Student engineers finish third in national Challenge X event
June 14, 2006
STARKVILLE, Miss.–A team of Mississippi State engineering students that developed a diesel-electric hybrid automobile capable of getting 35 miles-per-gallon finished third in the 2006 national Challenge X competition.
The nine-member university group is among 17 teams from institutions across the country re-engineering 2005 Chevrolet Equinox sport utility vehicles to minimize energy consumption, emissions and greenhouse gases while maintaining utility and performance.
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in Blacksburg finished first in the recently concluded second round of the three-year “Challenge X: Crossover to Sustainable Mobility” engineering competition. The University of Wisconsin-Madison was second.
“I’m very proud of our entire team,” said MSU team leader David Oglesby of Columbus, a graduate student in mechanical engineering. “We stayed focused through the entire competition so that we completed every event successfully.”
Marshall Molen, a power electronics research professor at the university’s Center for Advanced Vehicular Systems, serves as the team’s faculty adviser. Bob Kirkland is CAVS staff adviser for the project.
Sponsored by General Motors Corp. and U.S. Department of Energy, the national event is designed to see which collegiate team best can explore and develop advanced vehicle technologies that address important energy and environmental issues.
GM donated the so-called “crossover” Equinox sports utility vehicles for re-engineering by each competing school.
The MSU team designed a diesel-electric, parallel hybrid vehicle that has an internal combustion engine running the front wheels and an electric motor running the rear wheels. The diesel engine runs on B20 bio-diesel fuel, causing fewer emissions.
The first half of the competition at the GM Desert Proving Grounds in Mesa, Ariz., consisted of driving events such as timed acceleration, vehicle handling and trailer towing. The second half of the competition consisted of presentations on technical and design aspects of the respective vehicles.
“We did well in all of the driving events,” said team member Amanda McAlpin, an undeclared graduate student from Mathiston.
After their selection in 2004, the Challenge X teams spent their first year focusing on vehicle simulation and modeling, and subsystem development and testing. For this year and in next year’s concluding competition, the teams are integrating their advanced power trains and subsystems into their redesigned vehicles.
Each participating team received $10,000 in seed money and is eligible to collect up to $25,000 in additional production parts from GM. Award money up for grabs at the second-year competition totaled more than $90,000.
The MSU team also won awards in several individual categories of competition, earning $14,250 in prize money.
The other 13 participating Challenge X teams included Michigan Technological, Ohio State, Pennsylvania State, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, San Diego State, Texas Tech, Akron, California-Davis, Michigan, Tennessee, Texas-Austin, Tulsa, Waterloo (Canada), and West Virginia.
For more information about the MSU team, contact Amanda McAlpin.