Category: Team Updates
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Testing Sundae
Our team motto is “Test it again”, and we’ve certainly been trying to do that! For Sundae we decided to shift our test schedule so race crew training, strategy model validation, and other testing are biased towards Australia. Nothing prepares you for driving through the Outback in a race like driving through the Outback! But…
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Introducing Sundae
On Saturday July 1 we unveiled our 2017 car, Sundae. It is the smallest car this team has ever built in accordance with the new rules for the 2017 World Solar Challenge, which only allow for four square meters of silicon solar cells, and has an aggressive aerobody with more optimization than we have applied…
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Thanks to the Stanford Precourt Institute for Energy!
Stanford Solar Car would like to thank the Stanford Precourt Institute for Energy for their additional contribution to our project, and specifically welcome them into our Gold Sponsor Tier. The Precourt Institute for Energy is committed to pursuing a transition to a sustainable and affordable energy future, as well as foster excitement for new renewable…
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Just in Time — Our Newest Supporter, Henkel Corporation
Building a solar car takes a lot of materials, and we realized early this week that we had not procured enough of the film adhesive we use to glue the sturdy core in our layups to the carbon fiber in our car’s aerobody. Typically, these materials have lead times of 4+ weeks from the date of the…
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Arrival of Molds & Progression of our Build Cycle
Arrival of Molds & Progression of our Build Cycle On Thursday March 13th, 2017 our team finally received the next vehicle’s aerobody molds at the Automotive Innovation Lab! This was a huge moment for the team, as it marks our initial progression from the ideas and planning stage to the construction of our car.…
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Moving Closer to Building our Next Car
Aerobody, Batteries and BMS Although it’s been very rainy here at the farm, the weather hasn’t put a damper on the progress our team is making. Since our last update, we’ve finalized the final shape of the car we will race in the 2017 World Solar Challenge and will begin construction in the…
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Williams Advanced Engineering
Thanks to Williams Advanced Engineering for hosting us at their facilities in Oxfordshire for a fascinating workshop and design review! We spent two days discussing aerodynamics, composites, vehicle dynamics, program management and vehicle integration and instrumentation with their engineers and also had the opportunity to tour their design and manufacturing facilities and a collection of…
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Spring Quarter Stanford Solar Car
The rules are out and so is school, so we’re diving into a summer of hard work and research. But we’ve been working hard for all of last quarter, too! Read on to find out more about what we’ve been up to. Early in the quarter, we took Arctan out for a test drive in the…
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What have we been up to winter quarter?
We can’t believe the first quarter of this new cycle is already almost over! But as dead week and finals week fall upon us, SSCP is hard at work. These past few months we’ve been very busy recruiting new members and building up a new team, reaching out to sponsors and expanding our relationship with existing…
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Taking Arctan for a weekend drive…
This Saturday we took Arctan for a spin around campus to visit a Society of Women Engineers outreach event for local high schoolers. Even after being shipped across the ocean and hanging out at our lab for a couple months, Arctan drove just fine, answering first question we were asked in the Q&A: “can it…
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New Cycle, New Leadership
Introducing our 2016-17 cycle leadership team! Kelsey Josund – Team Lead (Computer Science 2016 & 2018) Max Drach – Engineering Lead (Computer Science 2017) Gawan Fiore – Strategy Lead (Computer Science 2016 & 2018) Kate Pregler – Electrical Lead (Electrical Engineering 2017) Brandon Solis – Code Lead (Computer Science 2017) Anna Olson & Rachel Abril…
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Summer 2015: Testing Arctan
Arctan has now air shipped off to Australia and team members have flown to meet it, so we have time to take a breath and reflect on our busy summer! Like previous summers before WSC, the team unveiled its new car to the public and set about testing. Unlike previous cycles, we knew from the…
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Wind Tunnel Testing Arctan at AeroDyn
At the start of this summer, the Stanford Solar Car Project embarked on a cross-country road trip to North Carolina to test Arctan’s aerodynamic performance. Located in Mooresville, NC, AeroDyn Technologies was kind enough to discount their fabulous facilities and expert services for our student team. Access to this wind tunnel enabled us to validate our…
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Arctan Array
The array for the Stanford Solar Car Project’s 2015 World Solar Challenge Vehicle, Arctan, incorporates some of the most advanced photovoltaic and encapsulation technologies. The primary component is SunPower Maxeon® cells. These back contact cells increase functional area and avoid shading due to the metal paste from front contact soldering. Once the cells were aligned and…
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Arctan Unveiled!
Thanks to everyone who came out to Arctan’s unveiling yesterday! Sharing our work with the public has been very rewarding, and we truly appreciate the support of the alumni, sponsors, friends, and families in building our newest vehicle. What’s next? In the spirit of our motto, “test it again,” we have lots of test drives on…
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Arctan Unveiling
The public is cordially invited to the unveiling of Arctan, the twelfth vehicle of the Stanford Solar Car Project. The event will take place at the Volkswagen Automotive Innovation Facility on Friday, July 10th at 5:30PM. Arctan is the product of thousands of student volunteer hours of design, construction and testing by a completely student-run, undergraduate team of…
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Arctan Telemetry: Daisy
All solar car teams strive to choose the most aerodynamic design, balance weight with durability and find high-efficiency solar panels and high-capacity batteries. These decisions are far from clear-cut, but let’s pretend there’s a definitive right answer. And let’s assume all the teams have unlimited budgets and, having chosen this right answer, can actually build…
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Manufacturing Arctan: Winter & Spring Update
It’s been a while since our last lengthy update, and since then we’ve built up a good portion of our next car. Our manufacturing cycle began in earnest over our Spring Break, when we received our car molds from Christensen Fiberglass Tooling and completed all of our carbon fiber layups. This marked our composites season,…
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Arctan – Stanford Solar Car’s Next Vehicle
The Stanford Solar Car Project is proud to announce that its twelfth vehicle will be named Arctan. The team has chosen this name in honor of Bryant Tan, an SSCP alumnus who passed away in June of 2014. Bryant joined SSCP in 2010 to design, build, and race Xenith. He helped architect the systems that led to Luminos‘…
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Looking back on 2014
The team’s design cycle for the next race began in earnest in June of 2014, with the release of the 2015 World Solar Challenge regulations. (Naturally, this coincided with a long lull in our blog updates–but rest assured, things are coming along!) Here’s a quick look back at what our team has been up to…
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A Farewell to Luminos Molds
On Saturday, the team said goodbye to the Luminos molds. The molds came out of a generous sponsorship from Christensen Fiberglass Tooling. After receiving the molds in December 2012 and using them for composite layups, the team built Luminos, which placed 4th at the 2013 World Solar Challenge. Since then, Oregon High School Solar Car Team of Bend, OR has…
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Aerodyn Wind Tunnel
The Aerodyn Wind Tunnel has been designed from the outset for performance, productivity, and economy. It has been designed specifically for race cars, by a racer/aerodynamicist. The tunnel was designed primarily for NASCAR Cup, Nationwide, & Truck teams; however, other types of vehicles, like Luminos, can also be accommodated. Gary Romberg – an engineer on Apollo’s…