University of Minnesota Solar Vehicle Project

We had a blast meeting all of the new students at Welcome Week! To start our recruitment season, we will be having a number of informational sessions. At these sessions, you will learn about our mission, team structure, races, and so much more! We look forward to seeing you all there! 9/12 5PM - 6PM at MCB 2-120 9/14 10:30AM - 11:30AM at Rapson 56 9/16 6PM - 7PM at Bruininks 530

We regret announcing our withdrawal from the American Solar Challenge. Despite our success in finishing third at FSGP and our excitement to continue our journey at ASC, we ran into race-ending motor issues on Saturday. Though disappointed, we return home to Minnesota with valuable lessons learned and great experiences shared with other solar racing teams. We wish the remaining teams the best of luck and look forward to bouncing back stronger than ever with our next car. Thank you all for your continued support - we couldn’t do it without you. Photo Credits: Joseph Shin

Results from the final day of FSGP are in! We finished the event having completed 158 laps over the past three days - and secured third place! 🥉 🎉 The team now looks forward to beginning the American Solar Challenge which kicks off Saturday morning from Music City - Nashville Tennessee! Thanks to the National Corvette Museum Motorsports Park for hosting FSGP as well as the festivities after the event. Photo credits: Joseph Shin

🌧️🏁 Race Day 2 threw some challenges our way! Thunderstorms last night and midday rain caused some setbacks, but our pit stops were successful in quickly applying anti-fog spray and getting the car back on track. We completed 98 laps and are thrilled to announce that we have qualified for the American Solar Challenge! We are proud of our performance today, and we can’t wait for ASC to start! Photo Credits: Joseph Shin

First day of racing complete! 🏁 🚗 ☀️ We successfully adjusted our lights and achieved our last needed green from the scrutineers, which meant we were off to the races!... well qualifying that is. Pitstops went smoothly, with the car stopping for a tire change and hydration breaks. Although we began the race with unmetered charging status, we quickly addressed the issues, meaning we are one step closer to qualifying for ASC! By noon we completed 45 laps, and tomorrow we plan on logging 53 more to secure our spot in ASC. Thanks for following, and stay tuned for more updates tomorrow! Photo Credits: Joseph Shin and Clayton Horstman Olson

Day 3 of scrutineering done! Though we had some minor setbacks with our lights, we earned greens from Impound/MOV today. We worked on getting our lights to meet regulations for the rest of the evening and hope to get them approved by the scrutineers tomorrow so we can secure a race position. Beyond the car itself, the team is thrilled for our first laundry day of the race, woohoo! Our current scrutineering status is listed below, looking forward to seeing everyone on the track tomorrow ☀️ Driver Registration: 🟢 Driver Operations: 🟢 Body & Sizing: 🟢 Electrical: 🟢 Dynamics: 🟢 Array: 🟢 Safety: 🟢 Impound/MOV: 🟢 Lights & Vision: 🟡 Battery Protection: 🟢 Mechanical: 🟢 Photo Credits: Joseph Shin

Day 2 of scrutineering complete! We started off the morning with mechanical scrutineering. Though most of the day was smooth, the scrutineers pointed out a few adjustments the team needed to make in order to pass. After receiving feedback we got straight to work, and quickly turned our red to yellow to move ahead! With the go ahead, we moved onto dynamic scrutineering. Our drivers took on the U-Turn, Figure-8, Slalom, and Braking Tests. We’re happy to report that we passed dynamics with flying colors! We’re looking forward to the track race, and lastly we’d like to give a huge shoutout to NCM Motorsport Park for hosting us, and to our amazing chefs for keeping us fueled! 🌞 Photo credits: Joseph Shin

🏁 Day 1 of scrutineering is in the books! After a long journey, we rolled into Bowling Green and set up our garage. It was a hustle getting ready for scrutineering, but we’ve had a blast talking with the other teams and learning more about their cars. The first day kicked off with a warm welcome from event staff and team roll call chants - UFF DA! Our first station of the day was weigh-in, then onto egress. After day one of scrutineering, here are our current results: Weigh-In: 🟢 Electrical: 🟡 Safety: 🟢 Battery Protection: 🟡 Driver Registration: 🟢 Driver Ops: 🟡 Lights & Vision: 🟡 We are working on a couple of minor changes to turn our yellows into greens, but we are feeling confident heading into day two of scrutineering. Thank you for your support, more updates soon! Follow our scrutineering status at the link below! https://lnkd.in/gFtBK7w4 Photo credits: Joseph Shin and Shafiq Amirul

Thank you to our amazing sponsor Quantronic Corporation! We recently got our boards for the 2024 American Solar Challenge picked and placed by Quantronic’s amazing team. They have been big supporters and sponsors of our team for a while now and we are so grateful that we get to continue working with their team. They have been so kind to us, and have provided us with so much advice that has greatly improved the quality of our PCB’s. Thank you so much Quantronic for your continued support!

We are happy to announce we’ve been awarded a Digi Green Tech award in the category of Green Vehicle Technology! We appreciate Digi’s continued support of the team!