Blog
Back in March 2020, the Solar Car Team at UVA went home for spring break not knowing that it was the last time we would step foot in our workspace for an entire year. The trajectory of the team - just like the rest of the world - was thrown into complete uncertainty and for graduating fourth years, it was a rather anti-climactic end to a long engineering journey. The race being cancelled and our university prohibiting in-person team meeting for a year weren’t exactly encouraging news. However, it turns out that the pandemic may have given us the soft reboot we needed. Read more→
Why a Solar Car Team?
Is a solar car a useful problem to tackle? Why do students dedicate so much time to it? And why is a
biomedical engineer working on the team? (hey that’s me!)
Here is my answer to “Why Solar Car?”
The first reason is why not? Seriously.
The second reason is apparent at competition, in the sweltering heat of the racing pits among excited yet exhausted students running between the car, the track, and the garage in a dance to drive their car to first place. It is the camaraderie between the teams, the passion of the “ray”-cers, and the complexity of the technical feat that is a full-sized, solar-powered vehicle.
I first heard about Solar Car in my 3rd year when a member plugged the team in one of our mechanical engineering classes. At that point, I had been very frustrated with the lack of hands-on experience that the mechanical engineering curriculum provided. Joining Solar Car was like a breath of fresh air. Despite my lack of experience, my ideas and contributions were welcomed immediately. I have learned so many invaluable skills building this car, all the while having a blast with a great group of people. Read more→
I am a first-year computer science major here at UVA and this is my second semester on the Solar Car team. Despite being a computer science major, I enjoy getting my hands dirty and working with computer aided design. Joining Solar Car was a great opportunity for me to get away from staring at a screen all day and to partake in an engineering project that encompasses a large range of differing engineering principles and concepts... Read more→
I joined the team in my first year. I found an old page from the 2000 team online and followed links until I found the email address of our old team lead, En De. I never thought I would get far on the team and I was very intimidated. I remember thinking about what it would be like to lead a team, I had no idea. I thought everything was so formal and couldn't imagine what it would be like to be a part of this until I was embedded. I remember thinking that everyone around me was much smarter than I was... Read more→