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Thread: 2004 FSAE- Worst Pontiac Event Ever?

  1. #1
    A general feeling of confusion surrounded 2004 FSAE in my mind. Skidpad starts at 8am Friday? 8:50. Endurance run order based on Autocross? Nope. Design semifinalists announced at 5:30pm Thursday? Nope. Brake workers seemed to think Lehigh with their solid axle locked the left rear but not the right rear. One of them complained a team's car was pitching under braking and almost held that team! Practice track so small teams hit bales and break suspensions. Watched a team in Design Prelim's have to explain what tire scrub meant to a judge. Running from imaginary tornados wasting half and hour of dry running time before rain came, then having workers tell teams that a decision to run will be made by 4pm, then restarting the AutoX event at 6:45pm. Explicitly describing in the AutoX drivers meeting that there is a line for first drivers and second drivers, the first driver line getting priority, and then the courseworkers letting multiple teams get second drivers run, pushing other schools back in the first driver line far enough they can't run before the rain.

    I just removed a general sense that the right hand never knew what the left hand was doing at 2004 FSAE. I know our team is planning on sending letters of concern to the FSAE Consortium officials, and we are trying to get as many other teams as we can to do the same.

    FSAE Competition isn't the reason we all bust our asses all year- the experience itself is worth the work, but it would be nice if the event were run as professionally as many of our teams.
    Code:
    "...with powershifts and tiresmoke for all"

  2. #2
    yea it would be nice if it was run professionally, and to an extent it certainly is, i wasnt over there in detroit, but in australia there are similar problems

    needless to say its definately NOT a tiny event, and trying to get the job done right is a big task, and all the volunteers and everything that needs to be done is a credit

    its not like you can blame the tornado on the officials now is it

  3. #3
    The brake test officials always seem to be the least organized and on top of their game. The single non-locking wheel on a solid axle brought back memories of our own experience last year at the brake test.

    We had done a number of unsuccessful runs when our car failed to launch one time. We pulled it off the brake test track and found out it was a halfshaft that had slid out of the tripod. For some reason, the idiot judge at the brake test decided that this was a safey hazard and pulled our inspection sticker on the spot. He made us waste more time by going back to the inspection tent where the judge there gave us a funny look when we described why the sticker had been pulled.

    How can a dislodged halfshaft be dangerous? What might happen? Oh yeah, the car might lose power and stop moving. Very dangerous.... It seemed to us like he was just using his power as a judge because he didn't like the fact that we kept bothering him to run repeated brake tests. He was a jerk to say the least

    And no, the halfshaft could not have worked its way out and hit a car behind us. It was not sliding out far enough.

  4. #4
    Although Lehigh's overall performance can not be blamed on the organizers, I have MANY issues with what I heard went on there.

    The general attitude at competition seems to be to treat us either as criminals or bratty children. I've seen and heard this attitude in tech inspection, brake testing, design judging and don't get me started on the endurance.

    On that last subject, I speak not from personal experience (we deserved to flunk the endurance) but I can only say for some teams, my heart goes out to you.

    Maybe we should inspect the organizer's personal cars for trace fluid leaks and see how well they do.

    There's a lot more I want to say but I gotta get back to work, I'll have to rant later.
    Lehigh Formula SAE 1999-2004

  5. #5
    At least they made a real autocross and endurance track this year. If everything else sucked, I'd still be happy about having real courses to drive on. The previous courses were retarded- this year they showed that you can have a fast, fun, safe course where there aren't many cones hit or spins.

    The track finally was consistent with what the cars are supposed to be designed for- the weekend autocrosser.
    --------------------------
    Matt Giaraffa
    Missouri S&T (UMR) FSAE 2001 - 2005

  6. #6
    We wouldn't know - we never ran it and missing the autocross is what I am most pissed about. Since the car was designed to take advantage of the tight autocross, it would have been nice to get some data on how it behaved if this course was different.

    Oh well, they only have a year to wait, then another year to evaluate the results...
    Lehigh Formula SAE 1999-2004

  7. #7
    I will agree to the utter confusion that went on at this year's compeition. This was my third time around coming to Pontiac and this was the worst by far. However I am willing to realize that those problems are most likely because the event was in an entirely new part of the parking lot and the organizers didn't have a feel for how teams would like or dislike them.

    Each and everyone who had a problem with the compeition should write Kathleen McDonald a respectfull email as to how the compeition could be done better in the future.

  8. #8
    It's very interesting to hear what your all saying over the pond, i'm in the Uk and was racing at last years Uk compertion and did'nt really have a big complaint about the british event. It amazes me what you guys are saying happens over there, test tracks that are so small they cause accidnets, thats crazy!!! That was one of the things that got me at last years Uk event, you have so many teams that finish there cars that week or a few days before and instead of having a proper test track you have a stupid figure of eight, where you can put any loads into anything.

    Intersting what you say about the SCCA tho, ours was run by the 750 Motor Club which is the UK equivilant, they run race track series for the under funded racer. I think they did a great job.I did think it was funny that they measured the track length wrong for the Endurance, Cheers to Toronto for pointing that out!!!

    And to add insalt to injurry, our car last year after the driver change in the endurance had a throttle that was stuck wide open with our master of a driver driving on the brake and clutch, it did this for about 5 -6 laps with no bother, then a lap before it was pulled in it started to boil the water and was spraying water out of the top of the water bottles like chalmers did before it cault fire. they decided that was enought.

    So i'd be intersted to hear what the teams that regually race in the UK and raced at this years US event thought??

    Also thing to all the marshalls i talked to were really good, seamed thay were they becasue they loved cars!!!

    Maybe more of you Americans should come over next year and see how it's all done!!! ( i do realise our comp is half the size of yours)

  9. #9
    My view:

    They shouldn't have let teams run their second drivers in Autocross when they specifically said they would run all the first drivers.

    Charlie from Auburn told me, they ran their first driver, and were ready to run their second driver and just wanted to be sure that they'd be first in line for the 2nd driver. Instead, the marshall signalled for them to send out their second driver...... bullocks.

    My only other beef is the layout of cones. I spent the first 2 laps very cautious because I felt the cone layout was pretty scarce. The track was SUPER bumpy and much more high speed compared to traditional FSAE tracks.....where were the slaloms in the enduro??

    I noticed that many teams shortened their wheelbases this year and went to what I call the "Tokyo Denki sized" era of FSAE cars......real small, real short wheelbases. But the teams made this decision only to negotiate the tight tracks that included slaloms of tradition.

    The track we ran was REALLY fast....guys at Rolla and UTA loved it I bet! ....where I went into 2 turns watch'n MSU lift inside wheels!

    I also got a black flag for apparently ignoring a blue flag. My beef about this is: I had been out for 3 laps. During each of the first 2 laps, I got blue flagged and pulled into the passee lane. WHY then would I decide to ignore a 3rd blue flag??? I really didn't see it, and the 1 minute penalty hurt us. The course marshall told me "you should be looking for flags"........ shouldn't I be focusing on racing?? I watched every single course worker from that point on and noticed that 80% of them didn't even have flags in their pocession!

    Those were my only beefs. Other then that, it was quite fun! I enjoyed seeing the quality and organization of other teams step up.

    Now off to Formula Student!

    Cheers,

    Vinh
    Vinh Pham
    Toronto FSAE Alumni 01-04
    www.fsae.utoronto.ca
    2003 Formula Student Champs!

  10. #10
    <BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by fsae_alum:
    Second, have SCCA come on board and run the event. If there's one thing that SCCA is, it's that their notoriously fair to everybody involved (teams that is). That's an interesting concept...having a company that is in the business of running racing events run....a racing event (as opposed to a bunch of big 3 engineers). Unfortunately, it sounds as if the event is getting way to big for the same old organizers to control logistically. It's no longer the competition it was 10 years ago. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

    The SCCA is part of the FSAE Consortium, they set up the autoX and endurance tracks, and supply most of the courseworkers! Howard Duncan, the SCCA Solo chair comes to Pontiac every year.
    Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
    Formula SAE '00 - '04
    Team Leader '01 - '03
    www.formularpi.com

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