Rohan Baindoor, a final year mechanical engineering student from Nitte Meenakshi College of Engineering has modified a Suzuki Access moped.
Inspired by the moped races held in Europe, Baindoor hit upon the idea of building his own race moped as a part of his final-year project.
He modified it to make it race-worthy. His moped can reach up to 130 km /hour and has a 0-60 kmph acceleration in 2.8 seconds.
Says Rohan, “I wanted to localise something that was a niche field. The basic idea was to develop one of the fastest vehicles in this category which is very rarely tried out in our country.” He received support from his faculty, N R Shetty and P B Shetty and took the help of Manju, a mechanic from MRX Racing.
“The main criterion behind the selection was to get maximum power output. So, we found Suzuki Access (125 cc) engine the most suitable. The chassis was a very challenging task that was to be designed so that it had to be lightweight and provide good aerodynamics. We chose aluminium for the entire chassis design, as it had desirable properties,” Rohan explains.
Finally, the weight of the moped was reduced by 52 per cent and acceleration increased by 42 per cent which was very close to the European race moped standards. He completed the project by spending nearly Rs two lakh.
After testing it on various stretches in Bangalore, Rohan now plans to take it to drag racing in Coimbatore and Chennai.
He confesses that his performance in exams was hit due to his involvement in the project. “But I have no regrets. It was my dream to do this well,” Rohan adds.
