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IOWA STATE DAILY
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The renewal of the New York Times subscription fee, paid for by Student Government, will be debated at tonight’s meeting. ONLINE
Streaming has replaced cable in the past decade by providing a wide variety of content at a lower price. But challenges are creeping in. PAGE 7
An independent student newspaper serving Iowa State since 1890.
WEDNESDAY 11.01.2017 No. 52 Vol 213
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Solar car returns from AU
COURTESY OF ELLIOT SUITER Iowa State’s solar car team, Team PrISUm, had a different goal from the other teams at the World Solar Challenge in Australia. The team wanted to create a car that would be more similar to modern consumer cars than the other solar cars. The idea was to achieve efficiency and practicality with a green energy source.
The World Solar Challenge (WSC) is a biennial event that sees teams from around the world compete to cross the Australian continent in a solar car, beginning in the Northern Territory of Darwin, and finishing in Adelaide, South Australia.
In total, the race is over 1,800 miles long. Teams have just six days to complete the journey. Team PrISUm, the ISU solar car team, began their pursuit of the WSC over two years ago. However, their main focus wasn’t to win the competition, but to change how the world looked at solar cars. “Our goal was to build a practical car,” said Matt Goode, race lead for the 2017 WSC. “We wanted to change the paradigm of transportation with Penumbra. There aren’t many U.S. competitions that highlight the use of a multi-seat car, so we kind of had the vision to build our car and apply for the WSC at the same time.” Penumbra, PrISUm’s current car, features much more practicality than most other solar cars. It has four doors, four seats, an easily accessible trunk and an on-board touch screen multimedia display that can be found in most newer cars today. Their car was bigger, less aerodynamic and heavier than most other cars in the competition. “But it was safer, roomier and had more cargo space,” Goode said. “And that’s what we wanted to achieve with this car.” One of the biggest things the team had to focus on leading up to and during the competition was communication. “It was really important for everyone to communicate with each other on what they were doing so that each system works together on the car,” said Andrew Mallek, systems director for the car. “There were also logistical
challenges that come with shipping a car across the world, and that proved to be pretty difficult for us and other teams.” PrISUm partnered with Boeing to have their battery pack flown from the U.S. to Australia. The team had to get a handwritten note from the head of the Department of Transportation in Washington, D.C. to authorize the battery pack to be flown on an aircraft. The team was also only able to find one company that would trailer their battery pack on land from Ames to the airport, due to the dangerous nature of lithium-ion batteries. “There are a lot of dangers that come with working with [lithium-ion batteries],” said Jason Cheng, member of the electrical team on PrISUm. “The batteries are a really good storage device because of how they react, but on the other hand, it means that reaction is very dangerous,” Cheng said. “It has a tendency to use itself as fuel.” The team experienced some of those dangers firsthand when some dust made its way onto a printed circuit board. Goode said due to the iron content of the Australian dust, it shorted a circuit and caused 144 volts to run through a high-resistive area, leading to a smoking battery box. Luckily, the team had preventative measures in place to prevent the whole battery pack from catching fire, but it created a lot of stress for the team while they were testing before the competition in Australia. Heavy rainfalls during the week also led to the team having to rethink the strategy of the race. “The rain and lack of sun go hand in hand for this sort of thing,” said Elliot Suiter, member of PrISUm.
SOLAR CAR
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BY MITCHELL.LAFRANCE @iowastatedaily.com
COURTESY OF BRIDGESTONE WORLD SOLAR CHALLENGE Team PrISUm traveled to Australia to compete against other solar car teams at the World Solar Challenge. Teams must travel over 1,800 miles in the span of six days.