FSAE-A improvements

[Jon Oneill]

Just though I'd start a forum post here, for the australian event competitors to list and discuss ideas / improvements for our event.

Personally, I would love to see a stronger focus on spectator interaction. I'd love to see the return of commentary the the event. Not just to explain the event to spectators, but also, to update competitors of what other teams are doing.

Personally, I'd love to see some of the more prominent Alumni step up and do this, as they should have a pretty good understanding of whats happening. Are any of the Moke TV guys interested?

[Jon Oneill]

Just though I'd start a forum post here, for the australian event competitors to list and discuss ideas / improvements for our event.

Personally, I would love to see a stronger focus on spectator interaction. I'd love to see the return of commentary the the event. Not just to explain the event to spectators, but also, to update competitors of what other teams are doing.

Personally, I'd love to see some of the more prominent Alumni step up and do this, as they should have a pretty good understanding of whats happening. Are any of the Moke TV guys interested?

[Ash47]

I would like to see some more awards on offer like some of the other competitions have.

E.g. Best paintwork, best use of composites, best team dance at afterparty, lightest car, etc

[NickFavazzo]

I would love to see much more involvement from the sponsors and businesses, I have not been overseas to compete but I hear stories of Companies interacting with students:O

more awards ie Honda powertrain award etc

Really just look at the German comp, video and commentary!

[Chris B]

Personally I'd like to see the venue rotated around the country, i.e brisbane one year, perth, adelaide, melbourne, sydney, etc. Reason is that at the moment the qld and WA teams are at a distinct disadvantage relative to the victorian teams as we have to pay to get too melbourne for the comp. for us coming from brisbane thats 10 days worth of car hire on two cars, plus fuel, plus 2 nights extra accomodation on the road somewhere. that;s easily 1-2 thousand dollars of wasted budget. if you were to rotate the venue around i feel it would make it fairer in this respect.

thats my two cents at least.

[NickFavazzo]

I don't think the turnout would be as great if it was held in WA, with 27 of the 30 teams needing to travel, it would be expensive. I would love for it to happen but doubt it will.

[Chris B]

i agree Nick, but being from WA yourself you're team would be in a similar situation to mine where every year you need to spend more of your budget simply on the logistics of getting to and competing in the comp compared to the victorian teams who have the comp just down the road every year and the added advantage that brings of if you need emergency parts or repairs etc their workshops are close by etc. i know itd never happen but as you say id love for it to because, itd help balance it out a bit and also lets be honest, its fun travelling to different places instead of always the same place.

[Rex Chan]

I agree with more actual company involvement and commentary. As to travel expenses, doesn't that come out of the magical budget of personal team member, private expenses? Though I do agree it would be cool if venues changed every couple of years (not that I've been to Weribee that often - only 3 years so far). More electrical power would be nice, and more space. I realise the tents cost money, but how about open air? Then its up to teams to provide shelter for the things they need to keep fry. Seems like how it works in the US anyway.

I have to say the current toilet arrangements are very good, as I used them a lot in 2010.

One thing I'd like is a bigger practice area. The current one is way too small, and cars always get close to the Armco. At FSUK2011, I saw haybales fencing off a patch of concrete, which means nothing to hit if you misjudge (we crashed in 2010, delaying our Enduro2 run).

Actually, the most important admin change FSAE-A should make is to the results system. They claimed full points weren't to be released until the next day (way too late - yet released maybe 30 mins later). They do realise that the award ceremony only tells teams who came top 3, and 20+ other teams have no idea what they came (mega disappointment + disbeleif when this was announced), after 1 year of hard work. And the actual results lack ALL details, compared with FSAE Michigan/California, FSUK, FSG, etc, etc. I'm not sure why we don't have all times and cones for all runs. They must have all the data, so why keep it secret + hold onto it? Otherwise, how can we compare ourselves to other teams and improve? Hell, how can we even compare ourselves to our own past teams? I don't even know which of our enduro runs counted to our overall score. How silly is that?

[Chris B]

true part of our trip price does come from personal funds but having said that, in order to keep the competition accessible to all of our members, we subsidise alot of the cost of going since as we all know undergrad engineers are normally fairly poor lol.

rex i saw your "moment," in the practise pen last year, that was what convinced us not to use the pen lol.

also a live scoreboard kinda thing updated every few hours would be amazing too.

[NickFavazzo]

The competition usually costs each team member around a grand, that will probably be more now due to flights (closer the xmas). The team organises the accommodation but we don't usually subsidise the individual cost of comp.

Live time/scoreboards would be epic, imagine an enduro with the lap times live, ok if it does not include off-course and cones.

I think they should provide a slightly larger tent, having the shelter is fair and in the scheme of things it doesn't cost a lot, especially considering the venue doesn't charge.

A larger practice area would be great, hay-bales to protect the cars would be awesome, cars push the limits to do some higher speed turns.