Design and Analysis of a Supra SAE India Formula Race car

Shivendu & Akash Ranjan Prasad

BE 3
rd
year Mechanical Engineering, Birla Institute Of Technology,patna
shivendu4ever@gmail.com aakash33ranjan@gmail.com
Abstract:- Each year the Society of Automotive Engineers hosts the Formula SAE India
Colligate Design Competition, also known as SUPRA SAE for engineering students across
India. The competition is judged based on the engineering, performance, and cost of a
Formula style car designed to be produced in a small 3000 unit production run. Also, the
vehicle should be aerodynamically designed, economic, safe and single seat high
performance vehicle intended for sale to the nonprofessional weekend racing enthusiasts.

The major challenges faced while designing a formula type race car are weight reduction and
safety. Hence to find a solution the design has been emphasized on minimizing the weight
and cost, while maximizing the safety and performance features providing sheer driving
pleasure along with speed, keeping in mind the time constraint. The design has been made
keeping in mind the acceleration, handling and braking to make it as fast as possible. To
increase the downforce during cornering, to maximize the stability and to enhance the
performance, certain innovations which were feasible were thought of and also designed
keeping in mind the SUPRA SAE rule-book. Driver comfort and safety was given foremost
importance during design. Our goal is to have weight of the frame around 50 kg. We plan to
meet this goal by strategic use of alloy steel in conjunction with optimized member
placement using results of FEA analysis. Based on the driver, engine, and suspension
packaging, an initial frame design is developed using CATIA V5R19 and analyzed using
ANSYS. The Supra SAE car is designed and fabricated considering the fact that the vehicle
should be completely safe for the driver in case of collisions from any side and should be
stable enough to avoid toppling in case of steep cornering. It should also be aerodynamically
correct for better manoeuvrability and road adherence even at the highest achievable speed of
the vehicle. The main requirement of any Formula vehicle is to have high value of Roll
stiffness. The frame must be checked for the stress exerted as a result of static and dynamic
forces, forces that may come from bending moments due to the torque transferred by the
drive train, forces and bending moments due to impact and due to car dynamics. The analysis
will determine the maximum allowable stress and reactions at joints along the frame.