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December 20, 2017

Podium finish for UOW Motorsport

UOW Motorsport claims silver in FSAE Australasian Championships.

A fuel leak, a broken spark plug and a close call with mandatory noise testing weren’t enough to stop UOW Motorsport from taking out silver in the recent Formula-SAE (FSAE) Australasian Championships.

FSAE is an international competition that requires students to design and build an open wheel, formula-style race car. The cars are then pitted against other local and international teams in a series of static and dynamic events, including design, cost, acceleration, one lap sprints and endurance events.

The event, held across four days in early December, gives engineering students the opportunity to develop their skills in design, management, manufacturing, communication, research and business operations.

Around 40 UOW students, who form part of UOW Motorsport, worked across two vehicles, working furiously to ensure each vehicle was competition ready. After 16 years of building internal combustion (IC) racers, UOW Motorsport made the decision to build an electric vehicle (EV).

With intentions of the EV evolving throughout a two-year project, the team took the prototype along to see how it fared with race judges – passing most of the technical inspections for the static events category.

Despite several challenges faced by the team, the IC racer finished in second place in Skidpan, Endurance and Efficiency, and second place overall.

Nearly all Australian states were represented, with a number of international competitors from Japan, India, Pakistan and New Zealand.

Associate Professor John Montagner from the Faculty of Engineering and Information Sciences said the team worked tirelessly throughout the year to ensure the vehicles were race-ready.

“This is my 15th competition and I continue to be impressed by the camaraderie our teams display and just how good they are at problem solving, an excellent skill in engineering,” John said.

“The whole competition is a tremendous learning environment.”