UPDATE!

Unfortunately I've gotten a little behind on updating this blog, so here's what we've been up to for the last month because, yes we have still been hard at work. The lower part of the body is nearly complete. We added the second layer of carbon fiber and after some frustration, got the 1/2 inch honeycomb layed down. We then added the 1/4 inch honeycomb to the curved portions of the body. After letting the epoxy cure to the honeycomb we added the third layer of carbon fiber and let it cure. Once cured, we smoothed out the transition from the 1/2 inch to 1/4 inch honeycomb with and sanded layer of 1/4 honeycomb. At that point, we were ready for the final layer of carbon fiber. We came in Tuesday and got right to work prepping for the final layup. After impregnating them with epoxy, we layed down the final sheets of carbon fiber and applied the vaccum. We came in yesterday and revieled the final layer. It was the nice smooth layer that we had hoped for. We finished up yesterday by smoothing out the transitions even further with some bondo.

While all of that was going on, we continued to work on the steering wheel layups. after 2 thick layers of fiberglass to create the negative, we realized that the wood mold was not going to release from the epoxy, so we scraped it and decided to go a different route. We are working on machining a mold that the plastics lab will be able to create a plastic steering wheel from. this will hopefully give us a nice smooth steering wheel which will be easy to mount the controls to.

We were also able to get the design for the motor housings finished and sent out to be machined. Also, the spider gears that the stator will connect to were machined and delivered to us.

The Frame is set to be fabricated and welded next week, with suspension mounts to follow in the next weeks.

As for the electrical side of the car, well we have been busy there too. Our main fuses and contactors have arrived as well as the power point trackers. The cells for our battery pack should be arriving within the next couple days and there will be a lot of work to do when they do. The senior design teams have been hard at work finishing both the telemetry and LED boards. The schematics for the main power bus have been finished as well as the the all important CAN bus, which allows the different components of the car to talk to each other, and the CAN bus cables have been purchased.

I will put some photos up tomorrow, so keep checking.

Odds n' Ends

I added some links for you guys to check out if you haven't already. You can find them on the right hand side of the page.

As for work, well, it's spring break and we have not had the hands needed to complete the lay-up. Despite that, progress is still being made. We had two important deliveries last Thursday: the machined aluminum suspension parts, and the steel tubing for the frame. We were also given a brief glimpse of the new design of the rear suspension, nicknamed "the dragon" after some artistic interpretation from Tim. David came in on Tuesday and cut the tubing down to size so it can be bent, fitted, and welded. The mold for the new steering wheel has been finished and is ready for lay-up. Abe came in again, and with the proper parts, finished opening the motor for us.