Delcam Professional Services helped students from the University of Birmingham to achieve the Universitys best ever Formula Student performance in the 2015 competition. Among a number of components machined at Delcams Birmingham headquarters was a new combined brake calliper and upright.
Staff from Delcam Professional Services provided guidance to
the students on the design of the upright and then machined the components on
five-axis machine tools in the companys Advanced Manufacturing Facility. Using a new bonded two-piece design with an
integrated calliper resulted in an upright-calliper combined mass of 803g,
delivering a 30% weight saving compared to the previous upright. As well as transferring load between the wheel
and the chassis, the part had to house the bearings in which the wheel hub
rotates and control the suspension geometry.
Formula Student is an annual engineering design competition, challenging students from universities around the world to design, build, develop and race single-seater racing cars. It has become recognised as a very effective proving ground for student engineers, where they can develop not only their design and engineering abilities but also skills in teamwork, management of people, time and money, marketing and project planning.
The University of Birmingham Formula Student team is one of the most established in the UK, having first taken part in the competition in 1998. The majority of the teams members are undergraduates in Mechanical Engineering. Other disciplines also take part as the competition is based around running the team as a successful business, not just having the fastest car.
2015 proved to be the teams most successful performance in its history, finishing as the third-best UK team and seventh-best overall out of 96 teams that entered.
Delcams support for the Formula Student team is part of a long-term relationship with the Engineering Department at the University of Birmingham. Students have been trained in the companys software as part of their degree courses for many years, and the two organisations have collaborated on a number of research projects.