One of the most fundamental decisions guiding the construction of the car is the choice of materials. The strength and weight of materials used decides the size and type of stock used to create components, as well as dictates in part what manufacturing techniques we can use. This dependency also works in inverse, for example […]
For the braking system, we are using brake discs and calipers from bike brakes, including cable activation via lever. When thinking of brake design and the uniquely shaped chassis, we decided we should use the simplest braking method for a prototype. The Solar Car Challenge requires a dual braking system, with separate pedals activating each […]
Just recently, we have shifted our Three-Dimensional Modeling software from Autodesk Inventor to Dassault Systems’ SOLIDWORKS. Between the program’s there have been many advantages in using SOLIDWORKS over Inventor, namely the real world application and use of the program allows us to make more critical design decisions without having to build anything. The featured image […]
UNDERSTANDING AND PROTOTYPING For our initial steering design, we decided to use a rack and pinion connected to a U-joint, which would connect to the steering wheel. To come up with the design, students visited a golf-cart services shop where they looked at the steering components on golf carts to get a better understanding of […]
One of the first design priorities was creating a fundamental chassis as a foundation for the rest of our car. This decision would guide the rest of the design process. Therefore, we began with the basics. We started by reviewing past designs to generate several ideas for the basic car geometry. From this preliminary brainstorming, we reached […]
