The evolution of formula-bio

Formula-Bio started out as a dream of building a race car with only three students and thereby showing the world that everything is possible if you put your passion into it. In this internship report the story of Formula-Bio and the reasoning behind the FB01 can be found. A large part of the report is about the modifications it took to make the FB01 to be the car that is was supposed to be; a robust, lightweight car that could give the thrill of fast cornering while still being environmentally as clean as possible. As you will find in the introduction it all started in July of 2007. At this point the journey of building a racing car with only three students began. The platform was going to be Formula-Bio, a self engineered racing category that has all the thrills of a racing car but with an environmentally safe character. The basic restrictions were that the car would run on a "green" fuel, would be as lightweight as possible and that 95% of the people should fit into it. Bio-Ethanol was chosen for the fuel, hence the marketing name Formula-Bio. The first car would be named the FB01. In the following two years the members of the team worked long days and many hours to realize their dream. At the beginning of 2009 the car was presented as a rolling chassis with the engine fitted into it. After this the team worked for another half year to make the engine run and to make the car driveable. Finally in August of 2009 the first few hundred meters were clocked on the FB01. Unfortunately a few problems occurred and the team decided to first test the FB01 and some loose parts of the FB01 in a test-environment. At this point this internship started. The goal of the internship was to make the car drivable and robust enough to race. First the suspension of the FB01 was tested on failure. These results let a need of stiffening and improving some suspension parts. Furthermore, the plumbing of the cooling system and oil system had to be redesigned, produced and fitted into the car. Remaining tasks were to make a robust shifting mechanism, improve the human interface, install launch and traction control, and build telemetry on the car to read out suspension and braking data. In addition it was desired to re-calibrate the engine and shifting mechanism. Furthermore, to find out if the suspension is though enough and works well, a shaker test should be performed during which the car will be excited over a specific frequencyrange at each wheel with interaction between the exciting of the wheels. During the internship the suspension parts were improved, the new cooling systems were fitted into the car, and the new control systems together with telemetry was designed and placed. Furthermore to make the robust shifting mechanism the car was equipped with a throttle-by-wire system. The remaining tasks after the internship are, calibrating the new shifting mechanism and throttle-by-wire system, placing the accelerometers, and preforming the shaker test. At the moment of writing the calibration of some systems has began and are preformed at the roller test bench of KMS (Kok Motor Sports).