FSAE Michigan 2009
Day 4 - Saturday, May 16
The final day at Michigan International Speedway started out being wet but the team was not scheduled to run for endurance until the afternoon session. We spent the morning setting up the car and we got that done even though the event was brought an hour forward.
By the time the afternoon session started, the course had already dried up. Our car was the 12th car to start. As soon as the car got out, we saw that it got passed by another car. We knew it was not a good sign and we noticed that the car was significantly slower than the rest of the car on the course. After running for two laps, our car was flagged and we had to retire from the event.
The team immediately did an investigation after the car was pulled out. We found out that the fuel line was kinked, so the engine was burning lean and not making its optimum power. After fixing that, Jack took the car for a few spins on the practice track, and according to him, it perform exactly as we had tuned it to.
The team finished 30th overall at Formula SAE Michigan. We learned a lot from this event and we hope to take the experience we gained to dominate all events at California.
Thanks for your support!
Day 3 - Friday, May 15
Upon arriving to the speedway, the exhaust system was modified for us to go thru Noise Test again. This time we had no issues passing, went on to brake and earned us the final tech sticker.
The team then rushed to get in line for acceleration. During the runs, the acceleration drivers noticed that the engine was not performing at its full capacity. As time was very limited, we then had to go on to the Skidpad event. After performing one run, the car ran out of fuel, so after refuelling, we got back to the Skidpad area towards the very end of the event. Unfortunately, we were not able to complete all four runs as the event had ended at its scheduled time.
The car got back into the paddock after the first two dynamic events and we found that the throttle needed to be fixed, which is why the engine pacage was not producing as much power earlier. We got that fixed and in the afternoon, the car got in line for the autocross event. About half way through, it started to rain on the course. Our car went out on dry tires and was one of the fastest in the wet, but our time was not as quick as those that went out when the course was dry.
At the end of the day, some of the scores for the events were posted and this is how we fared: Cost (64th place, 62.09/100 pts), Sales Presentation (26th place, 55.62/75 pts), Skidpad (8th place, 34.6/50pts), Acceleration (42nd place, 40.18/75pts), and Design (7th place, 110/150pts).
The autocross event score was not yet posted at this time, but we are scheduled to run in the afternoon session for endurance on Saturday.
More updates to come.
Day 2 - Thursday, May 14
Day two at Michigan International Speedway was quite a challenge for us. We started off in the morning with Tilt test, which earned our second tech sticker. We then went on to the Business Presentation event, where we impressed the judges with our plans to commercially produce the car. Later, we moved to the Cost event and were given full credit by the judges when asked on how to reduce the cost of a specific part of the car. The day continued with us in the Design tent, where we stayed for almost an hour explaining the design process and testing done on the parts, systems and the car as a whole.
While in the Design tent, we were told that the Technical Inspection officials missed out a couple of items on the inspection sheet, which forced us to get back into Tech Inspection bay right before it closed for the day. We did not have any problems there and got out soon after.
At 6pm, the announcer called out our car number as one of the cars that made the Design semi finals. The six tech leads (Nik, Sam, Daniel, Nick, Kiel, Brian), along with Jack, Gilbert, Nick Miller and Ryan Trickett were called into the garage at 6:30pm for the semi final event. As of the time this update is written, we have not heard from them.
Despite all the achievements for the day, we had difficulty in passing Noise Test. We worked really hard and tried different solutions to bring the noise level below 110 dB at 11,000 rpm. Right before the paddock closed, we found a way to overcome this and with a few additional materials and parts, we should be able to get thru Noise Test. We plan to test again first thing in the morning and move on to Brake Test to get our third tech sticker, which will allow us to run in the dynamic events.
Stay tuned for more updates from us in Michigan.
Day 1 - Wednesday, May 13
First day at FSAE Michigan went well with the team passing Technical Inspection, despite having to fix a few things on the car during the event.
Thursday will be filled with Brake & Noise and Tilt Test, as well as Business Presentation (11 am), Cost (2 pm) and Design (4 pm).
We are going to do our best to get through all the events and we hope to proceed to Design Semi Finals in the evening.
Day 0 - Tuesday, May 12
We are glad to announce that the team and the car have arrived safely in Detroit!
Tomorrow we will be going through tech inspection. Stay tuned for more news!