An Indian Formula Student competition

Humans of Formula Bharat

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humansofformulabharat

An excerpt from a Humans of Formula Bharat intervi

An excerpt from a Humans of Formula Bharat interview with Gopinathan Surendran

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Pre-pandemic when we started working towards parti

Pre-pandemic when we started working towards participating at Formula Hybrid Electric our goal was pretty clear, we wanted to stand first globally. Initially, we used to work with something called series hybrid architecture which had some reliability issues. It couldn’t complete the endurance with respect to the amount of the energy we had in our batteries. Hence we had to convert it to a heavier engine. The idea was that we wanted to switch to a parallel hybrid architecture. Technology that already existed in the hybrid vehicles didn’t fit our design requirements and we could not scale it down. So we ended up building a system for parallel hybrid architecture and we presented it at the competition. The judges were really impressed by how we innovated this as nobody had come up with something like this.
Hence we decided to file a patent for the architecture.

We never really started out thinking we would create something as unique that we would have to file a patent for. Honestly, It is scary when you keep improving the car as there are always these risks if it would work, how reliable it would be, would it be better than the previous designs or will it cost us dearly in the end. Our team would connect with the alumni and seniors to get a certainty if the architecture would work as if we weren’t successful it would cost the team. So, we ended up making a test rig in our base plate depicting how the drivetrain function would work if it was on a car and how would the functioning be if it is only in a gasoline mode or in an electric mode. This really helped us understand that brainstorming sessions are great but only when you get the hands-on experience is when you know how difficult it is to bring something into existence. We did meet our goal as we stood first globally at Formula Hybrid Electric 2021.

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Despite being on the team for 4 years, unfortunate

Despite being on the team for 4 years, unfortunately, I had the opportunity to attend just one event during my first year. COVID made things worse for us. I was already in my fourth year and with the minimum experience, I had from the event I attended I was the only team member with some amount of experience. Hence, I decided to take up the role of team captain. It was extremely difficult to motivate the team and bind them together towards the goal of participating in an event.

I tried my very best to organize different activities during the lockdown period to keep the members engaged and dedicated. We then decided to participate in Formula Bharat 2022. The restrictions by our college were strict; only 5 members were allowed to work in the workshop at one time. So, we made sure everyone on the team got the chance to be there when we were working on the car. We kept working on the car not knowing what our future had in store. For FB2022, we were using the CBR 250 engine as the mechanics for our last engine providers weren’t ready to visit our workshop. All of a sudden our engine stopped working and what we got to know next just made things even worse. The CBR mechanics who we were relying on had left our city and the ones who were available were not promising as the CBR 250 bike was discontinued by Honda. Finally, we managed to find a CBR mechanic who was ready to work on our engine but on two conditions that he would only work for us after his work hours which were from 8 am to 6 pm and we would have to carry our engine to his workplace that was 50-60 km away from us in Delhi. We had decided that nothing was stopping us and hence we would carry the engine to Delhi and work on it with the mechanic all night. We were all set with our car to participate at FB2022. Unfortunately, as the new variant was found close to the event dates, our college decided not to allow us to participate in the event. The pandemic took away a golden opportunity from us.

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An excerpt from a Humans of Formula Bharat intervi

An excerpt from a Humans of Formula Bharat interview with Shreyash Sreedhar Kalal

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“I did Biomedical Engineering. You would wonder

“I did Biomedical Engineering. You would wonder how I landed up in Mechanical Engineering building a car? My love for Formula One and extracurricular activities made me switch. I decided to join DJS Racing after I attended their orientation in college. At the recruitment interview, the team was confused as to why a biomedical engineer would want to join the team and how it would help them. I tried convincing them to understand that biomedical engineering also included electronics and software integration. Since DJS was looking into building an EV that year, I proposed having me on the team would definitely add value. I was the first person from biomedical engineering to be selected in the team in our university. This also created opportunities for other biomedical engineers.

During my second year, my team was preparing for FSG. We were only participating in the CV category. So, I decided to stay back and participate next year when we had both CV and EV vehicles ready. Unfortunately, COVID struck and I never got the chance to attend an onsite event. At the same time, we had just started working on our electric vehicle with new systems and 21700 batteries. We were working on building our very own BMS. After the lockdown was imposed it became difficult to procure the batteries that we were expecting 6 months ago. Most of the team members had to go back to their hometowns because of the rising cases. That’s when I had to make a very difficult decision to stay back in Mumbai and work with the team members who were around. We decided to visit a workshop to work on our car and then we brought back all the things to my apartment to continue working on it. Every day I would request the team members to come over to work only if it were possible for them. The entire lockdown period we worked really hard, we manufactured our systems and designed and tested them. We managed to do this in my 1BHK. My aim, while I took that decision of staying back, was to create a base for everyone. So I created individual segments and tested each of them. After the lockdown was lifted the current team put all those sub-segments together and worked on it on a higher level.“

“Every automobile enthusiast has a similar story

“Every automobile enthusiast has a similar story of how they were passionate about cars at a young age. Well, mine is quite similar. I was always fascinated about engines, the raw sound of it made me want to learn about it. In my first year, while I was appearing for my exam I could hear my seniors test the car in the quadrangle. The sound of the engine revving up was so loud as they used a straight pipe. It was beautiful! That’s when I knew I had to join the team.

Our participation at FB2022 was quite difficult as 5 of our team members tested positive just the night before the competition and so we weren't sure if we could make it for the competition. During my fourth year on the team, I made sure that I wasn’t the one building the car as I wanted my juniors to gain hands-on experience. I didn’t want the efforts to go in vain or the team to dissolve after I left. Hence, we decided to go ahead with the number of teammates we had and we participated at FB2022.”

#humansofformulabharat #hofb #formulabharat #formulastudent #formulastudentindia #formulaindia

An excerpt from a Humans of Formula Bharat intervi

An excerpt from a Humans of Formula Bharat interview with Pavan Nandkumar Kushare

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I had not heard about Formula Manipal until a frie

I had not heard about Formula Manipal until a friend told me about it. I saw the recruitment poster and I understood that they are building a racecar, and I thought to myself about my craze for automobiles and my liking for driving. It was a no brainer for me, I had to join the team.

One of my team's greatest successes was that we had a very strong core team. After FS2015, one of the biggest decisions we made is to sit out one year and design a car worthy, and that is better than any of our competitors. We wanted to bring down our car weight from 240 Kilos to 200 Kilos, so that we could do way better and we succeeded as the first official weight of the car in the next year was 198 Kilos. So we hit our target and we did better.

Mentioning another highlight from my time on the team was when our team participated at FS Czech Republic. We had cleared tech, and we were done with acceleration and skidpad. In the middle of the first lap at autocross, our engine blew up. It was almost the end of day when this happened, and our engine was destroyed. The next day was endurance, we had one blown engine and one half working engine. Hence we decided to go to Germany and pick up a new one. FaSTTUBe from TU Berlin was hosting us for 15 days in their workshop prior to the competition. Few of their team members had accompanied us to the event. So the night of the blow up incident, a couple of them and a few from my team, went to Germany and overnight got another engine of the same spec.

Meanwhile, my other team members figured out that there was a lubrication issue in our setup and with the help of other members who were our competitors, we were able to assemble a new engine overnight. There was a guy named Daniel from Scuderia Mensa, a team from Frankfurt who was team captain, driver and engine lead. He stayed up all night with us and helped us sort out our car. He had to drive the next day at endurance, but he wanted to help us. And at that particular moment, I saw Formula Student Spirit on display. People help each other with no bias. That was a very beautiful moment in my tenure as a Formula Student.

#humansofformulabharat #hofb #formulabharat #formulastudent #formulas

While I was growing up I always knew where my inte

While I was growing up I always knew where my interests lied as I also had my elder sister who was pursuing mechanical engineering. Hence, after my diploma, I decided to get into mechanical engineering. At the university, while I was waiting outside the classroom to appear for my entrance exam I see a chassis placed on the platform and two people talking. I was super intrigued to know what was happening and so I walked toward them. The first question the team captain asked me was if I wanted to join the team. Honestly, it did seem interesting but I wasn’t aware about it. So, the team captain just handed over the huge rule book to me and asked me to come in for an interview. I got back home and started preparing for the interview. My parents were really supportive of me wanting to join the team, my dad had just one advice for me though: Don't be upset if they don't take you to the competition just gain as much knowledge and experience as you can. On the 15th day after my admission in the university, I was selected to join the team Stallion Motorsport.

Our participation at Formula Bharat in 2017 wasn’t successful as we somehow managed to clear the scrutineering on the last day of the competition. We were amongst one of the last teams as per the rankings. At that time we were just 15 members in the team and we had so many plans and desires to perform better. In spite of the numbers, we started working towards building a better car. In 2018, we decided to participate at Formula Bharat, and this time we were the first team to clear the scrutineering and brake test. This is one of the most memorable moments from my time on the team. Formula Student has not only made me a better mechanical engineer but also trained me in areas such as stress management, team management, and the list goes on.

#humansofformulabharat #hofb #formulabharat #formulastudent #formulastudentindia #formulaindia

An excerpt from a Humans of Formula Bharat intervi

An excerpt from a Humans of Formula Bharat interview with Sushant Kumar

#humansofformulabharat #hofb #formulabharat #formulastudent #formulastudentindia #formulaindia

The skills that I inherited from my seniors were o

The skills that I inherited from my seniors were only applicable in the offline mode. With the pandemic causing a halt it became strenuous to keep the team members motivated as a team captain. I made sure in spite of the circumstances the knowledge transfer was happening as our team didn’t get a chance to manufacture for almost a year.

During our design phase for Formula Bharat 2022, we were due to pay the registration fee. Usually, our team splits the amount amongst the team members but the juniors seemed skeptical and around ten members left the team at that time. Luckily, we knew something like this would happen hence during recruitment we recruited fifteen extra members and that is how we pulled through the situation. Two weeks before the event I tested positive and had to isolate myself. There were a lot of crucial things left to be discussed and finalized. I would try to keep up by conducting virtual calls but while the team was getting their COVID negative reports in order to attend the event one of them tested positive and since they were all working in the workshop together, the rest had to isolate themselves. One good thing that happened in midst of all the setbacks was I got myself tested one day before the event and it was negative. I took a train first thing in the morning and was there at the event with my team by afternoon. Also, I am really grateful to our sponsors as they never questioned us asking, “You didn’t get a trophy this time?” they always motivate us and ask us when we are building our next car.

#humansofformulabharat #hofb #formulabharat #formulastudent #formulastudentindia #formulaindia

With seven years since our team's inception yet ou

With seven years since our team's inception yet our car never touched the track as we weren’t able to clear the tech inspection. In 2020, the tables turned for our team as we cleared the tech inspection and we were getting ready for the Endurance event. Our team was embracing the moment of happiness of clearing the TI for the first time and right at that moment, we got a notification from our college that our exams are scheduled to take place the same day as the endurance event. The entire team was stressed out with this so we decided to let the members decide for themselves what their decision would be.

We were around 24 members in the team, 17 of us decided to stay back and appear for the exam next year. Whereas the rest decided to go back in order to attend the exam. Fate had different plans for our team that year clearly. We got yet another notification from the college that the exams are postponed because of the CAA and NRC bill protests. And then all the team members stayed back and we were able to participate at the endurance event together.

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