Our team competed in the Portland, Oregon competition last weekend and surpassed our original goal of a top 20 finish. After being flagged into the quarantine area after completing the four hour endurance race, we were informed that we finished in third place! We finished 13th in the earlier day 1 events (hill climb, acceleration, maneuverability and rock crawl). Students represented schools from around the world including: France, Pretoria, Mexico and Venezuela. 100 post secondary schools in total registered for the competition.

SAE International has not yet published all of the results but we hope to learn our overall placement for the entire competition in the next few weeks.

The rear wheels now fit on the car and the rear suspension is complete and painted. The front suspension needs ball joint mounting tabs before the entire car becomes a rolling chassis. While waiting for ball joint tabs we have finished several body panels and the belly pan. The frame is almost fully welded and is still within an 1/8″, a major improvement over last year’s car.

Rear Suspension Assembly:

Robert has almost completed the design of the electrical system which will utilize two 9 volt batteries instead of the over-sized trailer break-away battery from last season.

Improved Electrical System:

Clarke’s Luggage and Shoe Repair is currently upholstering the seat base, back and headrest which will almost complete the driver’s compartment.

Last year’s baja vehicle has provided the opportunity to begin testing our CVT during construction our current vehicle. During the 2010-2011 season we weren’t able to test and tune our CVT prior to the Peoria, Illinois competition. The new CVT, adopted from the Junior Drag Racing industry, has already made a noticeable improvement to our vehicle’s acceleration. With more tuning we hope to continue to improve acceleration and also top speed.

New Jr Dragster CVT on 2010-2011 Baja:

With the exception of a couple of secondary members, the frame of the car is complete. There is still a significant amount of TIG welding remaining, but the frame has remained true and there is very little warping.

We received the first part of our water jet order from Hydro Designs which has allowed us to begin mocking up and tacking on the various tabs and brackets that pull the car together. The front suspension is finished with the exception of the upper a-arms and the rear suspension is currently in progress.

The team also visited Advance Engineered Products, where we cut and formed the aluminum body panels the cover the Baja. The frame and panels have been drilled and the panels are currently mocked up on the Baja and secured with clecos on a temporary basis.

There has also been substantial progress in finishing design, seating/padding, and steering.

Fabrication has slowed down on the project over the past two months. Emphasis was placed on completing the engineering and design of the project before moving forward.

The 2012 baja frame is nearing completion and the entire buggy is almost completely modeled in CAD. The necessary waterjetted and off the shelf components have been ordered in preparation for the coming weeks. Projected project completion remains early April, which will allow us to test our project before traveling to Portland, Oregon for our first competition of the season!

Frame Update (Lower control arms are also pictured)

CAD Update

Experience has proven to be a major advantage during frame fabrication for the 2011/12 season. When compared to the 2010/11 season, we have completed approximately 2 months of work, in 2 weeks. Our workmanship has also improved significantly and all tubing ends currently meet perfectly.

The design phase of the Cougar Racing 2012 Baja is drawing to a close and construction of the frame has begun. Fabrication and welding of the tube frame will continue throughout the month.

The frame is significantly different from last year’s in terms of both size and material. The primary roll cage will be constructed of 1.25″ x .065″ steel tubing , while secondary members will be composed of a mixture of tubing sizes including 1.00″ x .049″ and 1.00″ x .065″. The frame material for this season’s Baja is DOM chromoly, which exhibit’s considerably greater strength and stiffness than the lower carbon seam-welded steel tubing used in last year’s frame construction, while maintaining the same mass. We expect that the frame will be fully tack-welded within the next couple of weeks.

Fine detail design of the full Baja computer model will proceed until a full assembly is complete. A few of the next important design aspects to finalize include: body panels, steering system, and suspension mounting & bracing.

Below is the SaskTel documentary covering our 2011 competition season. Not sure what our team is about? Check out the video below:

October 4th, 2011 marks the beginning of the 2012 Baja SAE season. Our team will be building a new competition vehicle, from scratch, to compete in two international competitions. We have successfully registered for competitions in Portland, Oregon (May 16-19, 2012) and Madison, Wisconsin (June 7-10, 2012). The design of the 2012 competition vehicle is well underway and frame fabrication will begin in the next few weeks.

The 2011 competition vehicle has been fixed after rear axle tabs were bent in Peoria last June. Our team will be showcasing the vehicle at car shows and public events through October of next year.

Check back in the coming weeks for more fabrication updates and changes to our website.

Project BAJA SAE is officially a success! The team managed to complete our vehicle with only hours to spare; we were only able to perform very minimal testing, but on June 5th, 2011, our team of 5 students set route to Peoria, Illinois with rental car (Thrifty Car Rental), truck and trailer (Kramer Ltd.) with baja on-board.

After a full day of driving, we arrived in Minneapolis, where we rested for the night, and then completed the final touches on the car the following day (decals, paint, engine tuning, gas tank, and fire extinguisher).

We drove to Peoria the next day and arrived at our hotel in time to complete a final inspection of the car in order to be certain that we would pass the technical inspection.

On June 9th, we reached the competition site and completed both the design and cost presentations. Additionally, we spend the day sorting out compliance issues in order to finally pass technical inspection.

The following day consisted of dynamic events which included: brake test, acceleration run, hill climb, rock crawl, and maneuverability. The car performed extremely well, and more than exceeded our expectations as a first year team.

The final day of competition consisted entirely of the four hour endurance race, followed by award ceremony and clean-up. Our vehicle survived only the first two laps of the endurance due damage to the rear axle after a violent roll-over during the first lap. The vehicle was brought back into the pit area and repaired, but the quick fix was not sufficient enough to last another full lap. As a team, we owe the mishap to a design oversight which may have been avoided had we been able to perform more thorough testing, but for a first year team, we are satisfied with our accomplishments.

Our overall placement was 74th of 115 teams, and we all believe that this result could have been improved immensely, with only minor alterations to the vehicle; thus, the achievement should be regarded as an excellent starting point for future Baja SAE teams to use as a benchmark of achievement.

Without the support of our many sponsors, we would not have been able to make the trip to Peoria at all, let alone compete to standard that we did. So, we owe a big thank you to each of our sponsors, for which logos are displayed on our “Sponsors” tab. http://www.cougar-racing.com/?page_id=3

On Sunday May 29th the baja vehicle successfully performed to our expectations. The vehicle was tested only briefly, since much more work was required to have a completely competition-ready machine.

Testing incline approach capabilities on a 45 degree slope

In order to get to this point, the vehicle required paint (Kramer Ltd.), aluminum body panels and pedals (Advance Engineered Products Ltd.), safety harness and driver equipment (Canada’s Motorcycle), and racing seat re-finishing (Clark’s Luggage Repair). We also required a number of spare parts for competition and body panel cut-outs (Hydro Designs) to complete the vehicle’s aesthetics.

Bare metal frame with professional gloss black paint