FORMULA SAE

I guess it's way past due for an update.

The 2010 California Formula SAE competition has just finished yesterday. It was one crazy ride. So intense but so much fun. It is also so refreshing and interesting to see the other cars from schools all over the world.

I took some pictures but didn't opt to bring my camera, so they're crappy camera phone pics, for better pics search for "Cal Racing" on facebook, but our historian hasn't uploaded any pictures/videos at the time of this writing (he's probably on his way back home right now).

While I wanted to get involved in a number of things on the team, I ended up doing wiring. I started with some chassis fabrication (tube grindin'!), and general tasks during engine dyno testing. I've always enjoyed wiring, but have never focused this much on making a safe, reliable, and attractive final product. I have learned so effing much about automotive wiring, but I'm still a rookie and there is much more. I really do wish I could get into other disciplines like chassis, suspension, engine, composites, at least a little bit with the little time I have left on this team.

I regret so much not joining immediately freshman year. I have never worked this hard for anything in my life, and my job isn't even that hard.


Auto Club Speedway


Some of my wiring


University of Illinois - Urbana


University of Oklahoma


UC Berkeley getting worked on


Vellore Institute of Technology [India] (University of Leeds members shown also)


University of Leeds [UK] (Vellore Institute of Technology members shown also)


Montana State University - Bozeman


University of Illinois - Urbana Champaign (University of Alberta 2009 car visible on right)


University of Saskatchewan [Canada]- Tech Inspection (UC Davis visible in background)




Universidad Autonoma Estado Mexico - Tech Inspection
Crazy bodywork!


Chitkara Institute of Engineering and Technology [India]- Tech Inspection

FORMULA SAE

So it's official, I've joined Cal's Formula SAE team! I only have a few days experience working with them, but so far I love it. The people are great and I cannot WAIT to see this year's car up and running (which won't happen until next year, probably). The pic is of me in the car from the last competition, blurry because my cameraman didn't take into account my cameraphone's delay when snapping it.

The new engine is supposed to be dyno tested this weekend, I wonder if I'll get to see it, or more importantly hear it.

Why haven't I done this sooner? I haven't really done much with any club at Cal but I can see myself spending 80% of my weekends helping out with this. I loved metal shop in high school (I took metal 2 twice, never learned TIG though, which is hurting me right now), I love modifying/driving my RC car crazily, and I drove my Corolla wagon a little too ridiculously in high school. The only bad thing is I really can't pull myself to do work after coming home from the shop on the weekends since I'm so tired (or maybe that's just an excuse).


If you haven't heard about the UCwide "walkout", well, here is a pic I took from what happened at UC Berkeley. It was so massive I could barely hear what was going on, but the chanting/shouting was kinda fun.

If I get time/energy this weekend, maybe I'll post pics of my laptop speaker repair (it hasn't happened yet by the way, and yes I teased at it during the last post). I took apart my laptop and took them out, and to my surprise, it still works great! However, I ended up with an extra screw, which was very unsettling. I spent an hour partially taking it apart and putting it back together to try to figure out where it went, in the end I guess it's nonessential. I'll have another chance to figure it out soon though, during the repair.