Student Projects

ChemE Car Competition

Project Manager

Francia Quirarte, AIChE

Amount Requested

$5,000

Summary

The American Institute of Chemical Engineers hosts an annual competition for students to present their cars and compete. Students will spend a year designing and building a car together to compete against other university chapters. This competition provides an opportunity for chemical engineering students to apply the knowledge we have been learning and build a chemically-driven car. It will provide us with hands-on experience and a chance to showcase our talents.

Planned Activities/Investments

We will put together a team in the fall, composed of mainly chemical engineering students, but we hope to bring in students from other majors as well to form a more comprehensive team. In the fall we plan to design a car and test different reactions' capability to power our car. In the winter, we will finalize the car and ensure it is ready for the competition. In the early spring, the AIChE regional conference will be hosted in Michigan where the Northwestern chapter will compete. We hope to earn a spot to compete at the National Competition that would be hosted later that year.

Impact

This project would allow chemical engineering students to gain some hands on experience in chemistry by building a car that is powered by a chemical reaction. Since the car must be started at a specific time, we can bring in computer science students as well to create a program for the car to release the reactants at a given reactants. Similarly, bringing in electrical and mechanical engineering students to help build the frame of the car. By restarting this project, we can also get future students the same hands on experience. This project would also provide students with a project they can present as experience to potential employers. To evaluate the impact, at the end of the year I will survey team members on their thoughts on the project and for their thoughts on how we can improve for future students.

Deliverables

The main deliverable would be the car that we build.

Sustainability

In future years, we can rely on corporate sponsorships and fundraising of our own for the expenses.

Budget Overview

• Supplies for car including frame pieces, chemicals, electronics: $3,500

• Transportation and lodging costs for team to get to conference competitions (5-10 people): $1,500

 Total Budget Amount: $5,000

Faculty Adviser/Department

Muzhou Wang/Chemical Engineering