We just finished the 19 th annual Solar Car Challenge at Texas Motor Speedway. Twenty teams from across the country competed in this year’s challenge. Our car, Aurora, entered again this year. Aurora has been strong all year and made it through the toughest scrutineering (qualification process) ever. The race officials clarified a lot of rules that caused all teams to rework parts of their car that had previously passed inspection. We, along with 5 other teams, had to move our main fuse.
On Monday, our car was the first to pass scrutineering and be cleared to race. We were also the first on the track. 5 minutes and ¾ of a lap later, we were the first to break down. The motor shut down and would not start up again. The team worked on the motor and found a small short circuit that came into being on the first lap. We were finally able to get the car repaired and cleared to race again for Tuesday morning.
On Tuesday, we started again, but had to bring the car in at the end of two laps. The power was spiking again and the car was showing signs of stopping. Just as the car came off the track, the brakes completely seized up. The students had to pick up the car to get it out of the way of the other cars and remove the brakes so we could get it into the garage. The students went to work on the brakes and got the car cleared again to race that afternoon. In turn two, the car stopped on the track and started smoking.
Back in the garage, we found that half of the main battery wiring was burned up and the motor had a melt-down. The students fanned out and within 30 minutes had borrowed a motor and had it back on the car. They had also replaced all of the burned wiring. The biggest obstacle was finding the source(s) of the problems. We found two problems. A loose bolt in the rear suspension caused the wheel to tilt slightly which bound up and collapsed one of the brakes. The splice from the moved fuse was not done well enough and caused a massive restriction in the power cable and was literally blowing holes in the rest of the main power system. By Wednesday afternoon, we had replaced most of the main wiring and while checking for other short-circuits in the system, caused the controller to short out. Again, the students went out and found a replacement.
By Thursday morning, we were able to get the car running well enough to get out on the track and run again. Unfortunately, we were having to do this without the solar array (a blown switch that couldn’t be replaced) and with a bad brake that would take another 24 hours to replace. That morning, the car did a full lap and a half before having problems. The car inched along through the rest of the lap and came in on “fumes”.
All said, I am extremely proud of the effort that the team displayed. Throughout all of the issues, they never lost faith that they would get the car back on the track. By the end of the race, the team were presented with two awards. The first was from the race organization for the teams work supporting the solar car community by taking the car to various showings and news events all year. The second was presented by another team. Each day, the team with the most laps completed is given a trophy. On Thursday, the Houston, Mississippi team gave their trophy to our team for their non-stop drive to get the car back on the track in spite of having two different systems completely crash in the middle of the race.
Everyone should be proud of the job that the team did last week. It is hard enough to have a completely working car suddenly stop at the very start of the race. On top of that, they had 4 different systems on the car crash. Through it all, they kept their heads up and pushed through to see that the car did get back on the track and used up every watt of available power.
As further evidence of their dedication and strength, one of our team leaders for next year, Lexi, has decided that we will field an all-girls team as well next year. She is taking on the challenge of getting more girls involved in our STEM program.
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