Homecoming!

The car ride from Fiorano to Florence was pretty bad. The logistical problem I mentioned earlier was a truck swerving into our little racecar transporter, and then radioing another truck in as an accident “witness” for the police report. We were still in our uniforms, so they tried to tell the cops we were racing them. It was a long night.

The next day, we awoke and headed out to the Prato shop where the crate was, and sealed “gravedigger” into her coffin.

The rest was pretty simple… Train to Rome, Taxi to the Airport, Plane to Frankfurt, Plane to LA. We went out to dinner the last night, but we were wiped out. I think we’d all had enough of Europe. It was time to come home.


The Pomona brothers check out.

We ended up with 5th place. We also scored better in engineering than in the dynamic events for the first time in years. This is good, because one of the goals for this year was to change the culture of the team to value testing and engineering over just building and racing. We had a few systems where we really learned a lot about what was going on physically, and we are in a good position for next year… We have a fleet of ex-rookies, something to talk about, and a car that went from 515 lb to 455 lb in a year. And she’s going on another diet for next year.

The guys are already plowing ahead with the design for next year, and reminding me that I only have 4 classes left before I’m team history. (I caught Ross looking up water pumps for the 2008 cooling system, and I got jealous… It’s hard to let go.) There are a few target areas to improve for next year, but think I would upset the team if I posted them here.

We’re being well-received at school. My ME student collogues are asking me about the competition, and professors are telling us we did well.

I don’t want to get all sentimental, but I’m going to miss all this. It was stressful, difficult, and time consuming, but 100% worth it. I don’t know what I’m going to do after I get my degree… I think I want to work on engine systems, alternative power for cars, or cooling. All this new technology, the batteries, the fuel cells, electronics, etc... It all gets hot. Surely someone will need a cooling guy.

If you want more info about the team, email cppfsae@gmail.com, or email me at kjgasperini@csupomona.edu. (Or, hey, if you’re hiring…) I’ve also got big pictures of everything posted here, and much more.

Thanks for reading.

-Kevin

Competition: Day 3!

This was to be the most difficult day for us. We were up against three championship teams, and some good cars. Many of the European teams have well-credentialed drivers who would be tough competition indeed.

The day started with the results for the static events being posted, and we were in third place!

We were behind TU Graz, the Ferrari of the competition. (These guys have an automotive engineering major at their school, two to three teams running consecutively, and come out to lots of the FSAE competitions. Someone told me they had reserved 80 beds at a hotel nearby... They are the team to beat.) We were also just about tied with the other Graz team, Jonneaum graz.

3rd place? One point away from second?!? You know what this means... It’s time to roll out the ol’ stars and stripes!

And with that, we queued up for the dynamic events:

…We we kept it going for the endurance.


There was a bit of a scare because the car didn’t start right away for the 2nd leg of the endurance, but a little throttle solved that. We finished without incident, which is the way to do it.


This woman is Claudia Rossi. She works for ATA, and was really helpful, answering all the questions Jeremy, Cameron and I could throw at her. Thanks, Claudia!

The rest of the day was a blur. We packed up the car, and then headed to the awards ceremony. After that, we took a couple of pictures and then hit the road for Florence.


…And that wraps up another competition.


See you later, Pista di Fiorano... Until next time.

Competition: Day 2!

The second day of competition didn’t start quite as early. Day two was reserved for passing the dynamic tech inspections, and for the design presentations. Here we are, about to leave from the parking lot.

We had spent last night reviewing all of the design presentations, and auditing and critiquing everyone’s performance. Everyone had worked to improve their part of this contest since West.


We entered the track as they opened up, and attended to a few details, such as getting fresh tires mounted.


Looking for leaks on the tilt table.

Fixing leak from failed tilt table test, followed by returning to tilt table and passing.

Right after lunch, we waited for the practice area to open up. These lazy guys were all asleep when I went out to check on them!

Here we are, ready to fly! (Notice the three sticker sections. We get them for safety inspection, tilt table, and noise and brake testing. When you have all three, you may drive in the dynamic events.)

I don’t have any pictures of the actual judging, because I was busy presenting the cooling system. (To the technical director of Lamborghini!) Some of the other guys have these, and would love to show them to you if you drop by for a visit.

After we finished our events, we explored, checked up on our rivals, and left as the sun set.

Day 1 of FSAE Italy

We woke up at about 5, and got to the track at 5:30 to wait for ATA to let us in. We were the first team in line, and ready to go.


We set up before the sun came up, and were ready before most of the other teams had unloaded. This is the team I know. We were the same way in west, just ready to go. West was nice because we were also able to show our fun side with the kiddie pool and the event-sized stereo, but this one was only business.

Enzo’s house.


The awards at the opening ceremony.


Lunch

The rest of the day was spent getting through tech inspection, and going through the little checks to make sure we would be ready for race day. All was well, so after our inspection, we returned to the hotel to work on the much feared design presentation for tomorrow.

To Fiorano! (The Day Before Comp Take 2)

The day before competition, we moved the team and the car to the Fiorano hotel. We split up into two groups, one escorting the car in rental vehicles, and the other taking a train to Fiorano.

This turned out to be a pretty rotten way to get to Fiorano. We took a train, a tram, and then a bus. Problem is, the bus driver either didn’t like us or made a mistake and told us the hotel was “50 meters up the street” when he meant “50 meters up the street after you walk two kilometers.” Still, we arrived. And when we opened up our hotel window, we heard the Ferrari F1 cars testing before the upcoming Japan Race.

We did what anyone would do in our position… We ran the hell over to the track!


Unfortunatley, we had missed the F1 guys. They had stopped the cars and switched to the “I just bought a Ferrari and don’t know how to drive” crowd. We went back to the hotel, and decided to go for a team dinner.


Later that night, with the team tucked into bed, a few of us stayed up to get the paperwork 100% ready for our early day tomorrow.

Arg!

Ok everyone,

Iàm sorry itàs been dead. Competition got a little crazy, and we have a pretty aggressive schedule for getting out of here.

Here's where we stand:

We finished in 5th place.

After the static events, (design, cost, manufacturing) we were in third, only behind the two infamous teams from Graz, Austria. Unfortunatley for us, Stuttgart and Turin (who did poorly in these events) had really strong cars, and did well in the dynamic events.

We were consistantly about 4th to 5th in the static events, and bounced to second because other teams that did well in, say, design, didnàt do as well in the other events. I'll have more on this later.

We drove from Fiorano to Florence last night, just after the awards ceremony. There were a few issues that had come up that complicated matters, but they have been handled

Today, we crated the car. It is ready for its return to Pomona.

Half of the team is returning to CA, and the other half returns on the 26th. The remaining people are divided into two groups:

Cook, Dauphinee, Phillips, Torkay: Driving to Austria tonight, and to Frankfurt tomorrow.
Gasperini, Smith, Olson, Walters: Going to Rome tomorrow, flying to CA the next day.

We'll have more up in about three days. I'm sorry, but the next two days are going to be tricky because there are a lot of logistical details to track down. We want to make sure we get out of here cleanly, and without leaving anyone behind.

Another Update, Courtesy of Scott Borg

Sorry for the lack of updates, we just checked in at a hostel withinternet. The Ferrari track was amazing, the competition was fierce,and it was a good time for everyone.

On Friday was the tech inspection. We were one of the first teams onsite, we arrived before dawn. At the U.S. competitions, teams have to get in line for tech. With a smaller number of cars, the tech scrutineers made their way around the paddocks, inspecting each car in their pit area. We passed tech on the first inspection, and quickly went back to the hotel to prepare for the presentations on Saturday.

We spent a lot of time preparing for the Design, Business, andManufacturing presentations. A few first-year members would bepresenting systems that had been designed by former students, so their veteran teammates spent a lot of time quizzing and coaching them.

We did very well on Saturday, placing 5th, 4th, and 5th respectively. Not all of the other teams were this consistent, so we were sitting in 3rd place going into the dynamic events, which would all take place onSunday. Another difference between the U.S. and Italian events was that all the race events are held on the same day. At the U.S. competitions,the Skidpad, Acceleration and Autocross events are on Saturday and the 20-lap Endurance race is held on Sunday morning.

Ferrari's track time is very valuable, so we were only allowed three days there. This meant that all the racing would take place on Sunday.In the morning, we were pretty fast on the Skidpad, but the officialtimes weren't displayed for spectators to see. After all the carsfinished the skidpad, the Acceleration event began. This was a nicechange from the US events, which run both events at the same time,forcing spectators (and team members without track passes) to miss outon half the events.

During the Accel event, we were able to seeofficial times, and there were at least three-to-five cars that beatus in that event. The most concerning team was TU Graz from Austria,who had done very well at all the other events so far.The autocross event was held before lunch, and again there were a fewcars that were running faster than us. Both of our drivers hit coneson some of their runs, incurring 2 second penalties per cone, butDustin's fastest run was clean.

During lunch we prepped the car for the Endurance race: we wrapped anyoil lines that might leak and cause us to instantly fail. We changedto a fresh CO2 tank, and were a little worried because our larger CO2tank had been damaged a few days earlier; we would be forced to usethe smaller bottle, which might not be enough depending on the courselayout.The Endurance race is always tense for everyone on the team: you haveabout 20 minutes to wonder if something you built in a hurry will failduring the race or not, or if parts will wear out at the exact wrongtime, or if the drivers (from our team or other teams) might make amistake and damage the car.

We finished the race, and both drivers aswell as the car performed well, and I think we impressed a lot ofpeople. A couple of the top teams had problems and didn't finish, sothat could only help our chances at bringing home a trophy. On theother hand, we had been consistently slower than a few of the teamsout there, namely the Germans from Stuttgart and the Austrians from TUGraz.

Going into the awards ceremony, none of the scores from Sunday hadbeen posted yet, so we had no indication of how well we would do. Tomake a long story short, we took 5th place, and although it's notquite a top three trophy, we are very happy with it. Our entire teamperformed very well; we gave some high-budget teams a run for theirmoney, but some of them were faster than us. We got to walk aroundFerrari's private race track, see Enzo's house, and imagine that theirF1 teams were hiding inside one of the big hangars, waiting for us toleave so they could get back to testing for the next F1 race.

In closing, thanks to all who have helped get us this far, and keepwatching Cal Poly because they're going to continue to improve and dogreat things. Look for photos on www.csupomona.edu/fsae andhttp://blogspot.cppfsae.com/ , they should be posted within a coupleof weeks.

1st day of comp.

We woke up at 5, and arrived to the track at 5:30, got in by 6, and kept it going from there. We were one of the first through tech inspection, and are ready to do the presentations tomorrow.

I've got some goo dpictures, but it's bedtime.

Trackday!

Tuesday, Sept 20

Today was a testing day. Once again, we split up. I covered a lot of ground today. In the morning, I worked on my design presentation at the University of Florence. At lunch, a small contingent of our team attended a publicity event for the Florentine team in Piazza San Marco. (We saw them in the newspaper the next morning!) I saw more familiar faces from FSAE West, though we are both too busy to say more than hello.

They put a sticker on for us at West.


After that, I headed to a small go-kart place in the countryside to meet my team for the trackday the Florentines had reserved for our cars. Much of our competition is based on driver performance. Driving this car properly takes skill and experience. After four years of FSAE, Dustin has both. Charles lacks the experience, but the kid is good. Our team is complex, and the driver’s individual struggle is a big part of it.

After some seat time, and a few minor adjustments to the fuel map, (to compensate for the ethanol-free European gas.) the day was up, and we had to flag our boys in.

T Minus Four Hours and Counting...

Right now it is midnight, the day before comp. We wake up at 4:00 tomorrow, and go for broke. Actually, it's going to be getting our car into the tech inspection line as soon as we can.

Still, I am witnessing a level of alertness in my team absent since West, and Dertoit. We are in our element. We are "at comp."

Gravedigger rides again...

A day of Rest...

Sunday, September 16

On Sunday, everything shuts down in Italy. At least, everything we want to use gets locked up… The University of Firenze, Laboratorio PIN, and the Firenze Garage where our car will travel to on Monday for final prep. All closed. So, we decided to take a day to enjoy Florence.

It sucks, actually. I will be spending 10 days in one of the most beautiful cities on earth, one rich in artistic majestry, historical intrigue, and culinary excellence. And so far, I’ve spent all my time working, eating, or sleeping. We decided to walk around Florence, and see what we could.

Still, I found myself talking about the car with my group. Our team does a lot of learning that way… Small discussions. I found out later that every group had started to have their small discussions. Everything on a racecar comes at a cost. Much of the choices we must make in our project are decided by rules of thumb, and by looking at present convention, and history. So, it is important for a rookie to learn why we don’t run a turbo, and this information will be communicated via small discussion.

We wanted to get to a soccer game, but we got there too late. We heard the game though – it was nuts. Some of our team did make it in, though. Dan was telling me it was awesome. He saw people from all walks of life, of all ages, all decked out with their team colors. The game was a tie, and both sides left looking depressed. They wanted blood.

That night, it was back to work. We were figuring out where to get a rental truck, meeting with Italian team members, talking about design reviews, and just getting the team back into a competition mode. You don’t realize how much effort is involved in this project until you take two weeks off to tour Italy.

Sometimes, tuning feels like this.

Until next time!

And for those of you who wonder why we don’t run a turbo, here it is: A turbo helps pull air through our restrictor best at lower engine speeds. Now, when the engine winds up, the effects of the turbo are lessened… because of the restrictor. You gain a lot of low range power, but you also add weight, and lower reliability. A turbo adds weight, complexity, and danger… you might break the turbo, or blow the engine. It is also harder to tune. Now, our shifter is one of the best in all of FSAE. (Thank you Scott Borg, and others before him.) This lets us keep our car in our selected power range better, so we don’t need to worry about flattening out our torque curve, especially when you consider the costs.

The team, according to Borg

Scott Borg sent out an update email and copied me, so up it goes:

Sorry about the formatting, but tomorrow is a 4 a.m. wake up day for comp.

This might be my last update until the competition is finished. We'vegot the car together and running pretty well, and were able to do somedriving at a "local" go-kart track. The track was pretty nice, but itwas a bit of a drive; we realized that we might have an advantagecompared to some of the other European teams, simply because we can todrive around our school's big American parking lot practicallywhenever we want. The go-kart track was pretty narrow with dirtrunoffs, so the drivers might not be comfortable pushing the car toits limits for fear of damaging the car if they go off-track.Our hosts had some rough luck with their car, it seemed like theyspent more time fixing it than driving it this week. Hopefully they dowell at competition, but we're not so afraid of them having a hugehome-team advantage anymore. Our engine could use some tuning becausethe fuel (and probably altitude) is different here, but we've madesome minor adjustments and it seems to be running "well enough" if notquite "good."We're leaving our hostel in Firenze in a few minutes, and heading toFiorano which is near the Ferrari compound.We've been trying to scout the other teams via thier websites, and thecompetition looks to be tough but not impossibly so. If (absolutely)everything goes smoothly, we think we've got a shot at a top threefinish.I'm sending a copy of this email to quite a few people who didn't getmy other updates, because the first few didn't have much news about the FSAE car.

If you'd like to hear more about our progress in Italy,a few of the guys have been publishing updates at http://cppfsae.blogspot.com/

If you'd like to hear more about FSAE and the Cal Poly FSAE car, please visit www.csupomona.edu/fsae

Wish us luck,

Scott Borg

Ok, this post is from two days ago. Update since then: The car runs smoothly. It sounds like it’s still a beast, and that means its probably going to kick some butt tomorrow when we go test driving. Enjoy:

Saturday, September 15

Today, we took a train to Prato, to Laboratorio PIN, where our wonderful car is living.

The car is basically together, and back to its usual state of disrepair. There are a lot of little things to adjust, set, and tweak. We will also have to relocate to set our corner weights, and get our suspension intact.

We have the fluid systems intact, and are now working on the detailed prep needed for rule compliance, such as safety wiring.


And going after those little electrical gremlins…

We are learning a lot about the world at this competition. For example, today Andrew learned that “Gasoil” really stands for “Diesel” in Italian. Whoops.

After that, we all learned how to disassemble the fuel system, clean it all out, and put it back together.

There is a lot to do on the car, but only so many can work on it at once. A number of us returned to the Hostel to keep working on the looming design presentations. By the end of the night, I found out that the diesel had worked itself out of the system, and Gravedigger was purring happily.

First Day in Florence!

Just a note: We’ve got a lot of things to put up, and the blog is a few days behind reality. This post happened yesterday, and I’m going to keep bouncing around. I’m only giving up one spoiler: We started the car. It runs, but just barely. No worries, though. We’ll get this thing nailed down. Now, without further ado;

We’ve arrived in Florence!

It’s been a busy time. We were in Bologna this morning, and we got on a train bound for Florence. Upon arrival, we set out for the Ostello Archi Rossi.

They opened the rooms up, and checked the team in. As the day progressed, the team trickled in. About half of us went to the University of Florence, and visited our wonderful hosts. Their mechanical engineering department is tucked away in their university building, and we were well received by some dear friends who left us in Pomona after our FSAE West competition.

Andrew, Chris, Dustin and Matt had been in town for a day, decorating the car. We are in good shape, but have some work to do. We are worried about the gas, and have completed the major reassembley tasks after the time in the crate. No pics of the car yet, but we’ll get you hooked up soon.

We all had a big meeting that night, and have prepared our secret plans... And that’s all I can tell you for now!

A GP to Remember...

The GP, in a nutshell:

We got up early.

We found our spot.

We watched the Porsche GT2 cup.

We decided Solo2 needs to get one of these:

After the parade, the race began.

Red bull decided to test their driver protection systems during the race.

With Massa's car broken down and two McLarens to fight, Ferrari is in trouble. Their only hope is Raikkonen. Go Kimi, Go!

Hamilton earned 2nd with a last minute pass on Raikkonen.

People really like F1 out here.

And they let everyone on the track after the race. (Hint Hint, SCRAMP.)