Congratulations to the University of Kentucky team, the grand prize winner of the Fluke Connect contest! Their project was live testing performance parameters on a solar car. Using Fluke Connect, they saw a 16% decrease in idle energy consumption and 5.5% increase in dynamic energy efficiency.
About University of Kentucky team and project: Greetings from the University of Kentucky Solar Car Team! The University of Kentucky Solar Car Team is comprised of a highly dedicated and talented group of undergraduate engineering students. We strive daily to design, build, and test the best solar powered racing vehicle we can, all while pushing ourselves to gain valuable experience in the field of automotive engineering, electrical engineering, and mechanical engineering. As members of the Solar Car Team, we also gain valuable experience in teamwork, team management, and cross-disciplinary collaboration.
We do all of our own fundraising and pride ourselves on our dedication to the team and its mission. As a team, we are committed to researching and testing innovations in the field of alternative energy. As the world market for electric vehicles grows, it is becoming more feasible to integrate photovoltaics and energy-conserving systems into electric vehicles. Our team hopes to inspire this evolution of the transportation market, not only as students using these technologies today, but as future leaders of a cutting-edge work-force.
When testing new strategies and designs, performance data must be acquired while actually driving on the road. Normally, we must spend time trying to design systems to log or transmit data during the drive. We will be using the new Fluke Connect tools to replace our existing solutions to provide better data and expedite the design process. Specifically, we often need to measure voltage and current for our solar cell array. In addition, we will measure the temperature of the solar cells for use in efficiency calculations. Finally, we need to measure voltage and current of our custom lithium ion battery packs. This data is used in improving designs, calculating efficiency, and determining race strategy.
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