Updates

General updates to the Solar Car Team page

ASC Wrap Up

Posted Mon, 06/28/2010 - 2:14pm by Steven Durbin

The 2010 race crew has brought back Michigan's 3rd straight National Championship and 6th overall.  Infinium crossed the finish line 2 hours 12 minutes and 9 seconds ahead of the second place team Minnesota, the official stands can be found here.

Over the course of 6 days, Infinium traveled 1,100 miles averaging 40 mph, which is amazing considering the number of stop lights on this route!  The race crew only had 15 minutes on the side of the the road making a minor electrical repair. To bring back a championship the team had to run a flawless race.  Any downtime or penalties could have cost the team the race, but the team worked hard during the months prior to the race to ensure this didn't happen.

With the race now over, the team turns its sights to the 2011 project.  More pictures from the race should be uploaded in the near future.

Last Minute Strategy Preparations

Posted Sat, 06/19/2010 - 10:37pm by Alex Dowling

As the team relaxes before the start of the race, the Strategists are finishing last minute preparations for the race. Jordan is forecasting weather while Danyang and Andrew are analyzing race simulation results. Beth is working on getting new weather hardware that just arrived from Climatronics. Despite uncertainties in strategy simulations and forecasts, one thing is certain: tomorrow should be an interesting day of racing.

Strategy Discussion: Jordan and Andrew review weather forecasts and simulation results.

Strategy Discussion: Jordan and Andrew review weather forecasts and simulation results.

New Hardware: This sonimeter should provide accurate wind speed measurements strategists can use during the race.

Greetings from Tulsa

Posted Sat, 06/19/2010 - 4:37pm by Alex Dowling

Greeting from Tulsa!

Those who followed the team for the last two years may remember me; I raced as the Head Strategist in both NASC '08 and GGC '09 before "retiring" from the team. This ASC cycle we are starting a new tradition: former race crew members are traveling with the team as advisors. Jeff Rogers (micro-electric WSC '07, NASC '08 and GGC '09), Steve Hechtman (electrical/driver WSC '07 and NASC '08, Race Manager GGC '09) and I will be following the team along the race in Emeritus, a F-150 generously on loan from Ford. In addition to sharing our racing insights with the next generation of UM solar car raycers, we will be taking plenty of videos and photo. Expect plenty of blog posts from Emeritus during the next week.

After a delicious breakfast at the Embassy Suites - Dallas Lovefield this morning, we departed for Tulsa. Approximately five hours later we arrived at the Hilton Garden Inn - Tulsa Airport, our "base of operations" for tonight. Members of the main caravan (Blue, Chase and Lead) choreographed and rehearsed roadside procedures, while others began to unload the semi and catch up on e-mails.

Santosh and Gerald run from Chase.

Scrutineering Begins

Posted Sat, 06/12/2010 - 12:37pm by Rachel Kramer

The Team arrived and set up camp at the Motorsport Ranch in Cresson, TX yesterday evening. We will be camped here at the track for the next week as we and 15 other solar car teams work to pass the scrutineering and qualifying events. Some time last evening was spent meeting the other teams that also arrived early. It's been fun to meet students from Calgary, New York, Germany and Taiwan who are as passionate about solar cars as we are.

After an event kick-off meeting was held this morning, the testing began. We will start off with battery scrutineering this afternoon and plan to have all static and dynamic tests completed before Wednesday, when the Formula Sun Grand Prix qualifying event will begin.

Egress Practice Makes Perfect: Infinium driver Cecilia Yung practices egressing from the solar car. Regulations require that all drivers are able to exit their vehicles without assistance in ten seconds or less.

Team Arrives in Dallas

Posted Fri, 06/11/2010 - 11:45am by elardner

After a long 16 hour and almost 1200 mile drive straight from Ann Arbor, the team arrived in Dallas, Texas yesterday around noon. Despite the long overnight stretch we had no trouble keeping each driver awake and made it Dallas safe, but tired. Luckily we were able to drive straight to the Embassy Suites - Dallas Love Field. Embassy Suites is supporting our team this year with six very comfortable rooms, that were much appreciated after such a long journey across the country. Along with our rooms, the team woke up early this morning to take advantage of the complementary breakfast offered by the hotel. 

After breakfast today, we are working from the atrium of the hotel before we head to the track in Cresson to meet the semi trailer around 6 pm. 

Hard at work in the Atrium

Preparing for ASC

Posted Mon, 06/07/2010 - 11:58am by Steven Durbin

Since the team returned from Mock Race, many preparations have taken place to make Infinium a better car and our team perform better.

Yesterday Infinium was driven around campus to test some modifications and caravan procedures.  Today Infinium drove on the highway to practice driving at freeway speeds with traffic.  While engineers have been busy working on Infinium, the operations division has been outfitting carvan vehicles.

Ford Motor Company was kind enough to loan the team 2 F-150's and 2 Flex's to use as support vehicles during the race. To make them more Michigan themed, a wrap provided by Monroe Vinyl Graphics resembling the Michigan winged helmet was applied to the hood of all four vehicles.   Decals provided by Signs in 1 Day were applied to the sides and rear of the vehicles to make them look more official.  The vehicle made for some great pictures.

Personal Thoughts on Mock Race

Posted Sun, 05/30/2010 - 8:25pm by vakharia

What a week! Mock race was really cool experience. Driving the solar car on open roads and trying to hone my skills at maintaining speed on hills and turns was so much fun. As a member of the electrical division, it was really amazing seeing how well the electrical system performed over the 4 days of racing, and it really made me realize how great of a job the last team did in designing it. I think the mock race gave the team members, new and old, a good idea of what we will be expecting in terms of problems such as troublesome "just before the top of the hill" red lights / stop si... i mean RED signs (haha) and swapping out spares quickly to save time.

Also, looking back, I feel like I joined the team at the right time. I joined while the team was still racing Infinium in Australia and now I will be racing Infinium in ASC2010. Racing a car you didn't build may seem less fun, but I think this will help us to design our next car. I feel that having a good sense of what kind of obstacles the car will face in a race is absolutely essential when designing the car. The process of the team preparing itself and Infinium for ASC gives us the opportunity to generally get familiar with what our next car will need to overcome.

Overall this week was tons of fun, even though we all probably felt disgusting from the blistering heat and 2 days of Base-X with no shower.

It is Official, Mock Race is Done!

Posted Sun, 05/30/2010 - 1:03am by Steven Durbin

After leaving Ann Arbor a week ago the Infinium has finished a Mock Race of the 2010 American Solar Challenge route.

Driver Ryan Mazur exits Infinium at the finish line in Naperville

Infinum reached the end of timing in Naperville late this afternoon. The team was able to complete the route in 4 days which was a huge success for our team.  Over the course of our race Infinium was on the side of the road for very little time, which allowed us to cover so much ground.  Our team has improved so much over the past week.  Going on mock race gave our team challenges we could not have simulated in Ann Arbor.  It has also allowed the entire race crew to bond and become a closer group.

Now that the team has returned to Ann Arbor there are still several things we can work on to improve our performance.  As a team we will iron out some mistakes to finish ASC with an improved time.

Last Day of Mock Race

Posted Sat, 05/29/2010 - 9:36am by Steven Durbin

Last night the team camped on the Mississippi River. The surrounding landscape created a tremendous view in the morning sun.

Yesterday evening we held a team meeting, and decided to modify the schedule to finish Mock Race one day early. Today we will treat Normal, IL as a 15 minute checkpoint and then sprint the final leg to the finish line in Naperville, IL. By finishing today, the race crew can return to Ann Arbor tonight. Everyone is looking forward to a shower after camping in the humid weather.

The weather is great this morning which will allow Infinium to reach Normal in the early afternoon.

Busy Day for Infinium

Posted Fri, 05/28/2010 - 9:27pm by Steven Durbin
The team rolled into Rolla just before noon today and we observed a 1 hour control stop. During this stop we were able to meet the Missouri S&T Solar Car team and enjoyed chatting about the race and our vehicles. U or M meets Missouri S&TU of M meets Missouri S&T After our stop Infinium rolled back onto the road. On our way to Alton, we passed lots of people. It was interesting to see all the different reactions. Some people waved, took pictures, cheered, and there were even a couple "Go Blue!"'s yelled at us. It is amazing to see how many people are exciting to see and learn about solar technology. The Alton control stop is located right next to the Mississippi River which requires Infinium to cross the Clark Bridge. We were able to get a nice video of Infinium crossing this bridge. I hope you enjoy.