Electrifying Developments

In this week’s newsletter we are looking at some of the work carried out by our new future developments team lead by Yusuf Hussein, along with more innovations for the 2020 car.

Moving with the times

This year, SHU Racing has introduced a new management role to the team to look at developments for future cars. Currently Yusuf Hussein oversees this department, one of his key focuses has been on research and implementation of an electric powertrain to be fitted into the 2020 chassis design which will hopefully make it to competition in the coming years.

Yusuf’s primary focus is on critical components including motor selection, cells, cell stacks and a battery management system (BMS). Currently his focus is on developing a connection system to allow all the cells to have their state and temperature monitored by the BMS.

The accumulator is also being designed and different configurations are being explored in to fit in this year chassis. This is used for accepting and storing energy before it is released as necessary. Yusuf has also sourced all the required sensors and data loggers to use with the motor controller, so that it can rotate and draw power with user input.

Further work to be carried out this year includes mounting the motor within the chassis, along with the development of the reduction gear, and connecting the system to the differential to provide that all important power to the wheels.

Along with the design of the electronic components, Yusuf is producing a long term development plan containing several options for how and when the team will need to upgrade the motor from a single rear to dual rear motors and eventually hub motors, to ensure SHU Racing remains competitive in Formula Student for years to come.

Reducing Vibrations

For 2020, the engine bay has undergone a significant redesigned from previous years, thus creating a greater amount of space to house all the critical components.

Chassis and Powertrain have worked closely on the also development of an engine sub frame, commonly known as the cradle, to make fitting the engine a simpler process. The combination of more space and the new cradle has allowed our chassis manager, Martin Sowerby, to select a much larger bushing to hold the engine in position and better isolate any vibrations, therefore removing a lot of extra noise that has previously led to problems getting below the required limit. With initial testing starting next week we are excited to see how our new design will perform in comparison to previous years.

Meet the Team

The meet the team portion of our newsletter is a chance for you to gain an insight into the team and its members. This week we welcome James Fawcett, a third year on the team who is a part of bodywork and aero department as well as being one of the group preparing to weld the chassis.