Oshawa, ON – A team of engineering students from the University of Ontario Institute of Technology (UOIT) announced today their intentions to transform their new General Motors-donated vehicle into the next-generation EcoCAR and prove that they are the future of automotive engineers who will design and build the environmental vehicles of tomorrow.
“The cutting-edge design technologies that we used in Year One of the competition not only helped us perfect our vehicle design, but also provided us with valuable hands-on experience that will prepare us for our careers upon graduation,” said Mike Maduro, a UOIT Master of Engineering in Automotive Engineering student and EcoCAR team leader. “Now in Year Two of the competition, we are excited to be working on our EcoCAR vehicle and bring it from concept to the road.” EcoCAR: The NeXt Challenge, along with its headline sponsors - the United States Department of Energy (DOE) and GM, challenges 17 universities across the United States and Canada to redesign and reengineer a GM vehicle to further minimize fuel consumption and reduce emissions while retaining its performance and consumer appeal. EcoCAR seeks to inspire the next generation of scientists and engineers by giving them the tools and experience necessary to secure a more energy-efficient future.
As the student engineers from UOIT embark on the second phase of the challenge, they will incorporate a custom designed battery pack with 90 lithium-polymer batteries providing a total of 80 kWh of available energy. A 110 kW electric motor will drive the vehicle allowing it to perform similarly to its stock version. UOIT engineering students and faculty have estimated their prototype will be able to cover a range of more than 400 km per charge. In the first phase of the competition, the team designed a virtual model of their vehicle using advanced software and computer modeling tools, which earned them the keys to the vehicle so they could turn their cutting-edge simulations into reality. Now they have moved on to the physical stage of the competition, and will begin work under the hood of the vehicle and ultimately, take it to the road.
“EcoCAR gives students hands-on design and engineering experience,” said Dr. Greg Rohrauer, a UOIT assistant professor and the team's faculty advisor. “Our students have worked hard this past year and UOIT is very proud of their accomplishments to date.”
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Documents a student engineering competition in which universities compete in modifying a donated SUV to achieve a more fuel efficient vehicle. more
