Groot

This is our new car affectionately named Groot. Students were tasked with producing a new concept car after our Newquay qualifier in 2016. There was a lot of debate around a wheels in versus a wheels out design; in the end we decided to compromise on the above design with the front wheels enclosed and rear wheels exposed. This design allowed us to have the motor in the air flow to help further cool it and improve efficiency. We are hopeful that this will compensate for the additional rear drag. The other advantage of this design is that we have been able to keep the tear drop shape throughout and reduce materials and therefore weight.

After the overall concept was finalised we started to see how we could use bike parts to make the car as they are very sturdy and lightweight. We mocked up various prototypes with timber and bike parts until we were happy then I produced a Solidworks drawing of the chassis for the students.  Students were then tasked with drawing up the wheels and body shapes on Solidworks. We ran a couple of the body shapes through the fluid flow software and identified the best body shape. Students were the tasked with finding a software package that turned a 3D model in to a net as drawing the whole body in sheet metal would have taken a very long time. The students eventually found a couple of programs that would work. The one we eventually used was Pepakura as it was very easy to use.

The net was then saved as a DXF and split up so it could fit on our in house laser cutter. It was the glued together and taped and glassed internally by the students at lunch time and after school.

The students have worked tirelessly on this car for nearly a year. Some of the students have demonstrated determination and resolve well beyond their years. We look forward to the 2017 season and hope to improve on our prior performance.

I would like to thank former students (A level and undergraduate) for their continued support towards the team.

More detail to follow ..........

Aerodynamics - Summer break 2015

During the 2015 summer break Mr Erents and a hand full of students from the Penair Engineering team gave up the torrential rain and the busy Cornish coast to improve the aerodynamics of Raptor Fusion. The challenge was to complete the body on a very tight budget as due to race commitments we only had £150 to spend on the bodywork. After much discussion the team decided to produce a foam core fiberglass body as this would be very light and stiff and could be cut and adapted later if required.

Fiberglass is not an environmentally friendly material however it has properties that other materials struggle to match. The fiberglass body is also likely to last many years and can easily be repaired, so it may actually be better than a body made out of an eco-friendly material that has to be remade multiple times.

When working with fiberglass it is important to have the correct PPE gear. Respirators and good ventilation are a must.

In order to keep costs down we had to use the old body as a mould. The correct way to do this would have been to make a mould from foam however the cost of the foam alone would have exceeded our budget. We would have then had to have the mould cut out using a CNC machine to get the high quality finish we were looking for.

The first thing we did was adapt and pack out the previous body with foam to get the aerodynamic improvements we were looking for. This included shrinking the nose an adding a tail to the car. The tail is very important as the current tail is flat and causes a lot of drag. We also removed 'pinch' points in the wheel arches and raised the front to allow air to flow over the driver. Once the amendments were completed we shrink wrapped the car so that we could remove the body when complete.

Foam panels were then added to the car to stiffen it up before another layer of fiberglass was added.

The new car body is still under development but we will release pictures when it is finally completed. We hope to be able to test the new body at Castle Coombe. We have also made some other modifications that we hope will improve performance.

To be continued......

Truro College Visit - Flemings left Hand Rule.

On Thursday the 26th of February two A' level physics students from Truro college (Lucy Talbot and Claude De-Rijke-Thomas) delivered a talk to the Penair Engineering club. Students were taught about 'Flemings left hand rule' and were shown, through diagrams and models, how motors work. The students were then tasked to construct their own motor.

The students all really enjoyed this session and would like to publicly thank Lucy, Claude and Paul for setting up and delivering this presentation.

Penair Engineering -  CUC visit

On the 9th of February 2015 Penair Engineering club and some of the science leaders group visited the Exeter university Penryn campus. The group met the team that entered the shell eco marathon with their hydrogen fuel cell car. They explained to us the features of their car and how the hydrogen and oxygen was split to store power that would be then used to power the motor. This inspired us to upload to the blog.




This is the chassis system devised to assemble and disassemble with
 no welding.











This is a model showing the miniature hydrogen fuel cells. the water is separated by the electricity from the solar cells, the motor is then connected to the fuel cell which has stored the hydrogen to make electricity.

 

Green Power

South West Regional Qualifier

 

Raptor Fusion – ready for practice.

Rock on Raptor and the ladies in pink.

 

On Thursday the 19^th of June Penair School participated in the Greenpower electric vehicle race at Newquay airport.  The event included twenty one other schools from across the South West. All of the teams were battling it out for one of the top three positions,  that would secure them a place in the national final at Goodwood. The weather was stunning, which made for a fantastic atmosphere and made up for the last few years, where the race took place in driving rain.

The Penair Engineering teams had tested their cars on the schools all weather pitch and on the clubs rolling road. This meant that the teams had a clear strategy, and were ready for the new racing format that included making the cars run for longer on a single set of batteries. The practice laps were as eventful as ever for the teams, and highlighted a slight problem with one of our breaks. This was quickly fixed and the car got back on the track to let some of the younger drivers to become accustomed to the circuit. After the problems during the practice the first race went very smoothly with the Penair Engineerings boys’ team leading from the front for the majority of the race. The drivers and pit crew were extremely disciplined and focused on the race strategy throughout. This clearly worked in our favour and allowed us to achieve first place, and gave us a guaranteed position in National Final. The girls team (Rock on Raptor) were not quite as elated. This was due to their car running out of battery power ten minutes before the end of the race, but despite this, excellent driving allowed them to gain a very respectable 8^th place.

The second race also started very well with Raptor Fusion again producing some very consistent lap times thanks to some excellent driving from Alfie Spouse and Rufus Leather. The girls’ team were also doing extremely well, but without managing to change the gearing on their car we knew that they may run out of power before the end of the race again. Our suspicions were confirmed five minutes before the finish, but the girls’ had managed to gain a couple of places to achieve a 6^th position in the second race. Prior to this however the boys’ team was pulled in due to a break problem and a flat tyre. The team fixed the tyre as quickly as possible but were not quick enough to retain the number one slot. They did however manage to achieve third position in this race due to a flying last lap by Frederick Freeborn. The team also gained the award for best Engineered car and they also gained the Spirit of Greenpower award, for the help they have given to other teams locally. All in all it was an excellent day for both our teams and it was clear many of the other schools involved also thoroughly enjoyed themselves. I would like to personally thank Vaughan Curnow and Jeremy Way and the Greepower team for organising such an excellent event that clearly inspires the younger generations. I would also like to thank Spencer Hosen and Ron Koning for the support they have given to the Penair Engineering club over the past few years.

 

 

 

 

Greenpower National Finals

 

Headline Results, - Raptor fusion 9th place

Rock on Raptor 31st out of 75 competitors in the national final

The Penair Engineering team car Raptor Fusion was fourth on the grid at the National finals joined by 75 other competitors who had either made the mileage or who had been given a wild card. Penair Engineering was also joined thrree other Cornish teams in the final, by Richard Lander, Falmouth and Penryn. We thought our journey from Cornwall was long but other competitors had travelled from the top of Scotland, Poland and even the US. The weather for the final was not as great as last year so the drivers had to be even more focused during the race. The mornings practice had many competitors sliding all over the place with two cars sliding off the track entirely. Both the raptor fusion team and the girls Rock on Raptor team were really focused and driving exceptionally well. The boys team Raptor Fusion remained in the top 5 for most of the race but a missed pit stop and blown fuse meant that we were out of the running for a podium position. The target now was to try and remain the best team in Cornwall. After some nail biting overtaking and some excellent driving from Duncan Covey we managed to finish in 9th place on the day as the top Cornish school. This was a disappointing result as last year we finished in 4th place but we all learned what could be improved next year and will be doing all we can to gain one of the top three slots.

The girls Team Rock on Raptor under the leadership of Debbie Killingback and Ron Koning were the real success of the day climbing 33 places and becoming the most improved team of 2013.

Well done girls!

All of the students are clearly insired by engineering which is at the end of the day what this competition is all about. Previous students from the club have gone on to study Engineering or related subjects at college and one of our previous students George Sowerby has his eyes set on studying Electrical Engineering at university.

Thank you to all of our sponsors who have made this possible. We will be improving the cars over the winter period and will continue to share our successes with you in the future.

 

 

 

 

Raptor Fusion - ready to race.

 

 Raptor Fusion and a focused team in the pits

 

 

Rock on Raptor - ready to roll

 

You could not miss the girls team. They stood out a mile

and were interviewed by the press on a couple of occassions.

 

Penair Engineering High Altitude Balloon Project

One year ago we began to look into the possibility of high altitude photography. It seemed that the most feasible method was to use a weather balloon filled with helium as it is safe and relatively inexpensive. After some research we created a prototype which we tethered above Newquay Airport to film the Greenpower race from a bird’s eye view. This was extremely effective and we got some fantastic photos.

Our next issue was that the helium balloon can travel long distances due to high winds at altitude which meant we needed a reliable method of retrieving our payload once it had landed. With little experience in this field, a GPS tracker which used a mobile phone signal seemed the way to go. We therefore picked up two cheap devices for testing.

Another hurdle was that we needed a sturdy and high quality camera to make the journey without being damaged by the extreme cold and lack of pressure. A GoPro seemed the obvious answer and our teacher was willing to donate his old one however the limited battery life was a problem. We therefore hardwired an auxiliary battery supply to ensure we didn’t lose any valuable footage.

A further problem was the weight of our payload, which we needed to keep as light as possible. We bought a polystyrene transport box, packed it with solid roof insulation and cut out sections to fit the camera, GPS unit and batteries. We didn’t want to take the risk of our GPS and batteries freezing as they ascended and the temperature fell to about -55 degrees. So we packed two handwarmers around them before positioning them right in the centre of the box.

 

 

The amount of helium was also critical, as we needed to lift the payload at 5 metres per second to get enough altitude before the low pressure expanded the balloon so much that it burst. This meant calculating quite precisely how much weight the balloon had to lift before we attached the payload and let it go. There is a lot of information on the UK HAS website http://ukhas.org.uk/  including a spreadsheet that calculates this for you.

We had obtained approval from the CAA (Civil Aviation Authority) to launch in a three day window from Colliford Lake on Bodmin Moor between 7.00 am and 2pm as we were flying over airspace used by Bodmin, Plymouth and Exeter airports. After a very early start we finally launched at 7.40am into the fog, having run a landing prediction program http://habhub.org/predict/  that showed we should land in the Sidmouth area in about 2 hours. We were very anxious as there was quite a strong westerly wind and we were predicted to fly very close to the sea.

 

Unfortunately we lost contact with the GPS after only 10 minutes but optimistically drove towards our planned landing area. Two hours came and went and we were starting to think that it might not appear. We had decided to head to the beach to wait for an hour or so but then to our delight we received a text at 10.10 telling us that the GPS was alive and our plans were still on. When we looked up the latitude and longitude we discovered that not only had the balloon stayed up longer than predicted but it had drifted much further. We eventually drove to Piddletrenthide in Dorset and after one false start found it in a maize field just up the road in Alton Pancras. It looked on first inspection as though the camera had taken pictures but until we retrieved the SD card we would not know what they were. So we headed back to the Piddle Inn in Piddletrenthide where Joanna the Landlady was astonished to find that we had driven all the way from Truro.

We were astonished when we started looking at the photos. Not only were there pictures but they were far better than we had ever hoped. We had taken 1 photo every 5 seconds so could reasonably accurately time the flight and could see from the photos that the balloon had burst approximately two hours into the flight. But the big question was how high had it gone? We have no way of knowing exactly but we could see that the camera case had frozen up due to the low temperatures between 10 and 20 km high but amazingly had then cleared again to take our most stunning pictures. So it must have gone into the stratosphere and by analysing the distance it travelled we think it may have gone as high as 36km or nearly 120,000 ft.

It was a long drive home but we were elated. We had taken pictures that showed the blackness of space, the blue strip of the atmosphere and the curvature of the earth. We had achieved with a team of 15 year olds and some cheap and cheerful equipment what only a handful of schools worldwide have managed to do.

We tweeted the picture to Karen Nyberg, one of the astronauts on the International Space Station, who replied that it was an amazing achievement.

 

Project team:

Orion Page, Woody Polglase, Tim Powell, Dan Kerrison Stock – students

Martin Erents, Louise Allen – staff

With thanks to Nick Cartmill and Tom Allen