Assembled for Michigan

FRUCD is fired up for Michigan. Here is the last update before our much-anticipated competition and the finishing touches for our most competitive car yet. 

This past week, our team has also celebrated all the graduating seniors on our team with our second annual team banquet! Hosted at Ruhstaller Farms, the night was filled with heartfelt speeches, congratulations, and goodbyes as the end of the school year is fast approaching. 

Electrical has been collaborating with the accumulator team on new MVP (Minimum Viable Product) items for competition, such as installing waterproofing and subpack thermistors to monitor the battery pack temperature to prevent overheating that could result in damage. During our track day, they reported issues with the low-voltage battery capacity. Despite the setback, it provided valuable insights into the overall operation of FE13. Electrical also did further work on installing sensors and board headers for our telemetry system to help collect more useful data at the track day. In the photo below, our electrical team poses for their last meeting of the season! 

Accumulator reports that the Tractive Battery System, formerly known as the Accumulator, has been making steady progress. The competition rules required our team to install temperature sensors in the hottest part of the modules. The accumulator has installed a module, but in doing so, damaged it, forcing us to use a spare one. This required us to do single-module charging. They also recorded a video for the judges at Michigan that demonstrates how the tractive battery system meets their rules, which should provide a great advantage in the technical portion of the competition. Finally, the Accumulator finished various housekeeping items such as installing a positive locking mechanism on the screws. The Accumulator Team has also been working with the ESDC on the disposal of old tractive battery systems as well as high-voltage training. 

Aerostructures has been hard at work completing the aero package ahead of competition. This past week, composites completed the front wing main element, allowing the team to assemble and test our aeropackage at our latest Thunderhill track day. During the track day, our drivers were given track time to test the aeropackage, validating our work with CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) with reality. Aerodynamics has done further work with simulations to continue validation on different aeropackage configurations and performance conditions. Additionally, Aerostructures as a whole conducted a mock mech-tech and design event, ensuring our success and competence in this section of the upcoming competition.

Looking to the future, Wheel Package has completed the critical design review for FE14, a pivotal step in FRUCD’s next chapter. We look forward to our team’s next iteration and stay tuned for our updates from the competition!