News and pics: Rons Bantwal
Daijiworld Media Network- Mumbai
Mumbai, July 8: The students of K J Somaiya College of Engineering, unveiled their latest offering ORI 2014.
The car is a prototype for an International Design Competition at Germany, known as Formula Student Germany. The lightweight car comes with a custom built driver interface with live telemetry system and superior adjustability in suspension system along with extensive carbon fibre implementation as some of its high points.
The competition will take place in Hockenheimring, Germany from July 3 to August 3. The Formula SAE competition is held by the Society of Automotive Engineers and is the biggest engineering design competition in the world. ORI 2014 would be K J Somaiya Engineering College, entry to the Formula SAE competition. ORI 2014 will compete against 44 countries that participate in the SAE Competition to prove their might in the domain of automobile engineering excellence.
The Somaiya team has been participating at Formula Student Germany since 2007 making new race cars every year. In 2012 they became the first Indian team to complete all dynamic events at the competition. The Somaiya team is currently India’s top Ranked student Racing Team amongst the 450 odd teams in India that make such similar prototypes.
The race car was showcased to sports enthusiasts and automobile industry experts at the Somaiya Vidyavihar Campus on Friday July 4.
Shubha Pandit said, "At K J Somaiya College of Engineering, we believe that one of the best ways to learn is through actually undertaking projects. This enables the students to understand real life situations and adapt to them. The advantages of the experience and learning achieved by competing on global patforms is immense. They get the opportunity to interact with respected global engineering companies and some of our students have been selected to work in companies such as Tesla, Apple, Chrysler, Eric Bouelle racing, Bentley/ Aero, Mahindra EPC, Volkswagen Mototsports and GE Aviation. Our approach towards handons projects by students enable the industry to absorb well trained & experienced engineers, who are better equipped to deal with the real world."
The students said, "The experience of working on these projects trains us not only in the engineering aspects, but also important life skills like working in teams, project management, logistics, working as per global specifications and most importantly competing with teams from across the world, while also building good relations with them. Going to a different country and competing builds our confidence."
ORI-2014 has made use of advanced manufacturing processes like Rapid Prototyping. Equipped with a revolutionary eccentric drive train design that enables fine adjustment of drive train tension, the steering wheel contains an interactive driver interface that consists of gear position indicators and rpm lights.
ORI-2014 has a lot of sensors onboard and an on-board telemetry system that enables engineers to view data from the various sensors from 100 m away without the use of wires. ORI-2014 has implemented extensive carbon fibre applications including an entry into aerodynamics by building an underbody diffuser for the first time in its history, making the car light weight at the same time. The competition also sets pace for industry stalwarts to judge and recognise talent at the early age, as the race car that participates in the competition is completely conceptualized, developed, funded and driven by engineering students across the world.