Welcome to the Society of  Automotive Engineers

Student Chapter at University of Wisconsin Milwaukee

 

News

April 20, 2009

 

Opelika, Al- UWM SAE took a long grueling hike down to NCAT testing Facilities in Auburn, Alabama to debut its long awaited Chassis #42. The team left promptly at 4:00 am on Wednesday morning and arrived in Valley, Alabama at 9:00 pm that night. After a decent rest the team arrived at the competition site and registered.

                 After registration Chassis #42 was rushed into the Briggs & Stratton Engine check where the engine was adjusted and released for the competition. By being one of the first teams into the engine check UW-Milwaukee was also one of the first vehicles to get their frame checked in the Inspection tent and was awarded a number to begin full inspection the next day. While transferring the vehicle between each line the left rear tire began to seize up. After passing Frame Inspection the car was raced back to the paddocks where the team noticed an assembly malfunction within the CV carriers. Kyle Beutin, Kyle Neubauer, and Andy Block disassembled the rear suspension, repaired the worn out CV carrier, and checked the remaining pieces for any sort of damage. The team then reassembled the rear suspension and called it a night.

                 The next morning UW-Milwaukee SAE arrived early at the track in order to jump into the front of the inspection line. During Technical Inspection Cody Krueger was selected to represent the team as the remainder of the team watched from outside of the tent. After Technical Inspection was finished the team had a few minor and a few major problems that were promptly addressed. SAE required that the team show proper proof of purchase for its suspension hardware, replace hardware within the pedal assembly, and that the team should place a steel ban around the modified Polaris Clutch Cover.  Team Secretary, Chris Ehlers did the team a huge favor by having the SAO office email the team receipts for its hardware purchases.  Kyle Buetin worked on the Clutch cover while Cody Krueger replaced the hard to remove bolts from the pedal assembly.  The remainder of the team worked on adding extra rollbar padding, protecting sharp edges, and safety wiring the brake calipers. After most everything was finished the team ran the vehicle back to the inspection line just in time to get a recheck done before the site closed. The vehicle passed, with the exception of the modified Polaris clutch cover which was still in progress at the time. With only one item remaining in Technical Inspection the team would be ordered to the front of the Technical Inspection line the next morning. After finishing the Clutch cover the team called it a night.  When they returned in the morning the car was rushed to the front of the tech inspection line where it finally passed full tech inspection.

                 Once the sticker was placed on the vehicle the car was pushed to the brake check area. Driver, Kyle Neubauer was able to lock up all 4 tires using the Wilwood single piston brake caliper’s on the first run. Chassis #42 had achieved it full tech sticker and was now able to run in the Dynamic events.

                  Driver, Andy Block managed to pick up nine tenths of a second on his second acceleration run with a time of 7.90 seconds. Kyle Neubauer drove a solid traction time as Chassis #42 was able to pull the Polaris Ranger over the various terrains. After a quick lunch break the team headed toward the event hill where they would try the dynamic event Suspension and maneuverability.

                  Andy Block was selected to drive the Suspension event and with no wait the vehicle was ready to go through the rigorous course that would test every aspect of vehicle suspension. The vehicle began the course with a bang, and the frame bottomed out on the cement tube causing a dent in the frame and a crumple within the aluminum underbody. As the vehicle made it’s way around the course suspension seemd to be working quite well. However, when the vehicle reached the crevices within the course the rear suspension hyper extended as the differential kicked in. The CV cage could not withstand the immense torque of the engine and shattered when the wheel made contact with the edge of the crevice. The shatter within the CV ended the suspension event run and the Vehicle was towed back to the paddocks.

                 Once within the paddock,  Kyle Beutin was able to diagnose the problem as terminal. If the part would be replaced, the same failure would occur in the same situation. Rather than modify the engine and transmission placement the team thought it would be too much of a risk to replace the expensive CV and decided to pack up the hauler and return to Wisconsin. Even though disappointed the team knew it could learn from the events that occurred at SAE Alabama.

                 Chassis #42 was able to make it through technical inspection; this will allow the team to pass Technical Inspection a lot faster in the SAE Wisconsin Competition. The vehicle was not properly tested prior to this competition and also weighed in a hundred pounds heavier than was expected. The Vehicle also suffered its major driveline failure that relegated UW-Milwaukee BAJA SAE to a 79^th place finish out of 100 vehicles. A lot can be taken from the events in Alabama and a lot can be improved prior to a home town showing for UW-Milwaukee in Burlington, Wisconsin.

November 17, 2008

April 10, 2008

Lots of machine work needs to be done. Contact Cody or Colin to help out. The SAE shop has been re-organized and cleaned up so please try to keep it clean. Montreal race is coming up in a few months remember to get your passport. If anyone else is interested in signing up for either Montreal or Peoria you must register for the race through sae.org.

Dear SAE Supporters and Team Members,

The UW-Milwaukee Society of Automotive Engineers Baja Team recently participated
in the 2008 Baja SAE International Competition held in Montreal, QC, Canada.
The details from the competition are in the attached race recap.
                                  Recap will be posted soon.
We would like to thank everyone who has helped us this past year.  I would like
to send a personal thank you to everyone who I worked with over the past two
years as president of the organization.  We accomplished a lot over the past
couple of years, our organization has grown, and most importantly the active
members have gained priceless engineering and leadership experience.  None of
this would have been possible without the support from our sponsors and the UWM
College of Engineering and Applied Science.  From this point forward, all SAE
business should be directed to the new organization president, Mitchell Crawford
(msc@uwm.edu).  The new officer core is very excited to continue on with the
projects that we have started and I am confident that they will have a
successful term.

Have a good summer,
Cody

July 13, 2008

Hey Guys,

Last week we got the seat mounted, spindle parts, rear body panels (although some modifications are needed), side body panels and a card stock sheet done.

This week we will be focusing on:
1) Making the firewall
2) Making the under carriage of the car
3) Mounting the LED tail light
4) Mounting the body panels (only if Kyle B. is there to conduct it, however)
5) Brake balance adjuster mounted
6) Possibly look at a battery box design

I will be in Tonight (Monday) and Tomorrow (Tuesday) evening to go over some stuff, and work on the car. However, I have two tests coming up later this week, and must study for those. I will be going home this weekend (leaving here at Friday around noon) for a wedding back home

It is Andy Block's birthday tomorrow. Happy Birthday!

Other than that, everyone have a good week!

Mitch

October, 5 2008

We have finally solidified the dates of the Stout, Alabama and Wisconsin SAE Baja trips.

Stout will be from November 7th-9th.
SAE Alabama will be from April 15th-20th.
SAE Wisconsin will be from June 10th-15th.

The jury is still out on the MTU Winter Baja , however it will most likely be on the second week in February.

We are opening up Wednesday nights starting at 7:00, in addition to our Thursday night work nights that start at 6:30. You are free to come to either Wednesday, Thursday or both nights, depending on what works best.

The upcoming weeks will see more and more work that will need to be done in preparation for the Stout race. If you have not been in already, feel free to come in either of the nights!

October, 16 2008

We have made T-Shirts for SAE and we need to know if you what to order a shirt or two.  
1)The cost is $7.00 per shirt for SAE Members.
2)Public purchase or (NON-SAE Members) will be $10.00 per shirt.

The deadline for the shirt orders is Wed Oct. 22nd

I have some great news! This weekend, we came in 3rd place out of 21 vehicles at the 3-hour UW-Stout invitational endurance race!

Other schools in attendance included UW-Madison, UW-Stout, UW-Platteville, Iowa State, The University of Iowa, Michigan Technological University, the University of Illinois and Wichita State.

At the end, we were one of only five cars still running when the race ended. We were edged out by two of Michigan Tech's cars, both of which are considered to be the best in the Milwaukee Section.

We also  received some press, in the local newspaper ( equivalent to the Journal Sentinel for the Chippewa Valley and Eau Claire region). In the link below, you will find a picture on the right side. Ours is the car that is furthest to the right of the three cars.

http://www.leadertelegram.com/story-news_local.asp?id=BI9J5VMAGK5

February 18, 2009

 

UW Milwaukee Motorsports unveiled a new paint scheme for the Winter Race in Houghton Michigan. New member Ryan Tretow, quickly put his skills to use by painting and decaling Chassis #41 to resemble an early American World War II fighter plane. After completely tearing the vehicle down to the frame, removing the remaining Stout mud, and rebuilding it with some minor changes, a courageous group of six spent  six hours of travel time to get up to Houghton, Michigan on the Keweenaw Peninsula.

 

On race day Ryan Tretow started Chassis #41 on a slick track. After gaining a feel of the track he managed to maintain position while the track became slow due to the number of cars getting stuck on the numerous jumps. After a quick on track refueling Tretow brought the vehicle to it’s scheduled pit stop. Chris Kleinhuizen then piloted the vehicle to a strong few laps before a spinout and accident left the tank limping around the track on a flat tire. Mitch Crawford, Cody Krueger, and Ryan Tretow replaced the tire in the pits under record timing of 1 minute 45 seconds. Chris returned to the track and continued to lay down good lap times on a track which was relentless on its drivers. During the Intermission the team was up to 15^th position out of the 41 competitors. After a couple of ratchets and hammer blows the vehicle was ready for its second race. Andrew Block hopped into the driver seat for race two and managed to take advantage of the better track conditions and fully engaged CVT transmission to become one of the faster vehicles on the race track. After a fast hour the team brought the vehicle down pit lane for service. Block jumped out and handed the wheel to Andy Rux. Another quick pit stop put Rux in great position for the final leg of the race. After a couple seemingly flawless laps  Vehicle 41 had finally made its way toward the front of the field when a devastating blow to the right front suspension shattered both ball joints bringing the hard charging 41 to an abrupt halt. Yet again another miraculous unscheduled pit stop put a seemingly destroyed vehicle back onto the track in order to pick up 4 more crucial laps which aided the team to a 14^th place finish.

 

UW-Milwaukee’s BAJA SAE program returned to campus with their heads up high for they had managed to defeat 27 teams on route to a solid 14^th place finish. A finish which did not speak the volume of the way their pit crew had reacted to adversity and how all of its drivers reacted to the changing track conditions.  With an upcoming race in Alabama,  and its new vehicle close to completion the team has no time to unwind as it has yet another race to run. A race to finish it’s much anticipated 2009 vehicle.