpler science, we plan on producing a series of articles on the anatomy of a solar car. These articles will explain some basic (and sometimes not-so-basic – I’m looking at you, Navier-Stokes equations…) engineering theory. They will bridge the gap between our engineers and our followers. Anyone can look at a solar car and see that it is crammed with innovation and promise. But when you understand what is really going on – and, more importantly, why…
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Driving by Computer

Posted on May 17, 2009 by Dan Wilkins

Interesting to see a few weeks ago that Ricardo have been working on software not dissimilar to what we’re developing for the new car.

To quote their press release, “the Sentience vehicle will calculate and follow an optimal driving strategy. Its control system adjusts vehicle speed, acceleration and deceleration via its adaptive cruise control.” – precisely what Bethany will do as she travels through the outback.

It’s great to see some of these ideas going on to road vehicles and it shows that some of the technology we’re working on is not just applicable to cars in the future, but is feasible right now! This simple principle of saving energy through driving style will apply regardless of the form of energy available, be it petrol, electric charge or solar radiation. What’s also very pleasing to see is that the Transport Research Laboratory has shown that this technology really works. Apparently, “in evening tests on public roads in ‘real-world’ conditions in the vicinity of TRL, achieved mean savings at all times in excess of 5 per cent.”

Of course the major hurdle that this technology will face is our human desire for freedom. If the speed of your vehicle is…
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@cuerSolarTeam on Twitter

  • Dropped Endeavour off at Millbrook for the event tomorrow. The venue looks great, so excited for tomorrow!!!
    3 Feb 2012 16:00
  • Dirt bike disassembly complete! A fun evening for the mechanical team in a garage
    2 Feb 2012 20:07
  • the shocks off the dirt bike we just took apart for parts for the prototype #TwitPict
    http://t.co/1Wi67rEn
    2 Feb 2012 20:04
  • Discussing solar vehicle over a nice meal in the pub with CUER:Priceless :-)
    1 Feb 2012 23:10
  • Working on the presentation for the Millbrook event on Saturday. It's going to be AWESOME. With jazz hands!
    1 Feb 2012 17:31