Where Did the YCP Racing Team Place?

That is the question many people who have followed the YCP Racing Team’s journey to Michigan have been asking. The vehicle earned a 62nd-place finish in the overall ranking of 120 teams.

For those who may not have seen the media or YCP coverage, a team of 10 senior engineering students, along with faculty advisors Stephen Kuchnicki, PhD, and Jennifer Dawson, PhD, traveled to Michigan International Speedway to compete in the Formula SAE ® Michigan in May. Formula SAE® is a student design competition organized by SAE International. 

The competition was the senior design capstone project for YCP mechanical engineering students in which students applied the technical skills they learned in their studies and co-op experiences to a real-world design problem.

The York College Racing Team made the trip to Michigan to demonstrate their design to experts in the field of vehicle design and to see the efforts from schools worldwide. 

“The competition showcased the engineering strengths that these seniors possess,” said Kuchnicki. “They finished 24th in the cost event, in which they needed to demonstrate the overall production price of their prototype and discuss methods for reducing the cost of one of their components. The judges were impressed with the ideas and reasoning the students had in explaining how they would cut fuel system costs by 15 percent. Also, the vehicle finished 24th in the straight-line acceleration event, traveling 75 meters in just over 4.2 seconds – a time less than half a second slower than the fastest.”

Unfortunately, the team learned the value of thorough analysis and testing when a component of their drivetrain broke in the third dynamic event, the autocross.  

“They were able to manage a repair to this part, but then it failed again about three quarters of the way through the tough endurance event, which only 43 teams finished, knocking them out of the rest of the contest,” he recalls.

Kuchnicki believes that overall, the students learned a lot about real-world engineering during the production and competition. 

“They learned that the little things matter in design,” he said. “And from seeing the top-performing cars, they noticed that the ideas they had this year were not terribly far off, but required several smaller tweaks to get to a better design.”

But perhaps the most important thing the team learned is that there is no such thing as a “perfect” design or a set of rigid rules to follow.  

“The students realized that what their professors have been telling them throughout the project – that you need to have reasons for your design and to be able to explain those reasons to someone else – is vital,” he added. “No engineer can remember all the details of a design, especially not over the course of a year. Having a strong record of your design notes gives an invaluable tool for explaining your thoughts behind a design.”