An SAE International newsletter for Sponsors, Faculty, Professionals, and Students

Volume 3 Issue 5

Vehicle updates: pg 4-5

Autocross Fundraising: pg 6

SVEC Banquet: pg 9

Project Lead the Way: pg 9

Writers: John Wolf Tanya Krueger Editor: Jeff Yan

SAE at SJSU is growing up! Our Student Chapter has many thanks owed to the unique individuals that came together in 2008 and gave new life to the SAE program at San Jose State. These students built both the 2009 Formula SAE and Baja SAE vehicle simultaneously, while laying the groundwork for future teams to improve on. These students devoted everything to what they loved, and the bonds between them were strong. They were the key players that really kept things moving throughout the 2009 and 2010 competition years. Today they have graduated and/or moved on to new challenges. Starting this past fall, they left big shoes to fill for the next big generation of students.

The line up of leaders starting this past school year was all new. Every leader was doing something they had never done before. Even though we had all shadowed our predecessors and were familiar with the jobs at hand, being at the controls of a large student organization was a very new thing. Looking back, we have all learned a tremendous amount, and we are in much more capable hands today. Additionally, we’ve picked up some great talent along the way this year. Now, things are much more hopeful and future focused. We have a great team of mostly juniors who are excited to implement their own ideas next year. And given this year’s experiences, they have personal agendas for recruiting new students and passing down their knowledge to the next generations.

Lately we’ve been lucky to have another new generation of leaders step up already and take initiative, so that our more seasoned members can put a greater focus on streamlining our operations and planning ahead. We have big plans for our Student Chapter, so it feels like there is a lot of ground to cover ahead. Staying mindful of everyone who has invested in our success, we realize that it wouldn’t be possible without you. Thanks for all the great times, and here’s to many more!

24,000 miles this year alone.

ROAD TRIP!!!

Altogether, our student teams will travel a total of

ROAD TRIP!!! This May and June, our three vehicle teams will be traveling to four different competitions across the country. The Baja team travels to Illinois, Formula Hybrid returns to New Hampshire, and Formula SAE travels to both Michigan and Fontana, CA. If you’d like to help us transport our vehicles across the country, you can donate through paypal link here:

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@ SAN JOSE STATE UNIVERSITY

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Email: sae.sjsu@gmail.com

Hats off to the Baja team. They are reportedly running on schedule! Their frame is complete, with the suspension system nearing its final assembly onto the vehicle. The inboard suspension brackets are ready to be mated to the A-arms which are halfway done. Here you can see the jig completed and ready for the rear control arms to be welded. These A-arms will be connecting the frame to the uprights, shown below, which hold each wheel package. The power train side is making great progress also. The engine mount is near complete, the axles are ready, and the drive gears for a new rear gearbox have been lightened and are one step closer to final assembly. (right) Stay tuned for more updates!

The Formula SAE team is running behind schedule, facing a couple unfortunate setbacks. But things are looking up, with the final pieces coming together fast for the rolling chassis goal. All systems have gone into parallel development with the frame completed and engine fully mounted, making test fitting much more realistic. The composites team has been very busy creating our drivers seat and pouring molds for increased driver ergonomics. They are preparing to begin construction of our side pod, nose cone, and shear panels.

Left - Morgan Crouch working into the night on suspension pieces. Far left- engine completely mounted into frame

FORMULA HYBRID UPDATE

Make a Difference.

Become a Sponsor! Support project-based learning Many college students today graduate without the hands-on experience that they need to flourish in the work environment. Our program is the answer to this problem! Our students receive special training that puts them ahead of the curve in the professional sector. Through participating, they build skills in: -leadership -project management -team work -critical thinking -problem solving Please join us in our advancement We are prepared to present to you what our fostered relationship may hold.

FORMULA HYBRID UPDATE

Our Hybrid team has been working extra hard this month. Although they are admittedly behind schedule, the team has had a great turnout lately with lots of participation from the whole team. They are catching up to their deadlines with a more organized breakdown of tasks required, with a buddy system for greater accountability and insurance for making deadlines. Things seem to be working quite well.

www.fhsjsu.edu for more updates!

Shown here you can see the suspension A-arm jig completed and the first A-arms finished with their tac welding. The Electric Engineering team has much of their hardware together to control the electric motors and is now focusing more on programming.

Our Hybrid and Formula teams just had our most successful weekend in autocross volunteering! For a bit of background, autocross (sometimes referred to as "slalom") is a form of racing that is a much safer and cheaper alternative to racing on a road course (such as Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca). Instead of racing on a circuit, autocross competitors build courses out of cones in large parking lots, ran in a time-attack fashion. Autocross focuses more on driver skill and vehicle agility rather than high horsepower numbers. Our Formula Hybrid and Formula SAE vehicles are actually designed and built specifically for autocross racing.

Autocross Fundraising

Autocross is about the cheapest racing option out there, mainly because the event is staffed by volunteers. In fact, any driver that competes in an autocross event must also take a turn working one of many different assignments.

And that is where we come in! Our student members from the Formula Hybrid and Formula SAE teams have been showing up to local events to take over work assignments in ex-change for team donations. Our student chap-ter has been doing this for almost a full year now, and we've built some rapport with the regulars. Our team members gave up their weekends and worked all day on the 19th and the 20th in the freezing cold and pouring rain! But it was well worth it. SCCA members donated a total of $1,200 in just these two days! Thank you SFR SCCA for another great weekend!

This event was held at Great America

Tanya and Natallia recording the timing info for each racer

Thank you to Joe Parisi at Therma for giving us a great tour of their huge facilities! Located right around the corner in San Jose, Therma is a large mechanical con-tracting company which specializes in design, installation, and service of environmental systems and manufacturing processes. What astonished us the most about the tour was the fit and finish that went into every single product. Everything was extremely well made!

Thank you to Sandia Labs for an incredible tour of the Combustion Research Facilities in Livermore. Five members from our Student Chapter were able to see inside the research labs and learn about what kind of work actually happens inside. People speculate so much about what exactly happens inside an engine when your fuel mixture combusts. At the Sandia CRF, researchers are actually able to watch exactly what happens during combustion. Using various laser systems to probe inside combustion chambers, huge amounts of data are retrieved that reveal the answers to so many things! For example, researchers are able to examine exactly how carbon emissions are created, so that they can be prevented more effectively. It was a great learning experience, and a really cool chance to see what research facilities are really like! We hope to have another tour next Fall.

Stefan Herkewitz (Formula Manager) and John Wolf (SAE Vice President) were able to attend this year's State of the Valley Conference- a very uplifting experience. This conference is hosted annually by Joint Venture, (http://www.jointventure.org/) and functions like a "town meeting", where concerned citizens and leaders of Silicon Valley gather and discuss current issues. Last year our Student Chapter was able to exhibit our projects with a table display at the entrance to the main conference area with other organizations and event sponsors. Unfortunately we were too late this year in signing up to get a table, so we purchased regular student tickets. The experience that we had being a more active part of the event was much cooler than I expected. There were several guest speakers that presented a variety of issues and speculations on the current status and future directions of our region. Usually, after they spoke, a facilitator came on stage accompanied by a guest with opposing views and the three of them discussed for several minutes. The unique thing about these discussions was that the audience was free to post comments or questions anonymously on a projector through text messaging! It made for a very stimulating experience; this is the part that I enjoyed the most. You see, as a student organization searching for support from our local industry, we can only imagine, "what would we value if we were a sponsor?" The reality is that we are not CEOs, venture capitalists, or seasoned professionals. So, in a matter of speaking, we can only estimate what mat-ters the most to our potential sponsors.

So this was a great chance to see raw, unfiltered thought, straight from the minds of Silicon Valley's leaders. The audience posted messages every few seconds, at times. Sometimes the questions and comments were humorous, sarcastic, disrespectful, insightful, but they were almost always very thought provoking. I paid more attention to these at times then the actual speakers! There was discussion on many hot button issues, like offshore industry versus local industry, recent developments in bay area public transportation, trends in taxes, current investment trends, and overall frustration with the California state government. But there was at least one thing that everyone was generally agreeing on: that the current education system is a big problem. There were cries for making education improvement an economic imperative instead of a social one. But not many offered solutions. Stefan and I were optimistic to see or hear the stresses on education, since the purpose for our attendance was to network and promote our program. We commonly experience the disconnection between identifying problems and having the heart to be a part of the solution, internally in our program as well as looking for sponsorship. It is human nature to want things to be "fixed" without making personal sacrifice. This makes us even more grateful for our sponsors and supporters. It really separates you from so many people when you invest in us!

Be sure to

check out this

year’s index!

On Febuary 8th Natallia LoCicero, Simone Getty, and Tanya Krueger of SAE participated in an event at Henry M. Gunn High School in Palo Alto to promote a new program named “Project Lead the Way.” It is a non-profit organization that brings engineering to middle and high schools. They have several introduction engineering course that introduce 3-D solid modeling, as well as specifics such as civil engineering courses. The students were invited to be on a panel at Gunn High School to promote women in engineering, organized by Lisa Schmidt BSE. Everyone participating spoke about why they choose their field and the many rewards it has. The Associate Dean of the Charles W. Davidson College of Engineering, Dr. Emily L. Allen, as well as HP’s CTO, Susie Wee, were a few of the guests from industry and education. Overall, all the participants each had an amazing and different journey to tell with their choice in engineering. It showed the students that engineering is very multidimensional. The girls from FSAE were also able to speak individually with the 8th graders and answer their questions and comments after the panel was over.

Silicon Valley Engineering Council

2011 Engineer’s Week Banquet

Thank you to BAE Systems for sponsoring ten of our student members to attend! This event was a great opportunity for our students to network with professional silicon valley engineers. Celeste Volz Ford and Terry E. Shoup were honored for their contributions and welcomed into the SVEC Hall of fame. There were several great speakers, scholarship winners, great food, and 400 attendees. We are very grateful for the opportunity.

PROJECT

LEAD THE WAY

Thank You to our SponsorsThank You to our Sponsors