Students at full speed
San Pancrazio is a special day at Mondragon Unibertsitatea, especially for students at the School of Engineering 5.mailan. It is a day of celebration and competition. This year, students are presented with a new challenge, a new competition: the creation of a remotely controlled mini-car. They had to design and build the car themselves and then compete in a race. We have followed the process of car creation step by step; this has been the evolution from beginning to end.
ANDONI ELU, student: We thought about doing it in the all-terrain style, in the rallye style, with the bezel.
MIKEL REKALDE, student:75.000 euros, yes, cheap, I would buy it if I had money.
JAVIER ARRIBAS, student: The one that consumes less along with another group, and we are satisfied, yes.
San Pancrazio is not just a holiday at the Polytechnic School of Mondragon Unibertsitatea. Like a motorshow or a car show, 5th grade Industrial Engineering students are exposed to cars that they think and make themselves. Until now, a remote-controlled car has been designed with everyone starting from the same chassis, and today the race will be held. The winner is not, however, the one who crosses the finish line first. All parts of the project give points, but for the most part, whether people buy the car or not, and the races.
The race started two months ago. The task was to design and build, on the chassis, a body made of composite material. The first task, however, was to define the car, to position it in the market: the model, to whom it was destined, would be expensive or would have security... Most of them made sports cars.
JON IRAOLA, student: A lot of deportivos, yes; we did a survey among the students, and most of them came out deportivos, they say they were the favorites.
JON PRECOETXEA, Professor, Mondragon Unibertsitatea: What we do is a project in which we combine knowledge from different subjects, such as product design, CAD, CAM, CAE, materials, marketing and all that, and instead of addressing each topic separately, what we do is gather around a project, and that’s what the goal is, learn to do.
The most advanced technology is that of composites, which is used in Formula 1 and some rare luxury cars. Now, it seems that electric cars will also bet on this type of bodywork, using carbon and glass fibers, which results in lightweight and robust bodywork. The pieces are made in molds. In this case, the students had to make the body in a single piece, that is, in a single mold.
IÑAKI ARRIETA, student: Our car is a classic and we thought it would sell more for that.
ANDER MALBADI, student: This is the result after a long brainstorming that we proposed. We have planned to do it with the convertible or without the roof; we based ourselves on it and then what we did was to adapt it to the measurements they put on us. There were minimal radii, it had to be demountable from the mold, and so this was our result.
The mold must now be made: the container corresponding to the virtual 3D model. The initial strategy dictates here: some have chosen to use a few hours of work to produce a cheap and simple car and sell more.
JON PRECOETXEA, Professor, Mondragon Unibertsitatea: Or the opposite, it’s just as beautiful but incredibly expensive and no one will buy it. So, since the buying criteria are not clear, it is not an exact science; they will have to make a positioning and follow a strategy with their product and develop according to it the design, the manufacturing... everything.
The buyer is: Yes, I've voted for the Celottics. Consumption, rigidity... and, yes, it is much cheaper, the cheapest.
The final price is directly influenced by the time spent on all steps, for example, the hours spent on machining the mold. But also the materials and quantities of materials used, because some are more expensive than others.
AINHOA ARTOLA, student: It looks pretty cute. Our goal was to make a deportivo, safe and at the same time affordable for everyone.
ARITZ MARQUINEZ, student: Ours is worth a lot, but what we wanted was security, and that was our goal from the first step.
Students have been able to choose between carbon fabric, fiberglass fabric and a kind of glass mesh called mats.
IÑIGO ORTIZ DE MENDIBIL, Professor, Mondragon Unibertsitatea: Carbon fiber fabric is the one that has the best characteristics in terms of strength and stiffness, but it is also the most expensive. Fiberglass is better in shock tests. Finally, this fiberglass mat has mediocre mechanical characteristics and is used in the most aesthetic places.
ARANTZAZU ARABAOLAZA, student: This, for example, is the mat material, which in our case goes in the corners, because it takes shape more easily than carbon or glass fiber.
IRANTZU BERGANZA, student: We wanted him to be quick and confident at the same time. To ensure your safety, we've put a long end on it to get people out alive if there's a blow. We've put carbon into it to absorb the blow, to give it rigidity, and the glass fiber absorbs more energy.
The students have been free to make decisions; it has been the job of the teachers to reveal the mistakes they have made.
GORKA ARETXAGA, Professor, Mondragon Unibertsitatea: They learn with the initiative they have; by making mistakes they learn how to do it well afterwards.
The resin compacts and bonds all the materials together, and the vacuum will help all the layers to take the shape of the mold.
The body’s response to stiffness tests or crash tests depends on several factors: the direction and angle of the fibers, where to place them or the order of the layers. All this can be known virtually in advance, for which the students have used virtual calculus, a special software. These tests will obviously affect the final result as much as consumption. The consumption data is set by weight and aerodynamics.
JON PRECOETXEA, Professor, Mondragon Unibertsitatea: One thing is the academic and the other is the one that corresponds to the tournament, we have separated the two; that is, the best note may not be the one that wins, because there are other things. What we will measure academically will be more the process than the end result.
The Kaskelotti crossed the finish line first. With all the speed tests being counts Red MUN has scored the most points and people have had their favorite Montini car. The final winner will be known at the end of the course, along with the most important result: to pass the lesson, who will pass it, the teacher has the final word.
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