FutureTruck team gets a top award, finishes sixth

Cornell's hybrid SUV maneuvers during competition in Romeo, Mich. Courtesy of the U.S. Department of Energy

By Bill Steele

Cornell's Hybrid Electric Vehicle (HEV) student team won first prize for mathematical modeling in their vehicle design at the 2003 FutureTruck Competition June 2-12, while placing sixth overall.

The annual contest, held at the Ford Motor Co. Proving Grounds in Romeo, Mich., challenges engineering students to upgrade a standard 2002 Ford Explorer sport utility vehicle (SUV) for lower emissions and at least 25 percent higher fuel economy. The goal, according to sponsors, is to make the popular SUV more environmentally friendly while providing the features consumers demand. The competition is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy, Ford and several other companies.

"We're very happy with sixth," said team adviser John Callister, the Harvey Kinzelberg Director of Entrepreneurship in Engineering in Cornell's Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. "It was a very stiff competition." Cornell won $1,000 for placing sixth. Last year's team placed fourth.

Cornell also received the first MathWorks modeling award, which includes a $1,050 cash prize, for the best use of MATLAB and Simulink software in creating mathematical models of the engine, motor, transmission, controllers and other subsystems. Mathematical modeling is now a crucial step in the automotive design process, Callister said. MathWorks, the company that markets the software, will showcase Cornell's FutureTruck vehicle at the company's headquarters in Natick, Mass., in July.

All of the entries used a hybrid power train, in which an internal combustion engine is used in tandem with an electric motor to drive the wheels.

The Cornell entry, dubbed "Corona," used a turbocharged, 2-liter gasoline engine and a 150-kilowatt electric motor powered by a 336-volt battery pack. The design utilized regenerative braking, which recaptures braking energy usually dissipated as heat.

The Cornell vehicle earned 589 out of a possible 1,000 points. Scoring is based on a complex formula that includes not only fuel economy and emissions, but also acceleration, off-road performance and other features important to consumers. The University of Wisconsin-Madison placed first overall for the second year in a row with 841 points. Second was the University of California-Davis, and Michigan Technological University placed third.

The leader of the Cornell team, which included 30 undergraduate and master's students, was Jake Timm '04. Functional areas were led by Anthony Rivara '04, Patric Lowe, M.Eng '03, Adil Ahamed '04, Jeffrey Ho '03, Matt Kenney, M.Eng '03, and Jonathan Schoenberg '03.