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World Solar Challenge Started in Australian Desert

Posted by Zonk on from the go-sun-go dept.

photonic writes "The World Solar Challenge has just finished the first racing day. It is a 3000 kilometer race from Darwin to Adelaide for cars that are powered by solar energy only. The results from this day have not yet been published, but intermediate results suggest that the Dutch Nuon Solar Team is again on the lead. This team from Delft University of Technology has a reputation to uphold since they also won the previous two races in 2001 and 2003, the last one in a record breaking 97 km/h average. The Tesseract team from MIT was less fortunate: during the qualification they got off track and rolled over. After some fixing up they still managed to qualify into 7th place on battery power, but with substantial damage to the solar panel their challenge will be finishing rather than winning."

4 of 113 comments (clear)

  1. Day 1 results by Thijs+van+As · · Score: 4, Informative

    From the Dutch Nuna website:
    The Nuna 3 won day 1, finishing half an hour before the Michigan team (which got a flat tire halfway).

  2. 4 door GTO 'coupe' by ACDChook · · Score: 4, Informative

    Of course it does - it's a Holden Commodore, an Australian icon (not really a fan myself, they're pretty poo cars). The 2-door coupe based off the Commodore is the Monaro, which is exported to the US as the GTO Coupe.

  3. Re:solar energy only? by pilardi · · Score: 5, Informative

    They may start with batteries charged with 5kWh of stored energy

    http://www.wsc.org.au/2005/competition/vehicle.cla sses/solar/

  4. More Dutch teams participating by SigmundFreud · · Score: 4, Informative

    The success of the Dutch team has (finally) caused others to take up the challenge. One is another from the Netherlands, the http://www.solarteamtwente.nl/nieuws.php Solutra team (http://www.utwente.nl/ University of Twente). Compared to the Delftian guys, these people are novices, but it's nice to see some real rivalry and competition being initiated. I saw them practice, just a few days before the went to Australia, and asked if they has practiced changing tires (which I think is the important thing in winning the challenge). The answer: no, not yet, do you think that's important?
    Remember that it really is a challenge, since temperatures inside the car can get more than 50 degrees Celsius.

    --
    Sic transit gloria mundi.