My Review Of Formula Student 2017

Pic; Stefan Ruitenberg

Hello there!

It's that time of the year, Formula Student time, and what four-day event we had. But first, I have to start off with a little moan. This year's event saw a big drop in the number of cars competing. And I believe this is down to two things: a technical regulation boycott which saw a number of electric teams being given penalties for power modes or that the event in Hungary is just more suited to what they want. This saw the likes of TU Delft, Munich, Aachen and Stuttgart all skipping the Silverstone event.

I find this a real shame, as the cars they bring over really are exceptional, but that doesn't mean exceptional and well-engineered car were not on show, as they were. With these main heavyweights not here, this meant the door was opened for the teams with smaller budgets to really perform. Thus seeing Cardiff University winning the overall event (Typically I never get images of their car do I ...) and the University of Birmingham coming in 2nd place overall.

The purpose of this feature is to look at the technical advancements of 2017, with many great ideas on display. Even some of the outfits with smaller budgets managed to be innovative with their cars. Let’s take a look at what’s what.

Pic: Stefan Ruitenberg

Firstly, I want to talk about the quality that was on show. In the header image is UH Racing and the image above is Team Bath Racing, both of which had outstanding quality race cars. It has to be said that the pair are both well-funded teams, but interesting they run different car philosophies. Starting with UH Racing, who run a steel space frame as a foundation, which saw everything else being mounted too. What I like here is that the space frame is very light, with an overall car weight of 210Kg. Don't forget that car has a full aero package and a four cylinder engine too.

With Bath, on the other hand, they run a carbon monocoque, which is a bit easier to apply the engine and wings too I gather from some of the engineers in the German teams. Amazingly Bath managed to get a total weight of 170Kg, which is very impressive. It makes, my University (Team HARE) car look like a heavy weight boxer, weighing in at 250Kg's. Which goes to show lots can be gained or lost with the direction of the chassis. So think about what direction the car will go.

But, the pair both run similar front wing concepts, we can note a growing trend with the design and application of it. Nearer the chassis, teams nowadays seem to apply small flaps to move the flow clear of the outboard suspension components and upper/lower wishbones. Something used by both Bath and Hertfordshire.

Pic: Stefan Ruitenberg

With the aerodynamics this year, it remained a stable curve with nothing major being on show, apart from Brooks's front wing or maybe Maribor's rear wing end plates, more of later. Starting at Oxford Brookes, their front, which I managed to snap above, shows a more Formula 1 style front wing set up.

The wing see's no end plates, and a fairly advanced cascade and turning vane. Here Brooks is trying to control the front wheel wake via channelling some high energised flow downstream of the chassis so that the rear wing and diffuser work better.

It has to be said Brooks had some nice side pods and diffuser too. But Brooks always shows up with a well-made car. I also love the livery for this years car.

Pic: Stefan Ruitenberg

The other thing I did find rather interesting was Maribor University from Slovenia. Their car, shown above had really long end plates on the rear wing set up, which ultimately ran to the diffuser edges, which I think is a way to seal the floor edges by reducing the vortex it sheds or maybe controlling the turbulent flow of the rear tyres, but I am not 100% on that.

Interestingly, Maribor uses carbon brackets for the rear jack mounting point (orange steel tube at the rear). This is something new to FSUK, and will certainly take out some weight, that's if it's strong enough to support said car.

Pic: Stefan Ruitenberg

Above we can see a more conventional rear wing, as seen here on Karlstad University's car. They even used CNC'd swan neck pylons to partially mount the rear wing set up too. The wing was made up of two carbon end plates with three aerofoils mounted in between to provide the downforce. Again, the quality of this car was very high, and performance was good, thus giving the car 3rd place overall.

Pic: Stefan Ruitenberg

For suspension, I have to admit that I was quite impressed with what was on show this year. With the cars all having suspension front and rear, it is very important you control the loads and forces that go through the chassis, which is why machined bulkheads are now being applied both front and rear of the cars we see racing.

This very set up can be noted in the image above, which is the car from the University of Birmingham. They, like many teams, ran a CNC'd aluminium bulkhead which was mounted at the back of the car. This means the spring and dampers could be mounted on it, over the chassis, thus reducing stress, giving it a longer life.

"Making your car fast and looking great is easy but making your car reliable is what counts" Rob Bartley (Leeds University Mechanical Engineering Student) 

The push rods from the bell cranks went to the wheel hubs, which ultimately gave a neat rear configuration. I think this will grow in trend over the next couple of years.

Pic: Stefan Ruitenberg

For the front suspension, I have noticed a growing trend on mounting the main components on top of the chassis, as years before saw them mounted on the floor, or the sidewalls of the chassis. Here we can see Lancashire University's car, who applied them to the top of the car. And while you affect the aerodynamic performance, I think it's better to do this for loads, as you are able to deal with more vertical and horizontal loads. You can even use this concept to apply a Z-type anti-role bar too.

Pic: Stefan Ruitenberg

Here we can see what I spoke about above, where the spring and damper are applied to the chassis, as seen here on Team HARE's race car. At low speeds, this concept is good as its light and simple, but at high speeds means the forces being applied by the tyre contact patch could break welds in the chassis. So I think it's good to have the extra weight of a bulkhead to deal with the suspension loads.

Pic: Stefan Ruitenberg

While I was walking up and down the grid, I noticed that there was a really high standard of engine packaging on some of the ICE cars. In my image above, is UH Racing from the University of Hertfordshire, who are running a Honda CBR500R inline four, producing 65bhp.

This is the best image I got of the engine packaging, But from what you can see here, it was very tidy, with a nice location of the intercooler and air filter. I was also very impressed with the final drive mechanism and the cleanness of the exhaust system, which made for one high-quality car. I think this was probably the best condition car at the event.

Pic: Stefan Ruitenberg

Another team who showed real classy ICE package was the guys from Huddersfield University or Team HARE. Who for the first time is competing with a Triumph engine. The engine in question is a 95 bhp 675 3 cylinder, which was used over the 1 cylinder KTM used in the year before. The reason for this change was down to reliability. 

Team HATE powertrain manager says “The powertrain packaging for HARE-17 has proven to be challenging because whilst the size of our space frame has remained a similar size to previous years we have introduced a larger power unit in the form of a Triumph Daytona 675 IC engine. As such components such as the fuel tank and exhaust have been optimised in order with the limited space allocated for each. HARE-17 has also adopted a shorter wheel base which means special consideration had to be paid to packaging the drivetrain in order to keep the drive shafts as straight as possible”.

Pic: Stefan Ruitenberg

I would also like to talk about Leeds University Race Team, who managed to pick up the Spirit of The Race award by Willem Toet. For the people who may not know, Willem is a legendary aerodynamic engineer from formula 1, who has the likes of Ferrari, Benetton and Sauber on his CV.

Once the award was given, Leeds team leader, Tomas Brignell said “I think it is a testament to the strength of the Leeds team that members who were part of the team purely on their own volition were able to pass the car through both tech and scrutineering without having been involved in the actual design process. Their dedication and teamwork exemplify everything we as a team and a university stand for. I would like to express my sincerest thanks to both Mr Toet for recognising their commitment and the students themselves for all of their hard work at competition and throughout the year.”

That concludes the technical advancements of 2017 Formula Student UK, where all the teams will have to do it all over again with brand new race cars. And the quest continues for a British team to win the event overall, as this year Wales did with Cardiff University, so a big congratulations goes out to them.

Now, to get ready for Germany and Hungary events!