‘Formula Manipal’ cars excel at Coimbatore meet

Formula Manipal, a student project team of Manipal Institute of Technology-MAHE, did exceedingly well with the two cars-Combustion Car FMX8 and Electric Vehicle FMX8e that it had built at the just concluded Formula Bharat, an Engineering Design Competition held at Kari Motor Speedway in Coimbatore.

This year the competition also included electric vehicle for the first time and MIT students took part in the event with their electric vehicle.

The combustion car with a Honda CBR 600 engine and Electro-Pneumatic shifting and clutching, weighing only 210 kilogrammes came up with a brilliant performance among the 74 participating teams. It finished first in the dynamic event ‘Acceleration’ with an acceleration of 4.288 second and also first in the static event ‘Business Plan Presentation’. Formula Manipal finished third in the overall competition.

The electric car, making its debut in this event, also did well securing the second position in the Design Event and came third in the overall competition.

The electric vehicle has a 105HP motor powered by a 7.5kWh battery, packaged in just 195 kgs. Fifty students with faculty advisors conceived, designed and fabricated the cars.

Team Leader Shivam Gupta said, “Work on the electric car started in 2016 and we made our debut with this car. The team has come a long way from building the concept three years ago to winning the second prize in a national design event”.

“It is our passion that drives us to burn the midnight fuel and go the extra mile. The team worked incredibly hard on both the cars in the months leading up to the competition. We are glad to see our hard work pay off and have already started work on better designs for next year’s competition,” he said.

Team Manager Rithwik Srinivas said, “After the enormous hours and resources put on the cars, the success was a dream come true for the team. Along with the awards, we come back with a number of lessons learnt and a great experience.”

The faculty advisor for the electric car was Pramod Antony and for the combustion car Dr Dayananda Pai.