On August 24, 2016, Minghao visited the University of Calgary's solar car team. This page documents some of the knowledge learned from their Aeroshell Lead, Jeff Martens, and their mechanical team manager, Nick Elderfield.

Aerobody process

At the time of the visit, U of C was working on the mold for the successor to the Schulich Delta. They had created a polystyrene pattern for their entire aerobody and were in the process of applying many coats of primer and sanding them smooth. The next step in their process would be to lay up fibreglass over their pattern to fabricate their molds. Nick explained that they had considered directly laying up carbon fibre into a female polystyrene mold (the process used for MSXI) but chose against it to avoid the potential difficulty vacuum bagging the resulting mold.

U of C purchased two large drums of resin and hardener, which Nick explained was due to the lower cost.

Unibody structure

The Schulich Delta is designed with a composite unibody structure, with a composite chassis formed by thick bulkhead panels and surrounded by a thin shell forming the aerobody. The majority of the strength comes from their chassis (the thickness of their aerobody is ~2mm). Notably, the door to their car was quite flexible and Nick was wondering about how to meet crush zone requirements for FSGP 2017.

The rear of the car has a hatchback door that is removable, providing access to their vehicle electronic systems, battery, motor controllers, etc.

Vehicle interior

The Delta's cabin is mostly closed off by bulkheads, making it feel more like a real car. Most surfaces are formed using composite panels, including their seats. Nick explains that for their next vehicle they will likely purchase racing seats (like the ones used on MSXI). The driver dashboard and steering wheel are mounted as an extended piece coming out of their centre console as opposed to mounting to a front bulkhead (the reason for this is not certain).

The Delta's centre console is quite large and divides the driver and passenger seating positions. Most notably, the centre console is equipped with a large monitor embedded into its design (similar to Tesla's design) that allegedly is able to play multimedia content in addition to providing vehicle telemetry.