Welcome back to our newsletter! We are back with an update for November and will also give you some insight regarding what is going to happen for December.
General information
Collaboration award
In November, Clear River Racing received a price for collaboration called “Samverkanspriset”. The award was presented to the team at the “100° Karlstad” event by Karlstad University with the justification: “Winner of Samverkanspriset 2022 is Clear River Racing. The yearly project has since 2008 been a part of the global engineering students competition Formula student. They have shown that studying at Karlstad University can be more than lectures and reading books. Hundreds of voluntarily engaged students from various programs have had to work both theoretically and practically and in dire need delivered technics, design and marketing in collaboration with sponsors and partners locally, nationally and internationally – that are open to hire these students afterwards.”
The award is given to a student or a team of students that “[…] has proven themselves through collaboration or a project together with a company, an organization or an association. A collaboration or project has to have been completed or currently running and contribute with opening doors for students to the world of trade and industry.” The yearly event celebrates businesses and entrepreneurs in the county of “Värmland” and offers visitors mingle, people holding speeches, gala and a nice dinner to top it off.
IN-Dagen
IN-dagen was arranged by the marketing group, but loads of CRR members as well as students from other student associations helped during the day to make sure that everything was running smoothly. Each company that was able to join the fair was able to talk to students about future opportunities and collaborations.
The fair is mainly focused on engineers and the nature and technic -related programmes. CRR is the main student association who arranges the whole fair. It was held on the 10th of November here at Karlstad University, but compared to previous years the fair took up a bigger part of the house than before. “We expanded further and it was definitely considered a success” Felicia Öberg from marketing adds.
Let´s hear from the groups!
Aerodynamics
A lot has happened this month for aerodynamics. We started off with doing the last touches of our chosen concept and developing it to its fullest. We edited a bunch of measurements and looked over the rules to see that we follow them while generating as much downforce as possible while keeping as low drag as possible. Other than that we have started to put all the aero parts together, the whole aero package with the car. We have simulated the whole car, although we have had some trouble with our results from Creo Flow. We have also chosen fasteners for all parts, 3D printed a couple of parts plus made some small parts with the CNC. We have made molds for our parts as well. For December we have a deadline Thursday 1/12 where we have to send in all files. We are waiting for answers from sponsors, in case they can either help us or do the whole molds and if they can do everything then we will just have to wait. If not we will use the CNC to make parts ourselves with help from Karlstad Makers. Other than that we will help the other groups in whatever way that we can assist them.
Chassis
This month the chassis group has mainly focused on two things, getting the outer carbon skin of the monocoque ready for curing, and finalizing the design of the steel space frame and various containers and brackets the chassis group helps design. To accomplish this the group has been working hard brainstorming, analyzing, and optimizing their designs, even getting some help from a previous Clear River Racing member (thank you Axel!) and then documenting it all in preparation for the Structural Equivalency Spreadsheet (SES), essentially a proof of concept document for everything structural that we’ll have to fill out ahead of competition this summer. Related to this, several composite panels to be used for physical strength testing of our carbon fibre layups are in the middle of being manufactured, also in preparation for curing in the coming week. All in all a very busy period for the chassis group but with great progress being made thanks to all the hard work put in by the team!
Marketing
This month we held the work fair IN-Dagen where over 40 companies came to meet and network with engineering students at Karlstad University, hopefully even found their next big talent. Thanks to those of you who visited, I dare say the fair was a huge success. Great work team, especially Ida Frost and Felicia Öberg in the marketing team! Ahead, we are preparing for the construction phase so that everything runs smoothly logistically. We have also made a lot of progress on the design and specification of the documents that we hand in for the static event part (Bill of materials and Cost file) of the competition, with our team member Óscar López Urroz paving the way. We are confident that it will be more in-depth this year and create a better overview of our operations.
PR
During this month PR has mainly focused on the continued work to expand our brand. Creating and developing content to show both ourselves but also our sponsors. A lot of the work in November involved creating marketing material for IN-Dagen but also to start welcoming all of our sponsors and a new thing called “Weekly recap” where we on our Instagram every Sunday post stories of some of the things that has happened during the work week. We have also gotten our team clothes and photographed the entire team. Now our main work for December and forward is to continue creating content showing both ourselves and all our sponsors. Where we plan to perhaps come and visit some of our sponsors to create content with them and show our followers what you all do! We are also currently updating our website and planning for future PR projects to furthermore expand our brand.
Suspension
This month for suspension we’ve only been designing. The steering design is complete, while the pedal box is on its way of getting done. We are currently designing the uprights and have also looked into topology optimization since that would be a very cool thing to do. That would mean that we are the first CRR team 3D printing in metal, either way we can look forward to really cool designs.
For December we are planning to finish work with construction, prepare for manufacturing. This will include designs that are going for outsourcing, to Sandvik and such. The parts that will be laser cut are going to get sent away to begin with. The plan is that on the 13th of December the suspension group is going to Sandvik which we’re really looking forward to.
Voltage
Voltage is working on their next iteration of a couple of PCB:s, with the goal that these new versions will be the final product that will end up on the vehicle. We also have some more complicated circuits still under development but will soon be in the testing phase. We are also working with the digital systems of the vehicle. We have simulated a model of the car in Simulink, which we will use as a base to be able to continue developing the torque vectoring system. Other than that, we are and will be purchasing materials, components and everything needed for the production phase that is right around the corner. The goal is to prepare as much as possible so that everything can run smoothly when production starts.
That was all we had for this months update and actually all we had for 2022. We want to wish you all a merry christmas and a happy new year! Check back in after new years and we will be back as usual with another monthly update.
