October 11, 2013

Nuna7 nabs World Solar Challenge title in Australia

Filed under: Automobiles,Science,Sustainability by Orangemaster @ 3:30 pm

The Delft University of Technology won its fourth title back in 2007 with its solar powered car Nuna4, but this year with Nuna7 it picked up its fifth title in Adelaide, Australia yesterday.

The Dutch beat their archrivals of Tokai University, Japan who had won the last two editions.

There were obstacles on the way to the finish line: temperatures of almost 50 celsius in the cockpit, taking big chances with specially designed lenses to soak up solar rays, and a grasshopper that bounced around the cockpit.

(Link: www.kennislink.nl, Photo of Nuna7 by Nuon, some rights reserved)

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June 27, 2007

The Nuna 4 unveiled today

Filed under: Automobiles,Science,Sustainability by Orangemaster @ 10:12 am
Nuon solar challenge 4

Today in Delft, South Holland (and hopefully with some sun) the unveiling of the Nuna 4 solar-powered car (see the car here) will take place, an event open to all.

The team designed a whole new solar-powered car in order to meet new rules of the World Solar Challenge: less solar cells on the car, the driver needed to be sitting up straight and security measures were tightened. In short, this new car is the first step towards an actual solar-powered car that is more like an ordinary car.

Oh, and the Delft University of Technology is looking for its fourth win in a row.

The Nuna 4 was designed and built by 11 enthousiastic students from the Delft University of Technology, who will be leaving for Australia this summer for the World Solar Challenge, the world championship of solar-powered cars, held from 21 to 28 October.

The unveiling will take place at 16:25 at the field in front of the Delft University of Technology on the Mekelweg for anyone in the neighbourhood.

(Link: TU Delft)

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October 13, 2017

Dutch win third World Solar Challenge 2017

Filed under: Automobiles by Orangemaster @ 3:33 pm

dutchteamrev

This week the Nuon Dutch team won a 3,000-kilometre solar car race across Australia’s outback for the third-straight year with the Nuna 9 car (not pictured here), travelling at an average speed of 81.2 kilometres per hour. The car pictured here is a Cruiser class Stella Lux, another solar-powered Dutch car that wins races.

This year, the team’s winning time was 37 hours, 10 minutes and 41 seconds. When their team finished first in 2015, it took them 33.03 hours. This year they had to compensate for severe wind gusts.

The win is the seventh for Nuon, with their car overcoming cloudy skies as they took the lead early and stayed ahead in the elite Challenger class, which features slick, single seat aerodynamic vehicles built for sustained endurance and total energy efficiency.

(Link: phys.org, Photo of Cruiser class Stella Lux by Bart van Overbeeke/phys.org)

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December 10, 2014

Dutch actress reaches South Pole by tractor

Filed under: Automobiles,General,Nature by Orangemaster @ 11:29 am

‘Tractor girl’ Manon Ossevoort, a 38-year-old Dutch actress and adventurer, has arrived at the South Pole at 10:30 p.m. EST on 8 December 2014 after a 17-day, 2,500-kilometre journey across Antarctica in a red Massey Ferguson MF 5610 tractor.

Ossevoort had already driven a tractor 38,000 km from her home in the Netherlands across Europe and Africa in 2005, when she had missed the boat due to transport her to Antarctica. At the time Ossevoort returned home, wrote a book, and waited for the opportunity to finish the final leg of her journey.

The journey was achieved with the help of a mother and daughter team from Iqaluit, Nunavut, Canada, Matty McNair and Sarah McNair-Landry as well as a mechanic, two truck drivers and a creative director. The first mechanised trip to the pole was done in 1958 by Sir Edmund Hilary using Ferguson TE20 tractors.

In 2008 Bernice Notenboom reached the South Pole on skis, becoming the first Dutch woman to do so.

(Links: www.independent.co.uk, www.cbc.ca)

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October 16, 2013

Eindhoven nails first place in cruiser class at World Solar Challenge

Filed under: Automobiles,Sustainability by Orangemaster @ 5:54 pm

This week a solar-powered street legal car named Stella, built by students from the Eindhoven University of Technology, was entered into the World Solar Challenge in Australia and won first place (PDF) in the new cruiser class.

While earlier this week students from the Delft University of Technology won for speed, the Eindhoven crew won for practicality, “with the ultimate goal of an entrant being able to meet the requirements for road registration in the country of origin.”

Why would a rainy country like the Netherlands even want to become a heavy hitter in solar-powered cars, you may wonder. “The Netherlands has enough sunlight to drive about 70 kilometres a day, given that the average drive only drives about 38 km/h. If you charge up the battery, you can drive 430 kilometres, which is a lot,” says Van Loon, one of the Eindhoven students.

(Link: www.kennislink.nl, Photo of Nuna7 and Stella by Jorrit Lousberg, some rights reserved)

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August 17, 2013

Solar car from Eindhoven rated street legal

Filed under: Automobiles,Sustainability by Branko Collin @ 10:05 pm

A team of students from the Eindhoven University of Technology has created a solar powered family car that is street legal, Telegraaf reported last Tuesday.

The car called Stella was created by Solar Team Eindhoven in a bid to win the Cruiser Class of the World Solar Challenge in Australia this October. Stella is 4.5 metres long, 1.65 metres wide and seats four. It can go 430 kilometres on a single charge. The solar panel has only got an efficiency rating of 22%. Spokesperson Wouter van Loon told Bright last month that this was a conscious decision: “We could have opted for a space-grade panel, but this way we keep the car affordable.”

The car’s top speed is only 120 km/h because the special low-friction tires cannot handle more. In the past teams of the universities of Twente and Delft also participated in the World Solar Challenge. Delft’s car Nuna, shown here, won the race 4 times out of the 7 it entered, and in 2011 it finished second after Japan’s Tokai Challenger.

(Photo of Nuna5 by Nuon Solar Team, some rights reserved)

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October 6, 2009

Engineering shorts

Filed under: Automobiles,Aviation,Online by Branko Collin @ 8:48 am

soyuz_clogNews from the tech trenches.

– The Nuna 5 solar powered car ran into a ditch last Saturday while preparing for the annual World Solar Challenge, writes Telegraaf (Dutch). The student-built car was driving at a speed of 110 kph at the time. Driver Jelle managed to get out unhurt, but several components of the car, including the solar panel, turned out to be damaged. The team from Delft University expects to have repaired the damage before the October 25 start.

See here for a drag race between Nuna 5 and its predecessor, Nuna 4, during happier times.

– Layar (augmented reality) includes an application that will let you spot the houses of the famous called BN’er Verkenner (Celeb Scout). US actor Brad Pitt, enjoying a quite afternoon in his Amsterdam canal house, was its victim in this video posted at Engadget.

Layar is a mobile phone tool that adds a geographic layer to your Android phone’s operating system, letting you check out what’s available near your current location.

– The Netherlands has its own space organisation. The NSO (Netherlands Space Office) was kickstarted last Wednesday by Minister Maria van der Hoeven (Economic Affairs) and astronaut André Kuipers. The NSO is supposed to help design and build a Dutch space programme, according to Algemeen Dagblad (Dutch).

Kuipers was recently selected for a half-year stay at the International Space Station starting December 2010.

(The illustration is a mock-up by me, not an actual NSO lifting body design space craft on top of a Soyuz rocket. Photo of a Soyuz rocket by NASA.
Photo of a big clog by Jocelyn Kinny, some rights reserved.)

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October 28, 2007

Dutch solar car wins fourth title

Filed under: Automobiles,Science,Sustainability by Orangemaster @ 10:39 pm
Nuon solar challenge 4

The Dutch solar car Nuna4 won the 20th World Solar Challenge, a 3,000 km race through the Australian outback. The Nuna4 took 33 h 17 min for the race and was the fourth win for the Dutch team Nuon Solar, which holds the race record at 29 hours and 11 minutes. The sun-powered cars from around the world raced from Darwin on Australia’s tropical north coast to Adelaide on the country’s southern coast. Travelling only during daylight, sometimes in scorching temperatures, Nuna4’s average speed was 90.7 km/h.

Read up on the team as we reported some time back.

(Link stuff.co.nz)

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