The whole team was looking on anxiously. And boy it flew - years of hard work finally paid off! Everything about the flight was near perfect, everyone was ecstatic.
This is the story of NUST Airworks. Our journey started about two years ago.
A team of five members, with a passion for aviation, decided to take part in its first local competition called the Propellair. This took place in 2016 with the team bagging the best electrical plane award. From here the team gaining confidence from recent suhardccess went on to participate in numerous local competitions. Some of our more notable victories were the NERC Game of Drones overall champion, one of the oldest and toughest competition in the local circuit, and the grand champion award at Propellair in 2017. This was a time when the team really started to think big. And after consultation with our faculty adviser and the Dean of the society, we finally decided to go all the way to UK and represent Pakistan on an international stage.
The idea to participate was pretty straightforward since the team had pretty much won almost all local competitions. We even won the best project award in SUPARCO space week, in which most projects on display were the final year projects of graduating seniors. We were still in our 2nd year by then! The team had also grew in number, taking in more members and volunteers.
We were all set to start work, but with great ambitions came even greater tasks. The first one being to raise funds for our competition registration. This is where our first sponsor came on board, Whales College. Sir Wahaj Hussain was extremely supportive of our student project and was willing to sponsor us to help our cause. After getting done with our registrations, the team was officially registered to take part in the IMechE UAS Challenge 2018 . Now came the time to start work on the actual plane.
The research was all done and the designs were ready, but we were again short of funds. But instead of waiting around for more sponsors to come on board, the team decided to pool in money from all team members and fund the project on our own for the time being. After pooling in the money, the order for the parts of the plane had now been placed.
NUST Airworks with Halcyon
The next task of the team was to approach schools and offer them workshops for their students. The team would not only inculcate their skills and knowledge, but also promote the stem field amongst the youth. This is where we met Ma’am Ainee Shehzad. She too was proud of our efforts and immediately offered to conduct our workshops. Ma’am Ainee was extremely helpful and a great source of motivation for us. She even went out of her way to help us out by giving us contacts of corporates who could be potential sponsors for the team.
After the completion of the workshop, the parts had finally arrived after a huge delay due to customs authority. Delivery of parts would not have been possible without the help of our university admin. We are indeed very grateful to our Dean, Captain Tauqeer, without whom this society would not have been able to funciton. Customs can be hard to manage at times, and this is where Lt. Faisal was instrumental in getting our parts cleared from the customs with much ease.
The team immediately started work on our plane and got it ready in a short amount of time. Unfortunately though, due to a power failure, the plane came crashing down real hard. This was a huge blow to the team. Our first prototype was now gone and so was the money invested in R&D to get where it was today. However, every journey towards success always comes with its fair set of trials and tribulations. Despite being very hurt, we immediately got back up on our feet and started work again the very next day.
The funds were again a real issue, since the team had also exhausted its own money invested into the first prototype. But, good news was soon to follow. The marketing team, after much diligent efforts, managed to rope in two big sponsors, McDonalds and Gaditek respectively. McDonalds had even agreed on a deal to make a motivational video of the entire team’s journey thus far. This video went on to be viewed by almost a million people on Facebook. The news of NUST Airworks was now known to everyone in the university and gained much popularity. The second prototype’s order, with the help of sponsorship, was now placed again.
Halcyon, the name of our autonomous plane, was modular in design. It has an 8ft wing span with a 2kg payload capacity. It is commercially very feasible and highly reliable. The planes redundant systems means that it has backup for almost every system and can land safely in case of any failure. The team was now effectively working in Halcyon's test flight and very little time remained for the actual competition. We also would like to thank Mr.Raja Sabri owner of Integrated Dynamics, whose technical advice during the design of the plane was indeed very important for the team. We are also grateful to Mr.Ahad Wali who piloted all our test flights of the plane.
The last month before the competition was perhaps the toughest during our entire journey. This was a time when our finals had begun, everyone was fasting due to the month of Ramadan, and add to that the test flights in extreme temperatures of 47 degrees near the beach side of Defence Phase 8, Karachi. This place was quite far off from our university too, hence managing all these things was quite a challenge. Add to that all the necessary travel arrangements and last minute logistics work needed to be done. Our patience and resolve was surely tested, but the entire team showed great maturity and we persevered. We are proud to say that we managed to have conducted more than 30 test flights during this entire time! We made sure Halcyon was truly ready and prepared on all ends for the competition
Now came the time for us to depart for the competition. We made our 30 hours long journey by plane and train, all the way to Llanbedr, Wales. This journey was also extremely tiring and exhausting due to the fact that we were carrying Halcyon with us in four separate crates. Again, getting it cleared from the customs was a task which was completed on the day. We finally reached the extremely beautiful and scenic place, the Snowdonia Aerospace Center. The campsite had a lovely view and we immediately made our tents. Despite the long hours of travelling, the team was really excited for the next three days of the competition. Team NUST Airworks was all set for the IMechE UAS Challenge.
We started the next day with our first test flight. The Halcyon managed to make a very solid test flight in stormy conditions. This was very pleasing for all of us since we were one of only two student teams who managed to test fly their planes in such bad conditions, the other team being the eventual grand champions of the competition.
The competition was really good. It was our first year there and there were many other teams which had a fair bit of experience from past events. One such team with whom we were really close was Team Newton from Loughborough University. Their pilot John was extremely kind enough to fly our plane too for the entire competition. John was a really good and well experienced, licensed pilot. Yousuf, one of the student team members of the Loughborough University was also helpful to us whenever possible. The event was by far no smooth sailing for us or any other team throughout the competition too. Unfortunately, bad weather was to follow the next three days of the competition, which meant challenging conditions for the planes to fly. There were also radio interference issues too. For instance, once we were on the airfield, our plane couldn’t fly. This was due to the fact that someone else’s wireless module was connected to our plane and had messed up our settings completely. However, once the issues were resolved we got back on the field and saw the plane fly beautifully.
Ultimately, all our hard work paid off in the end. We managed to raise Pakistan’s flag well and truly high by winning two awards. The highest placed new entrant and the media award. The team with the highest mission scores for a university that has not previously taken part, was awarded the highest placed new entrant award. The media award was also won by us due to our most effective local media, school engagement and social media campaign. With almost a million views, the motivational video made with McDonalds played a vital role in getting us this award. We were extremely proud when the whole team was asked to rise and applauded for its efforts by the judges in the closing ceremony of the competition. It felt like all the pain and tough moments experienced in getting to this place was well worth it.
At the end of the day, perseverance, hard work and passion got us all the way to this place. From starting out in some local competitions to going all the way to the UK, and earning recognition for Pakistan in an international arena. But, the journey doesn’t end here just yet. We are very excited and motivated to work for next year. With the experience we now have, we are very much ready to get back on the drawing board and start work for next year’s competition, with our eyes set on the coveted prize on the Grand Champion award!