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After a strong showing by UOIT Motorsports at their first competition at Formula SAE West in California, the team went to Formula SAE in Michigan with high hopes of a strong finish. The trend of a small, strong group of team members continued as the team increased their size by one from California, taking 6 members to the event to compete. Day 1, Tech. Inspections went rather smoothly, with the car needing only minor work to pass on the second try. The tilt test, noise test, and brake test were all passed on the first attempt. Day 2, static events. The team split up between working on the car and travelling to different presentations with and without the car. All presentations finished respectably with excellent feedback coming from cost and design presentations. Day 3, dynamic events. The team headed to acceleration, turning in a standing start time of 4.643 seconds over 75m. Moving on the the skid pad event, the team turned in a time of 5.577 seconds on a 15.25 diameter circle. The day ended with the autocross event. High expectations for this event turned into trouble for the team. After the first attempt with the first driver, the car had a front hub failure, and couldn't finish the rest of the attempts. A dissapointing time of 55.271 seconds was set. Day 4, endurance event. After a long night of repair, and thanks to the Daimler Chrysler Proving Grounds, the team repaired the damaged hub and was prepared to tackle the endurance race. The first stint went flawless, with 0 cones, and very consistant, things were looking very positive for a strong finish. After the driver change, the pace was picked up sligtly, and on the third lap, disaster happened. On a high speed transition area onto the banking of the superspeedway, a steering arm broke, forcing the car to retire. With the F2007 car retired, the team is planning to take lots of learning experiences from the competition, and use them towards future events for the F2008 car, starting with Formula SAE West at the end of June |
