Australian Transcontinental World Record Attempt on a solar-powered car
source:
http://www.sunswift.com/
For the past 12 months the UNSW Solar Racing Team has designed, constructed and refined several key components in our current solar car, Jaycar Sunswift III in preparation for a world record attempt. The vehicle is powered by an array of high-efficiency silicon solar cells which are up for adoption! Adopt-A-Cell project is to involve both the local and corporate communities in a partnership to help our team make history by developing the most advanced solar powered vehicle in Australia.
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13 January 2007: Day 4 – on track to break record
Today we covered a little less than 800km’s between Wirrulla and Renmark (near the SA/VIC border). Our drive took us through diverse terrain: from the arid outback, to the coast near Port Augusta, over the hills north of the Clare Valley and down past the Murray River at Morgan. The weather was good again, and thanks to some fixes made to the solar array last night, the car was performing relatively well.
So far we’ve talked mostly about our solar car, but to run if safely and efficiently on the road we actually require a fair amount of ‘technology’ in the support cars. As can be seen in the picture below we have the expected CB radios, GPS, a rotating beacon and so on connected in the lead vehicle. Thanks to support from the NRMA via use of their van, we also have spare batteries, a built-in air compressor for easy tyre changes and two fuel tanks for extended range. Additionally, inverters have been fitted in each vehicle to charge our phones and power a laptop or two (which apart from data analysis also provides entertainment/distraction in the form of music). We even tried to install a rear vision camera and display system in our tow vehicle for increased visibility (okay, so this one is still a work-in-progress).
Just before we arrived at our ‘campsite’ (on some land out the back of Monash), we got our first flat tyre on the solar car for the trip… not a bad result for almost 3,000km of driving (sometimes with fairly strong crosswinds). For an estimated time of arrival in Sydney and details of our finish location, please check back here tomorrow night or Monday morning.
12 January 2007: Ceduna (day 3)
It is now our third day on the road and we have just passed Ceduna in South Australia. The team has made great progress considering we had significant cloud cover for our first two days of travelling. Today, we woke up to a star-filled sky eager to get an early start. There was some disappointment when we were unable to fix problems with two trackers this morning (meaning we have been driving with only two-thirds of the solar array functioning properly today). Despite this, our car is running with most of its aerodynamic fairings fitted and is consequently using very little energy.
Solar cars traditionally incorporate spats (wheel coverings) and fillets (an aerodynamic join between the spats and bottom shell). These fittings allow the already highly streamlined vehicles to travel close to the speed limit whilst using a fraction of the energy required by conventional vehicles. While these and other devices have been known to reduce the energy consumption of vehicles for some time, it is only recently that we have seen an attempt by manufacturers to incorporate them into vehicle design. Additionally, the aesthetics of highly streamlined vehicles are yet to be widely accepted by the general public.
By the end of the day, we will be roughly half way to Sydney. At this stage we are already around one week ahead of the original record set by the Quiet Achiever in 1983. Given progress so far, the team is also confident that we will break the present (unofficial) record of 8.5 days.