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With a campus spread across several buildings in the west of the city, we were showed around their workshops by current team leader Will Daniels, former leader turned university technician Andrew Menzies and their new Faculty Advisor Tarek Jomaa. Sporting an impressive workspace filled with engines, motors, a Formula 4 spec car and more besides, this reflects the motorsport degree courses that the university offers and allows students to get hands on with maintenance and on track testing of a variety of vehicles. There’s even a Formula Student simulator in a corner, which it turns out was originally Brunel Racing’s 2007 car that the university bought from them in order to get an idea of how to build a car.
While all this is great to see, one question remains: where exactly have the team been? “We last competed in the 2015 event with “Justine” and did quite well” explained Andy, though he did admit that the car together in just a couple of days before that competition. “For us, it was important that the team showed everyone what they could do and despite the lack of testing, we did quite well with finishing place of 75th against some hot competition from German and European teams.” After this first outing in 2015 the team moved on to a Class 2 team in 2016, however in the two years that followed the team struggled to get things moving after the summer break. “It’s often easy to talk about what you need to do, rather than getting into action, so progress on the car stalled” explained Will.
As one of only a couple of former members from last year including Sienna, Will is keen that the team for the 2019 competition do not make the same mistakes again. “We’ve now got a strong team of around 20 students on board as the core team, which is organised into four sub teams: Suspension and Chassis, Bodywork, Powertrain and Electrical Systems” he explained. “We’ve already had the ball rolling at the beginning of the summer and we’re already working with a pre-existing chassis and continuing to design from there, with a target of getting everything designed by Christmas.” From there, the team hope to build the car and start testing at nearby Bruntingthorpe by Easter, but there’s plenty of improvements since Justine that can be made in the meantime. “At 301kg, she was slightly on the heavy side for a non-winged car - we did overengineer her for safety!” admitted Andy. So weight savings are first on the list of wants, but Will has a list of improvements, including lighter rims, redesigned uprights, lighter body, updating the suspension and much more. In fact, they hope to have the kinematics done by this time in the competition, enabling them to get on to the rest of the car. Given the situation they were in not only 12 months ago, the 2019 competition has given Will and the team an opportunity to restart their entry.
These positive changes also extend to the academic faculty as well. A former motorsport engineer with a strong background in design, aeronautics, dynamics and more, new lecturer and faculty advisor Tarek is keen to get stuck in to the project. “For me, I feel it is important that the students have practical projects to work on, especially if they are doing a specialised degree like motorsport engineering” he elaborated. “But it's important for me not to do the work for them, rather to support and guide the students’ into considering the outcomes of decisions so they can better learn from what they are doing”. It also helps that he has purposefully integrated the Formula Student competition with the assignments that the students need to produce, so learning and car development go hand in hand.
Speaking of support, as Derby Motorsports have been somewhat dormant for some time, the team had more or less had to restart working relations with the university from scratch. However, their efforts from the beginning of the summer have already born fruit: the team now have a dedicated room in the main workshop building to meet and assemble parts on the car. “It's really made all the hard work worth it” said Will “it gives us a home base to work from and now we can start getting to work on the car.” As we were talking, the team also got confirmation of a dedicated computer lab in the building upstairs, bringing much needed support for design and simulation close to their workspace. Add to this their existing equipment in their workshop and the opportunity to test locally, Derby Motorsports now have the tools to get the job done.
When it comes to goals, Andy and Will are quite keen to show that the team are capable of. “Of course we’re aiming for a top 10 position” said Andy confidently “with a team of automotive and motorsports degree students we are in a great position to get this done. “But getting there in a working car and doing more than 1 lap of the Endurance event is what will enable us to achieve this” finished Will.
To compete in Formula Student is not just about designing and building a car, but often is about overcoming all the associated challenges of organisation, prioritisation and teamwork to get the job done. While Derby Motorsports have clearly been through some tough times recently, the combination of support from the faculty and the passion for building a new car from the team gives the impression that they have really turned things around. Team Derby Motorsport should definitely be one to watch come the summer competition, best of luck to Will, Sienna and the whole team, you can keep up to date on all their progress online:
Website: https://www.teamderbymotorsport.com
Facebook: Team Derby Motorsport Formula Student Team
Twitter: @teamderbyfs
Youtube: Team Derby Motorsport Formula Student Team