I have made two different slide shows…wasn’t sure which style people preferred. Enjoy!

http://s615.photobucket.com/albums/tt235/hrilling/?action=view&current=29e20e05.pbw

http://s615.photobucket.com/albums/tt235/hrilling/?action=view&current=7cd5f87d.pbw

Thursday

We arrived a little later than expected because we were working hard making sure everything was loaded on the trailer and accounting for everything that we might need. We found arriving late wasn’t the worst thing because instead of being in the Upper Padlock like planned, we got to be in the lower which meant a little less work pushing the car around We worked on the car that night making sure it would be ready for tech first thing in the morning. We also found out that we got a 15/15 on the cost report!! So we were feeling pretty well heading into Static day on Friday.

Friday

Well Friday morning started off well. We made it through engine tech with no problems and had fun waiting in lines (which weren’t nearly as bad as last year’s) to do our Tech inspection. First problem that was discovered was that the top of our roll cage was slightly more narrow than we had originally thought. We had to add in a new members in order to protect the driver but over all, not a horrible fix. We went through our design presentation fairly well and think we have figured out ways to make it better after watching some other teams. We placed 27th overall in design (70.68/75 on the report and 72/125 on the presentation). Back in Tech, we found out we had a few more problems than planned so it was back to the trailer to fix them. We eneded up not being able to make it back through the line Friday but knew we would be ready first thing on Saturday morning.

Saturday

As planned, we made it through tech first thing in the morning and passed our brake check on the first try. Now it was on to our Dynamic events. Thomas ran our acceleration event and our times were a 6.2 and a 6.3. This put us in the 30s on the endurance day placement and was a huge improvement over last year David did the Tractor Pull over different types of terrain and we made a pretty good time of under 10 seconds (like…9 something…can’t remember). Aaron did good on his go at the manuevability and only hit 5 cones! So I believe our final time was around a minute long. Our suspension held up well on the actual suspension part of the suspension event. The only trouble came was at the very end when our rear tire found a hole someone had dug earlier. This made us DQed on the suspension event but we’re still way above where we were last yaer overall in the Dynamic events. I’ll be able to put up our official rankings in the next few days.

Sunday

Finally, the day came for the Endurance Race. After a wonderful hour early start (to beat the weather) at 8:30 am…Thomas started us off to a good start with an average lap time of 10:40 when the throttle started messing up. We got the car back into the pits and replaced the throttle and then Thomas could pull around a 8:19 lap. Then Alex got in to finish up the race and with all the water and mud, our kill switch shorted out. This caused our motor to die before we could make our next lap. Once again, back to the pits but still only a minor fix. Alex got back on the track and our last problem came when a hole was cut in our tire along with a missing valve steam :/ Alex still managed to complete another lap giving us a final total of 8. We tried to get spare tires on the car but by the time we were ready to head back, there were only 5 minutes left in the race and they wouldn’t let us back on the track. That being said, we completed the endurance race with a final ranking of 46th. This put us one spot behind Georgia Tech who also completed 8 laps but had a faster average lap time. Last year, our car didn’t even complete the endurance race because of CVT issues.

Over all, our car did excellent this year and there was improvement across the board. I’ll be able to put up the final results soon and give a side by side comparison with last year! So I’ll be putting up some pictures so you can get an idea how the competition went and check back soon for results.

www.sae.org –>go to Baja competition at the bottom of the page to see some results.

Right now everyone in the shop is in work mode with getting spare parts made for the car and starting to load the trailer. Hopefully we won’t forget anything when we head to Auburn on Thursday!!!

So looking at the list, there’s a few more things that need to be done such as mounting things on the car and getting our decals onto the side panels. We finish the engine cover and we should get that on the car once we get the car back. It’s just going to be a very busy 3 days ahead of us. Here are some pictures since I haven’t written in a while. Hopefully I’ll update this everyday while we’re at competition to let you know how we’re doing and put pictures up. The car’s come a long way so enjoy!

Alex getting ready to drive the car

Our awesome floor plate David made

Aaron and Alex hard at work welding the frame

Our 2009 Baja!

You might be on UAB’s Baja team if:

1.      You are on a first name basis with every restaurant, machine shop, and auto parts store owner within a five mile radius.

2.      You have nightmares where the machinery is chasing you

3.      You know your plans every night during spring semester and they all involve handtools

4.      You use your textbook for something other than a pillow

5.      You willingly spend 2 hours learning material from a junior level class when you are a sophomore just so you can finish that one equation

6.      You have taken a nap on the shop floor while the grinder is going

7.      You have ever asked a professor for a homework extension because you were at school all weekend

8.      You know what the standard sizes for tubing and bolts are off the top of your head

9.      You know who Father Time is

10.  You can do conversions, force, stress and moment calculations better than addition and subtraction

11.  You have accepted that 3-5 hours counts for a “good night of sleep”

12.  You see logs as minor speed bumps and mud is a regular part of your diet

13.  You look at the new campus construction site as a new practice track

14.   You begin all of your sentences with “what if we…” or “we could”

15.  You design baja parts when you get bored in class

16.  You’ve seen Tina reach the end of her graph

17.  Your drawing files consist of scraps of any material you can find

18.  You know where the secret stash of moonpies and oatmeal cream pies are

19.  You know that the third time is the charm… ok…maybe the fourth

20.  You know if at first you don’t succeed you can always fill it with weld

http://www.al.com/birminghamnews/stories/index.ssf?/base/news/1237796149220200.xml&coll=2

Only 22 more days until compeition!!!

http://photos.al.com/gallery/4461/Blazer%20Motorsports

Alex has begun welding up our frame. We’re about 3/4 of the way done because we’re still waiting on some of our shafts for the drive train. We want to make sure everything is right on the rear before welding so from the firewall up, we have a nice sturdy frame (minus a few pieces here and there)

Alex welding the frame

Next on the agenda, the cost report was finished on Wednesday night at 10:30 pm (offically done then with all the converting into PDF and double checking).  The cost report was looking to be a HUGE improvment over last years. Well…….that being said, us along with many other teams submitted our excel document as .xlxs instead of .xls (the old excel format) and we were told we had to resend it in and it would be counted late. so yeah…that was not a high point of the week…

We have steering now on the car along with working on brakes and the throttle cable. The seat came in from Cain Awning and it looks great (thanks again Cain Awning!!!) We might need to re-enforce it some with another layer of fabric because of the force we’re afraid the seat might see. Father Time is going to be working on the seat belts/mounting points this weekend and so we should have that done so then the firewall can be put in! David made the front bumper and it looks great. We’re going to be putting in a cool front plate so be on the look out for those pictures soon. We should be getting in our actual tires/wheels today and so now all we’re waiting on is one of the rear shafts so then we can get our drive train together.

Here are some more pictures of our progress:

New seat (so comfortable! like the lazy boy of racing seats)

Car with the wheels on it. Looking great!

David modeling the car

So our car is looking good and progress is moving forward. There’s still plenty to be done so I will keep you updated. The team will be traveling to Auburn next Friday to attend an SAE student night and hopefully win the presentation contest to earn some more money for the team! I’ll let you know how that goes so in conclusion: 27 more days till competition!!!!!!!!!!!!

Alex McConathy, Captain - Jr. in Mechanical Engineering

David Sexton (aka"Father Time") - Jr. in Materials Engineering

Thomas Moland - Jr. in Mechanical Engineering

Aaron Knepper - Jr. in Mechanical Engineering

Scott Mayfield - Sr. in Mechanical Engineering

Haley Rilling - Jr. in Mechanical Engineering

David Saunders - Jr. in Mechanical Engineering

Stephen Williams - Jr. in Materials Engineering

Eric Burns - Sr. in Mechanical Engineering

David working on the seat

Alex demostrating the seat in the car

Mock up of the rear of the car

Aaron and Thomas working at the welding table

Alex using the mill to machine the tensioners for the car

Aaron a little nervous about testing the seat in the car that’s only held together by tacks at the moment…but hey, it held! lol

Seat! Way to go David and David (or Father Time) on getting the seat completed this weekend! Actually right now they’re finishing it up but let’s just call it done Alex will be finishing the welding on it Monday and then we’ll be ready to send it off to Cain Awning who will be putting fabric on the seat for free (Thanks Cain Awning of Birmingham!!!!!!) So with the completion of the seat…maybe soon we will have a stearing wheel and pedal assembly to go along with it.

David (not Father Time David) was working some on the pedal assembly with the master cylinders and figuring out ways of putting it together while Aaron was working on the seat and also grilling some dinner for us tonight (it was delicious).

Alex has been running NONSTOP today to finish one side of the car’s suspension. We have completed and have assembled the front and rear A-arms along with the knuckles and it looks great. Alex designed both the front and rear suspension assemblies and I can’t wait to see how it will fair once we the tires on and have it rolling.

And let me just brag a little on my productivity today…..we WILL NOT be doing the cost report last minute this year. I have sat today in front of the computer for most of the day working on getting receipts in and accounted for along with entering in everything that we have fabricated on the car. Cost Report is one of the areas of the competition that we get scored on and with previous years have suffered a little on so this year we will hopefully see a huge improvment

So now that we have half the car done…this coming week should bring us…you guessed it…THE OTHER HALF! so hopefully the word of the day (Productive) will carry over in the weeks that follow. Our goal is to have the car running by the end of our Spring Break (March 8 – 15) which will put us about a month away from competition! Time is closing in! Enjoy the pictures of our progress!

Alex and Thomas working on mocking up the front suspension with Alex’s knuckle assembly

Tina and Alex working on mocking up the rear suspension and the Drivetrain

Father Time showing off his seat

Left to Right: Father Time (David) and David working at the CNC Lathe

Argh! It’s only letting me put up 4 pictures in this post so I’ll make a separte post with just pictures