4 CAMPUS

IIT SAE projects develop student skills

Charles Currier & Austin Gonzalez
TECHNEWS WRITER & OPINION EDITOR

We’ve all heard it time and time
again - college can be the time of our lives.
For me personally, it was a combination of the
international culture at HT, and the fantastic
interdisciplinary projects that students can
get involved in. Our collegiate chapter of
the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE),
and its auto racing team, IIT Motorsports,
supports one of these mammoth projects:
Formula SAE (FSAE).

Every year the students in SAE
design, build, and race their own formula
st‘y e, open—wheeled, electric race car for the
FSAE competitions held around the world.
The team has been working feverishly to
complete it’s latest design. They’ve put in
hundreds of hours this summer completing
our carbon fiber chassis and brushless hub
motors. The ThunderHawk, their last car,
weighed a scant 604 pounds while pushing
out 180 horsepower and 1000 foot-pounds of
torque. This year, the team looks to drop the
weight, but maintain performance to really
blow away the competition.

This year a new project was
introduced: a gas—powered off-road vehicle

for Baja SAE. The Baja vehicle is all about
reliability through simplicity with its single
cylinder motor, steel tube frame chassis, and
long travel suspension. It also serves as a
perfect introduction into competing as part of
a racing team. The FSAE project, on the other
hand, utilizes lightweight carbon composites,
complex control circuits, and high-voltage
electric hub motors. '

Through this project, team members
and those that preceded them have acquired
incredible expertise in their areas of focus and
have gone on to work for companies such as
GM, Chrysler, Honda, Dallara Automobili,
and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
However, it all starts with incoming students.
No matter the major or what experience
one has, everyone can contribute. There is a
niche for everyone from those in the fields
of business, to computers, to engineering
of all types, the artistically inclined, and
anyone who loves cars or racing. Every facet
is needed to build a team that can create and
field competitive vehicles.

To take advantage of what IIT has to
offer, grow an invaluable skill set, and have the
time of your life doing it, contact SAE today
at sae@iit.edu and visit their shop to check
out what they do when you’re on campus.

September 15 | Hermann Hall Ballroom | 12:30 - 2pm

campussustainability@iit.edu

| Special Summer Issue

Photos by Austin Gonzalez