OBR Newsletter – February 2014

Chassis Manufacture Begins

With the flat chassis panels arriving back from Codem Composites at the end of

January, the team officially moved into the manufacturing phase for the year.

At the beginning of the month the chassis manufacture started with the floor panel,

closely followed by the RHS and LHS chassis panels. The chassis team have been flying

through the build so far, and once each of the panels were popped out of the jigs we were

pretty happy with the shapes and alignment of each panel overall.

We saved another 0.3kg and increased the access to the engine bay by making the

cut-outs into the rear of the side panels. This will hopefully further increase our chances of

reaching the <30kg weight target for the chassis overall.

After doing some test fits and gaining some helpful tips from Luke Evans of RBR we

were able to join the side panels together, and most recently we have installed the

machined aluminium rear bulkhead into the rear chassis.

Matt weighs the chassis down while it is bent around the edge of the workbench

Rear bulkhead curing into the rear of the chassis

OBR Newsletter – February 2014

We had our first design event practise on the 8th of February, where team Alumni

members from Force India, Lotus, McLaren, Marussia, Aston Martin Racing, Toyota

Motorsport Germany, Zytek, Wirth Research and Bosch attended to help give the new team

members a representation of what the real design review will be like.

Overall the ‘Judges’ were very happy with the team’s progress, and were confident

that with another 2 design practises scheduled in the lead up to competition we will be in

top form by the time that we arrive for Silverstone.

The Aerodynamics department has begun to make some real progress with their

manufacturing, and since the foam moulds came back from the hot-wire CNC cutters; they have

been working hard on manufacturing and hand-finishing the fiberglass female moulds. It will not be

long until the first profiles are ready to go, once again thanks to the use of Banbury & Bicester

College’s Autoclave.

The Chassis group completed and submitted our Structural Equivalency Spreadsheet for the

new chassis to the 2014 FSUK and FSG events. The new carbon skin material has allowed us to save a

measured 6.5kg in the skin weights compared to the 2013 chassis, while still allowing us to open up

larger holes for access and cooling into the engine bay.

Thanks again to all of the Alumni that attended!

Fibreglass female moulds in progress

OBR Newsletter – February 2014

It’s also good news for the engine group, who have been able to run the 570cc engine (big

thanks to CamCoat for the piston and combustion chamber coating) on the dyno for the first time.

They have been working on gaining comparison data between the two cylinder sizes, and have been

testing intake runner lengths, plenum volumes and exhaust lengths in order to try to optimise the

performance of the engine for the FSUK and FSG track layouts.

In addition to this we have also agreed a partnership with Swindon Engines. This is a really

promising tie-up; that will see Swindon helping us out with their extensive engine design &

development experience, and manufacturing some parts for our new intake system. We were lucky

enough to get a tour around their facility in Swindon, and are looking forward to more visits in the

coming months.

Looking ahead to March we will be heading out testing early on to gain some track data with

the 570cc engine, and we will be working on the launch control and automatic shifting systems &

driver training.

We will also be attending the Santander awards evening in Headington, to give thanks to the

support from our biggest sponsor Santander Universities.

We are also looking forward to heading back to Base Performance to run some more laps in

the simulator, hopefully further developing the car and track model so that we are able to test

drivers and compare radical changes to the setup and parameters of the car and analyse

performance increases.

Skin shear testing in progress

Swindon Engines joins us as a Sponsor

OBR Newsletter – February 2014