Unwind's First Roar!!

Today we succesfully tested out our LGA 340 Lombardini engine after getting the electrical and fuel supply connections right.A video coming up soon.Credits to ENT ,Dewaj and Nikhilesh.

E&T Team Going For Gold

1st October 2009:

Preparations are goin on at full swing as Team Unwired are finalising on its design as the fabrication is about to begin.

The Chromoly (ordered from the US) used for fabricating the rollcage has arrived and is presently stuck at Ernakulam at customs (Bloody customs officer). We are hopeful of getting the Chromoly till the 7th of October. So presently the jobless Chassis team is out looking for MS pipes for making the MS rollcage and the jigs used for keeping the pipes straight while welding.

And after much delay from the Engineering Unit of our college, the electrification of our workspace will finally begin (thanks to the Director). So hopefully you guys will see our workspace lighted up and running at full throttle from next week.

So back to the main story:

What distinguishes our team from the rest???

1. We are using Chromoly for our rollcage ( 30% lighter than other material)

2. We may be the first team from the country to use a CVT (no need for changing gears + max efficiency)

3. We are designing and fabricating our own FNR gearbox..the first team in the country to do so

As you may see "designing" a gearbox is not an easy task and the entire load has fallen on our E&T (Engine and Transmission) team to make this impossible task possible in just a month.

So after days of nite-outs, discussions(read fights), deliberations and study, they have finally arrived at a design and this is what it looks like:

So more than half of the work done, the team has to just design the casing and give it for casting outside. But the casing is proving to be a major headache because of the estimated cost of the casting increasing as the design begins to become more complex. So the casing has to be as rectangular as possible and still has to be as rounded as possible for the splash lubrication to take place.

So the team is still deliberating this by consulting with people from the industry. You can see these guys working on weekends in the classroom of DB 319 with the projector and making the casing in CAD and placing the gearbox to optimize their design. Here you can see their latest casing design and placement in the vehicle:

The diffrential has been provided to us by Eaton Ltd. Thank you Eaton for providing us all the technical details of the LSD (Limited Slip Diffrential). The unique point of the LSD is that it is specifically meant for off-road racing. The LSD is differnt from the open differntial from the fact that in an open diffrential, a condition of slip occurs when one of the driving wheels has no traction and the vehicle does not move. This condition can be seen when a vehicle is stuck in mud. The LSD prevents this by mean of a locking mechanism which gets activated in this condition and makes it work like a solid axle.