Formula Student 2005
Background to Formula Student
Originally a spin-off from the long running Formula SAE competition in America and launched in the UK in 1998, the Formula Student competition is now an established event in the motor-sport, University and Graduate Employer calendar. Formula Student is an international event, with an ever-increasing list of entrants from Europe, North America, Asia and Australia. The competition challenges University students to conceive, design, build and compete with a small single-seater racing car. While predominantly focused on the design and production of the racing car, the competition is actually more about developing future engineering talent, not just in engineering disciplines but also in the management, marketing and people skills critical to modern industry.
The activity provides opportunities for students to develop and demonstrate their skills, enthusiasm, ingenuity and commitment to engineering excellence, and for industry to foster close links with academia to develop the people attributes they need for future success.
To this end, Perkins Engines have supported the event since 2000, sponsoring both the event itself and individual Universities. For the 2005 season Perkins sponsored the Universities of Bath and Loughborough, continuing a long running association with both teams.
Perkins have provided both financial and technical support to the Universities, calling on expertise from throughout the company to provide guidance on not just powertrain design and optimisation, but in all aspects of the competition.
Formula Student 2005
Unlike most motor-sport events the remit for the vehicle specification of Formula Student is very open, allowing the student competitors to develop a very creative range of vehicles. The rules of the competition stipulate engines up 610cc capacity, with a 20mm diameter inlet restrictor. Many UK teams still opt for 4 cylinder sports bike engines while smaller singles and twins provide lighter alternatives that are often used to very good effect. Tubular steel space-frame chassis were still the most common basis for cars but many teams are turning to a composite material monocoque chassis.
Formula Student focuses not only on the engineering design of motor-sport cars, competition points are also awarded for the manufacturability, marketability and business viability of the project. The Presentation event requires that every team present a business case for producing a batch of 1000 cars to a manufacturing board. The standard of the cars built by students at universities around the world continues to improve every year.
The University of Toronto's many years of participation in Formula SAE and Formula Student showed as they took overall Class 1 honours. A particularly notable feature of their level of preparation was that they had an engine and gearing set-up that allowed them to complete the entire endurance course in just one gear.
Visit http://www.imeche.org.uk/formulastudent/news.asp for more information about and results from the Formula Student 2005 event.
Loughborough University
Loughborough chose to enter only a Class 1 car, which had a space-frame chassis with carbon fibre bodywork and was powered by a naturally aspirated Triumph Daytona engine. The finish and presentation of the Loughborough car was particularly neat and professional. Loughborough completed their car in time to take advantage of their proximity to Bruntingthorpe and use it for testing. This helped them achieve good results in the first 3 dynamic events on the Saturday despite having to overcome a fuel pump problem on the day. Achieving 10th place in the sprint event saw the team finish Saturday on a high note.
On the Sunday a suspected sensor fault and a contentious ruling by the course officials forced their retirement from the endurance event. Despite this setback Loughborough finished 24th of the 57 Class 1 competitors and were the 7th best UK team.
Visit http://www.lumotorsport.co.uk for more information about the Loughborough team.
Bath University
Bath's Class 1 car had a chassis constructed from lightweight honeycomb-carbon fibre composite panels and was powered by a supercharged Yamaha R6 engine making a healthy 88 bhp. They also entered their 2004 car in the 200 series category for cars from the previous year.
Their supercharged engine ensured them a 1st place in the acceleration event with the first sub 4 second 75 meter acceleration run in the history of the Formula Student competition. Strong finishes in the sprint and skidpan events helped them finish 18th overall in Class 1, and 5th best UK team, despite an oil leak forcing them to retire from the endurance event with a few laps remaining. Bath University's 200 series car benefited from a year of development and finished 5th in class.
Visit http://www.burtracing.com for more information about the Bath team.
The view from Perkins
Perkins Engineering Manager, Duncan Riding, attended both of the FS car launches and final year student project reviews for our sponsored teams (Loughborough and Bath) and attended the final day of the event. "The enthusiasm and dedication of the better FS students is remarkable", he said. "Some students are putting in silly hours to deliver the race car while still achieving good grades for their degrees. We want them here. Both Loughborough and Bath have achieved significant improvements on their previous years results and Loughborough had good reason to be miffed over an on-the-day-rule-imposition for the Endurance event. Perkins gets excellent exposure to highly competent people through our involvement in Formula Student. We just need to be able to convince them that motor-sport is a perfectly acceptable hobby, however, there are several billion people in developing nations who need responsible power for agriculture, heat & light and construction which is a far more worthy career challenge. We made a specific recruitment campaign last year at both Bath and Loughborough, where we were able to convince excellent Graduates of that worthy challenge".
If you would like more information or would like to get involved, please contact us at PTeC_Consultancy@perkins.com.
