In the business office, we’ll be catching up with our mail and email, and getting the fall newsletter sent off.  Feel free to write or call; we’ll on campus until the 23rd.

Most notable though is the progress of a new telemetry system to monitor the car and assist in determining race strategy.  Two recently graduated team members, Asa Williams and Matthew Piatt, have generously agreed to develop a new system to meet our specific needs.  The project is already producing early prototypes, and we plan to start implementing the designs into the car itself when we come back in January for the Winter term.

Work continues on the second upper body, and we will soon be installing the ribs that provide structural support.  Also, our Fall newsletter is now being finalized, and should be sent out in the next couple of weeks.  If you are not currently on our mailing list, send us an email at solar@principia.edu and we’ll be happy to add you to the list.

Thanks for reading!

Tom Brownell, team leader

With a firm target in mind, we will start making the arrangements to race overseas.  I hope to post a list of parts, equipment, and resources that we will need that could potentially be donated (please don’t hesitate to let us know if you have any ideas to support this opportunity).  More details about the race and our participation will appear in our upcoming newsletters.

Last weekend was Homecoming at Principia College, and we were able to have the car on display at the football game.  Thanks to everyone who stopped by!  Next week we will be visiting the Rotary Club of Alton, and displaying the car at Principia Coast-to-Coast.  As always, we appreciate everyone who has, and continues to support our project and our goals.

Tom Brownell

Team Leader

Last week, we also got the opportunity to give a presentation to Principia’s Autumn Session participants. Steve Shedd, a faculty adviser, gave a power point presentation about the history of the solar car program here at Prin. Afterwards, several team members stayed to answer questions. The Autumn Sessioners were all excited to hear that we had a newsletter that we send out once or twice each quarter. (If you would like to receive our newsletter, email your name and address to prinsolar@principia.edu.)

This Saturday is Homecoming, and we will have Ra 7 on display on the practice football field from 11:30 am to 1:30 pm during the Homecoming football game. Several team members will be there to answer questions. Hope to see you there!

Peter Chaney

Car Leader, Principia Solar Car

Up in the office, the business team has been working hard to put together a proposal which we will submit to the school in regards to our participation in the 2009 World Solar Rally.  Racing in a country on the other side of the globe is a major undertaking that will require a lot of support from on and off campus.  Besides finding the funds necessary to ship the car and the team around the world, some sort of plan will need to be worked out so that being off-campus for a couple of weeks during the middle of the term will not affect their other course work in a negative way.

We are also hoping to utilze the fact that this Fall term will be finished a week and a half before Thanksgiving, and keep part of the team on campus during that time.  Having opportunities to devote extended periods of time to the project without having a full course-load outside of solar car is extremely helpful, and we hope to use the time for a variety of projects, including sending some students to training seminars for our NX computer-design program, taking the car to visit local shops and businesses that helped us to build parts of it, and focusing some time on fund raising and sponsorships.

Tom Brownell

Team Leader, Principia Solar Car

The outreach event at the Green Homes and Renewable Energy Festival in Mid-Town St. Louis was a success; thanks to everyone who stopped by to see us.  The car was on display from 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM, along with about 65 other booths that were selling, promoting, or advocating green and sustainable practices.  Twice during the day, children participated in a solar car race of their own, racing solar cars built from kits down the middle of the street.  The kits included axles and wheels, a rectangle of corrugated plastic for the body, a small motor connected to an axle with a rubber band, and a solar cell to power the motor.  After each of the races, the winning builder and their car got their picture taken with our team and our car, as well as a group shot of all the solar racers.  Several groups of students and faculty from both Principia’s St. Louis and Elsah campuses also stopped by our booth, as well as a few of our sponsors.  Thanks again to everyone for their support!

This week, work continues on the second upper body of the car.  Amoung other things, we are also working on designing a new kingpin as an improvement to the car, and looking for someone with a waterjet to cut out a couple of small parts for our current kingpin.  Our next outreach event will be at Principia College’s Homecoming weekend.

Thanks for reading,

Tom Brownell

Team Leader, Principia Solar Car Project

Saturday was a busy day for us, and we had about a dozen new team members along with several other members down at the solar car shop to wet out and lay down the first two layers of carbon fiber for what will be a second upper body.   The new top will not have any solar cells on it, and will be used for driver training and short test drives to help make sure that we don’t damage any of the very important (and very expensive) photovoltaic cells.

After laying down the carbon fiber in the upper body mold, the team got cleaned up and we drove the car up onto the Pub Patio for a chance to show the car to the Trustees’ Council, a volunteer group which is devoted to supporting Principia through contact with its donors.  Everyone seemed excited to see the car, and we received a very warm reception.

This week we will continue work on the new upper body, and get the car ready to showcase this Saturday at the Green Homes and Energy Festival.  Hope to see you there!

-Tom Brownell

The team is back on campus, and gearing up for an exciting quarter.  After finishing the North American Solar Challenge at the end of July and visiting Banff National Park as a team, the car headed back to campus as the team members headed off to finally start our summer break.

One week of classes have now gone by, and we’ve recruited some great new students to the team who are quickly learning all about the car.  This quarter will give us a chance to put the last finishing touches on the car that were not finished in time for the race, as well as share the car and our experiences with the community.  Many thanks are due to our supporters, and we hope to give as many of them as we can a chance to see the car.  Already, we have been interviewed by KMOV Channel 4 St. Louis (to be aired as part of a segment on “green” energy), and we have outreach events planned in Alton, St. Louis, and within the Principia community.

What does the future of Ra 7 hold for our team?  As of this point, the team has decided that we would like to race the car next October in the 2009 World Solar Challenge, a 3000 km race across the outback of Australia.  While the details have yet to be worked out, the team is excited about this opportunity and has already begun to work on the slight modifications that are necessary to compete in the Australian race.

Thanks again for your support!  Feel free to call or email us with any questions or comments; we’d love to hear from you.

Tom Brownell

Team Leader, Principia Solar Car Team
tom.brownell@principia.edu

This will be our final update for NASC 2008. The race is finished and the standings have been finalized. As I said yesterday, Principia is confirmed as the second place team after Michigan, followed by FH Bochum, Waterloo, and Minnesota. See the official NASC website for further results: www.americansolarchallenge.org.

At today’s awards banquet (held at the Calgary Zoo), we received two additional honors: the Safety Award and a Technical Excellence Award for our photovoltaic solar array. Our other adventures for the day included cleaning out the vans and repacking the trailer, trading team t-shirts with our comrades on other teams, and going to the Wednesday evening testimony meeting at First Church of Christ, Scientist in Calgary. After the service, church members held an ice cream social in our honor. We loved their gracious reception, and it’s always fun to meet our invaluable supporters.

Thanks to all of you for keeping up with our progress throughout scrutineering and the race and for supporting us every step of the way with your love and prayers. Keep an eye on our website in the coming weeks for the rest of our photos and for updates on our potential future plans (www.prin.edu/solar).

Over and out,
Karen

I’m going to have to make it a short email tonight because all of us here are too elated to spend much time typing instead of smiling and hugging each other. We finished the race in Calgary this afternoon, and our position has been confirmed–we got second place! This is the biggest victory Principia has ever had in a cross-country race, and we’re excited to have accomplished so much. It’s amazing what we can do when we keep our team goals in mind: glorifying God and doing our best.

A few quick details. We left Medicine Hat in second place, as usual, at 9:01am. The leg to Calgary was only 185 miles, so the cars stayed relatively close together. We skipped around in line, passing and being passed by Waterloo, Bochum, Calgary, Queens, and Minnesota. We ran through a few clouds, but the sunshine was strong enough that we could maintain the speed we needed to hold second place. Tom Brownell was our driver for the day. We don’t yet have official results for most of the other teams, but I’ll email again tomorrow with the official standings and a report of tomorrow’s awards banquet. For now, just join in our celebration–we made it to Calgary!

Now that the car is packed away for the night, we’re heading out to a celebratory dinner with our friends from Minnesota. Tune in for further details on the day at 10pm CST on Principia Internet Radio (www.prin.edu/radio).

Cheers,
Karen

P.S. If you’ve only just been added to our email list, you can check out what happened earlier in the race on our website: www.prin.edu/solar. Click “NASC” in the top right-hand corner, then choose to click through the emails on the left-hand menu. Enjoy!