The Second edition of BAJA SAE INDIA was held from Jan 30th to Feb 2nd 2009 at NATRAX (National Automobile Test Tracks) facility in Peethampur, Indore.
Though this was only the second edition in India, already the number of competing institutes has vaulted from 27 to fifty-eight teams from around the country consisting of One thousand two hundred students backed by fifteen sponsors.
The competition was maddening and after the immense success of the 2007 event, a mammoth 108 teams had applied for a spot for the 2009 event. The long list of teams had gone through a rigorous telephonic interview and Dr Karuppaiah and his team had filtered out only the best of the best and finally 58 teams were left in the field. .
For the 2009 event however, Lombardini has provided a bigger 340cc engine with 11hp The gearboxes are from Mahindra Alfa 3 wheeler. The petrol-engined buggies ran on fuel supplied by Bharat Petroleum, and since all these are provided free of cost to the students, it helps to keep costs in check.
This is as real an engineering challenge these budding engineers will probably face in their entire career, since the challenge is to design, build and finally race a ground-up design.
Only if the teams satisfy the judges in all the static and dynamic criteria, are they allowed to participate in the final race. This is the big one, and while speed is important, the focus is on reliability. The drivers have to negotiate an arduous course with a number of challenges, including a water trough, whoop-de-dos and a metal trap. The event was scheduled to run for three hours, but was shortened by 30 minutes for logistical reasons. Nevertheless, this was enough to gauge the capability of the buggies.
While IIT Mumbai led the early part of the race, it stopped with a broken drive shaft on the second lap, handing the lead to AISSMS from Pune, which lost out with a lengthy refuelling stop. Thus, the team from Sant Longewal College, near Patiala, shot into the lead. It was a case of strong reliability and a strong drive from the midfield. Equally impressive was the team from Punjab Engineering College, which started even further back but drove hard throughout to finish a close second.
With over Rs 31 lakh in prize money, there was indeed strong motivation for the teams, and the organizers have the right idea to encourage the teams to think innovatively and design fast and reliable buggies. Many sponsors had placement cells at the show. They conducted interviews and gave appointment letters to over 60 students.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uz8-TaRmn4o
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Yi2GmfOS_Y&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AcJMPpa6Lnc&feature=related
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