Steve Fox. Body Work. Cost Report.

Steve Fox (Michigan competition chief design judge) came to Cedarville on March 13th to give a presentation on learning from the past. It was a great time for our team to get feedback on our design and change some things before it was too late. The team enjoyed showing off all of our hard work and learned a lot.

Body work is a labor of love. For anyone that has never made body panels before be prepared for a lot of sanding. Currently I'm in the process of making the male mold for the body and sidepod. We started out with a SolidWorks 3-D drawing of the car, then I took that and made cross section drawings of the car every 4.5 inches and cut out stations using MDF board. Once the stations were in place we covered it in foam insulation to connect the stations together. Last night I started filling the cracks and covering the foam in drywall paste. Today has been lots of sanding and more filling with drywall paste. We are still a long way from a completed painted body panel but I'm just going to keep sanding.

As part of our competition we are required to make up a cost report of every single thing that is on our car. This is an insanely tedious task but it must be done. The real problem is that is taking away time from putting our car together. It is also turning out that something that are saving us money like making a carbon fiber intake instead of a rapid prototype is actually costing a lot more in our report. This is because the report is costed out over 1,000 cars instead of just 1 and for us the labor is free.

- Wes

Steve Fox

Wooden stations

Dustin adding foam

Scott excited about the expandable foam and the complete mess we made

After I fixed the foam mess and it was all covered

After the first layer of drywall paste was applied

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Still rough paste application

After I sanded off the rough edges

Painting Update

Last week Dustin and I were able to get all of our painting done for the frame and the A-Arms. It took a lot of time to strip the frame am clean it but the car looks really good now. As a side note, personally if I were to do it again I would not paint the frame and A-Arms this early. It seems as soon as it was painted something needed to be moved, changed and re-welded or someone else scratched the paint off while putting the seat in or attaching a brake line. This means I'll eventually have to repaint the car or at least do a lot of touch up which could all have been avoided by waiting a few weeks.

-Wes

Painting the A-Arms

A-Arms hanging out to dry

Starting to paint the frame after finishing the primer on the frame

Painting the frame

Nearing completion

Inside the frame

Brian and Scott working on putting the car back together

Paint!

Performance Paint and Supply just sent me home with everything we needed to paint our frame, A-Arms, and body all FREE OF CHARGE! A huge thank you goes out to the guys out there and all the help they give us.

- Wes

All of the paint supplied by Performance Paint

The 2010 Jackets Racing Car Color

Running Car? Check.

This week has been a whirlwind for our team. We went from having a half welded frame on Friday afternoon (February 26th) to having a running car on Thursday (March 4th). To call it a miracle would not do our team justice. It took blood from Dustin, Andrew, Nick and a few other team members. It took sleep, from pretty much everyone. Finally it took the dedication and faith from our entire team to put Kimberly together. Even though we did miss our deadline by a few days it is the earliest a Cedarville team has ever had a running car and that is something we are all proud of. Now that it is all put together we are in the process of tearing it apart so we can have the frame painted and the car reassembled and driving by this coming Saturday. What is the rush you ask? Well, the longer we wait the less time we have to drive and test our car and as a special bonus Chief Design Judge of the FSAE Michigan competition will be coming here on Saturday.

- Wes

 

Pressing bearings into the front upright

Front uprights fully assembled for the first time

 Scott's engines on the stretcher

Matt K. working on the front suspension

Andrew adjusting the rear A-Arms

The Engine team working on wiring

Almost rolling chassis

Ben working on the pedal assembly

Dustin and Jon heat treated our tulips

Wiring being put in the car

Andrew posing for his vanity picture

 Setting up the car on the dynamometer

Car running for the first time on the chassis dyno!

5:39

It's 5:39 A.M. and 12 people on the Formula team are still in the shop trying to get the car running under it's own power by midnight. It's been a long night and it is going to be a rough day.

- Wes