1. Photo inside the big tent. This is the work area for all the teams. Each area had electric power and a banner with the team name and where they were from indicated on a map of North and South America. Really a nice set-up for the teams. It was kind of like a circus under the big top, with many of the teams thrashing on their "clown cars", our team included.
2. Prototype car. The rules are pretty much wide open on this class. They have to go through a safety inspection but that's about the only thing that's checked. The car got 830 miles per gallon here but it has gone over 1000 mpg back in Indiana. Sonoma Raceway is about at sea level and the course has a couple of hills. In Indiana the course is flat and it's run at about 1000' elevation. I'm not sure how much difference that made and I'm not sure of the fuel they were running in California. I asked several people about the fuel and no-one seemed to know the octane rating or if it contained ethanol. Both of the team cars are fuel injected but are being run on the factory injection settings. The instructor said he hasn't found the time to fiddle with the mapping of the system and having done some of this in the past, I can believe that.
3. Urban Concept car. This class has to be built to conform to a strict set of rules. Basically it's a "street legal" car - lights, horn, turn signals, windshield wiper, trunk, and conform to size limits.
4. Team photo. Great group of students and advisors. I don't know if I ever would have undertaken a project like this. Building one car and taking it to Indy like I used to was enough of a headache. Building two cars, shipping them across country and then taking seven high schools kids on a 2000 mile trip? I don't think so.
The students did well for the most part. Not exactly a well oiled machine but they were able to do what needed to be done. The Urban Concept car had a bent brake rotor that I was able to help with. One of the students did all the wrenching and I manned the hammer to get it straightened out. Most of the tools were in various cardboard boxes for shipping. They started out labeled but got mixed up as the week went on. They could have used someone to keep things organized a bit better. Shell was very safety conscious. They had people walking around checking on the teams to keep everyone safe. Our team did a pretty good job for the most part except for the safety glasses. Most of the glasses ended up on top of the bill of their caps the minute they weren't actually doing something and then they had to be reminded to put them back on again when working on the car.
All in all, a very successful and enjoyable outing. The team will be competing in Indiana at the end of the month. Hopefully they'll be as successful there as well.
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