KANSAN.COM / THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN / MONDAY, MAY 3, 2010 / NEWS
3A
ENGINEERING
Remote control models drive future thinking
BY BRENNA LONG blong@kansan.com
Gas gulping, all-American muscle cars paved the road for power and speed more than 50 years ago, but now the sound of motors revving causes the environmentally conscious people to shutter. With natural resources diminishing and a green movement spreading through the nation, cars of the future are slowly starting to roll in.
Popping open the hood of the car industry, students in a senior design class in the mechanical engineering department is researching, testing and solar powering their way into the car market of the future.
Beginning in August, six groups of KU engineering students have crafted six sustainable remote control cars, which are one-eighth the
size of a regular vehicle. These 23-1 inch engineering projects mean more than a grade; they could change the way Americans cruise the highway. From hydrogen fuel cells to electric motors, the 32 engineering students, or the EcoHawks know the market, understand the cost and see the green future ahead.
"I don't think anyone can really predict what the car of the future is going to be, but I think that some aspect of technology in each of the cars that has been built will be in the car of the future," said Chris Depcik, assistant professor of mechanical engineering. "I said this is what I want you to do, and then I let them go about it in their own way."
Once given the task, each team set on a different road.
The teams — AMP, CellMates, Cranofran, Electric Slide, Redline and Slayer — have specific people on their team devoted to tuning a part of their car.
"It's good to get a background in sustainable technology," said Bryan Strecker, a senior from Topeka on the Electric Slide team. "I might not be working with cars, but I would like to do something with solar."
The body cuts through the air, the engine runs off the sun, the frame protects the spinning gears and the suspension smooths the ride. But if, as the song says, "Life is a Highway," these students want to make sure their cars leave the fewest carbon tread marks.
This is the first time the class has
SEE CARS ON PAGE 4A
HowardTing/KANSAN
Members of the Redine Ecolawards, Ben Englebrecht, Austin Hausmann, Travis Schneiwes, presents their 1/8th scale model to the KU School of Engineering Advisory Board members. Team Redine is attempting to build a 1/8th scale vehicle that runs nurex on electricity.
Teams create environmentally friendly designs for cars
TEAM REDLINE
Song: Little Red Corvette
Goal: ultimately high speed.
Created by:
Austin Hausmann, Andrew Bieger, Ben Engelbrecht, Robert Low and
Robin Subrani
BC car cost: S1 700
Estimated full-scale cost: $100,000 to $150,000
Top speed of RC car: tested at 55 miles per hour, theoretically 103 miles per hour
Modeled after: Chevrolet Corvette C6 ZR1
Distance range for RC car: 25 miles
"It should go zero to 100 in a few seconds," Hausmann said.
Distance range for RC car: 25 miles
Experience with cars: This group had a lot of experience with cars, trucks and boats before this project.
Problems: The team broke the speed control and blew a tire while testing the car last week. They have ordered new steel belt tires for future runs.
Difference from the rest: The team focused on creating a fast car at the lowest price possible.
TEAM ELECTRIC SLIDE
Song: Electric Slide
Bryan Strecker, Saleh Alamoudi, John Cover, Chris Jaggers and Cody Moore
Goal: making an affordable electric car
RC car cost: $900
Estimated full scale cost: $22,000
"We want to make it so the average consumer can buy it,"
Modeled after: Ford Focus
Top speed of RC car: 45 but theoretically 70 miles per hour
Distance range for RC car: 30 miles
Battery life: 45 minutes
Battery charges in one hour
Problems: They didn't have a set blue print on how to make their car.
"Something goes wrong every day!" Jaggers said. "A good day is when we don't work on it."
Difference from the rest: The team hand-made components and offers an affordable solar vehicle design.
"Other groups could just go buy their parts," Strecker said. "We had to make all our parts. So they were more just modifying."
TEAM CELLMATES
Song: Slow Ride
Created by:
Chris Billinger, Miles Detrixhe, Sarah Gelvin, Brandon Hursl
estimated full scale cost: $100,000 to $170,000^
Modeled after: Toyota Prius
Top speed of RC car: 10 to 15 miles per hour
Filling hydrogen fuel tank: 333 syringe pumps
top speed of the car to 15 miles per hour
"it's not speed we are worried about" Gelvin said
Why taxis, the taxi would give them a market located in one area. The cars also travel at lower speeds. There are limited hydrogen fuel filling stations across the nation.
The cars also drive at lower speeds. There are limited hydrogen filling stations across the nation.
Problems: Filling the tank with enough hydrogen to run the car.
bringing the tank with enough hydrogen to run the car. "It's sustainable but not very efficient at this point," Billinger said. Difference from the rest: The team is powering their car with hydrogen, unlike the electric motors fueled by solar.
TEAM AMP
Song: Little Deuce Coupe
Created by:
Goal: Create an all electric, plug in luxury sedan
RC car cost: $877
Jessica Lamb, Kyle Combes, Amber Markey, Brian Paddock and Mike Pollino
Estimated full scale cost: $40,000 to $50,000
top speed of RC car. 34 miles per hour
Modeled after Audi A4
Top speed of RC car: 34 miles per hour
Distance range for RC car: 30 miles
Distance range for full-scale car: 300 miles
Charge lithium iron phosphate batteries on car: 20 minutes, normal batteries charge in one hour.
Charge for full-scale car: two hours
Difference from the rest: Lightweight aluminum frame and ability to plug into AC and DC power sources
"If you had solar panels in the backyard, you could plug your car directly into your solar panels, or if it is raining outside or say you are at a super market and there is a wall outlet, in the future, you could plug it in there," Lamb said.
TEAM CRANOFRAN
Song: Fun, Fun, Fun
Goal: create purely electric mid-sized sedan utilizing solar power Created by:
Melanie Gray, Drew Beougher, Alfonso Bortone, Becky Dellwig and Luke Harmon
RC car cost: $650
Distance range of RC car 4 miles
Top speed of RC car: 45 miles per hour
Estimated full-scale cost: $50,000 to $70,000
Distance range for full-scale car: 300 miles
Difference from the rest: Created a futuristic, more appealing car.
Difference from the rest: Created a futuristic, more appealing car for a larger market and powered by solar energy with a small, efficient
motor.
"Deep down there is still a part of me that
keep down the fastest group," Harmon said. "Driving it in the future: Concepts of the car already exist," Bortone said. "The group was confident in seeing cars like theirs in the future."
Song: Mud on the Tires
TEAM SLAYER
Created by:
Goal: Create a parallel-hybrid truck, one biodiesel and one electric motor
Will Pro, Christian Altic, Mike Kuchinski, Joseph McCracken, Calvin Morris and Thomas Prinsen
RC car cost: $1,200
Modeled after: 2007 Chevy Silverado truck
Estimated full scale cost: $50,000 to $60,000
Why a truck: The team decided to look at the industry facing the most criticism for low fuel economy and efficiency. The truck industry is also the slowest to adapt hybrid technology.
Top speed of RC car: 43 miles per hour with single motor, 86 miles per hour with both motors
RC car travel time: one hour at 55 miles per hour
Difference from the rest: The team is running a parallel-hybrid motor ahead their truck. It offers the tenure and mobility.
tor aboard their truck, it offers the torque and power the truck industry needs to sell but still keeps their truck sustainable.
GET A HEAD START ON YOUR SUMMER SEMESTER
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KU Independent Study • enroll@ku.edu • 785-864-5823
HUMANITIES LECTURE SERIES 2009-2010
785-864-4798 • www.hallcenter.ku.edu
An Evening with Mary Oliver
May 5, 2010 | 7:30 p.m.
Lied Center of Kansas
Supported by the Sosland Foundation of Kansas City
The author of 18 collections of poetry, most notably the Pulitzer Prize-winning American Primitive (1983) and New and Selected Poems, Volume One (1992), which garnered a National Book Award, Mary Oliver will share her work and take questions from the audience. Her most recent collections are The Truro Bear and Other Adventures (2008), new poems and beloved classics about creatures of all sorts, and Evidence (2009). Red Bird (2008) was an immediate national bestseller. Oliver is a past recipient of the Guggenheim Fellowship.
"A Conversation with Mary Oliver"
Thursday, May 6, 10 a.m.
Hall Center Conference Hall
This series is sponsored by Kamaas Public Radio. Partial funding for the Humanities Lecture Series is provided by the National Endowment for the Humanities 2000 Challenge Grant.
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