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To take part in the race in Formula Student (UK) which is the international counterpart of formula one at engineering college level, IIT Bombay has come up with, what they claim to be the fastest Indian electric racing car, Orca.
The car has some amazing features and speed of more than 145 kmph and acceleration of 0-100 kmph in 3.47 seconds. This car was not a part of their project and was made by the racing team said, Shardul Jade, a final year electrical engineering student, who is a part of the team. Students inaugurated the car at the PC Saxena Auditorium at IIT Bombay.
Jade also added that to select a person on team, the students are first briefed about racing and then finally they are interviews regarding their basic knowledge and understanding.
Currently the team has 70 students in it and the project took 10 months to come alive. The project was also sent for testing for two months.
These 70 students are from 8 different fields of engineering. Rishabh Kapasi, a final-year student and team leader, said, “I learnt a lot about mechanical engineering and team work during the process of completing this project.”
The car has more than 20,000 components and the skeleton of the car weighs 29 kg. To ensure safety of the driver and surroundings, a low-voltage safety system has been developed, students said. “The low voltage safety system monitors the temperature of the cells and keeps the high and low voltage systems separate”, explained Kapasi.
One of the professors who mentored the team said that he was amazed by the idea and students developed the project entirely on their own. Orca is the fifth electric car manufactured by IIT Bombay’s racing team and uses a battery pack of 95 cells, which will deliver continuous power of 80 kilowatt.
Tanushree Bagrodia, the chief sponsor of Orca, said, “We are proud of the all the achievements of the racing team of IIT Bombay.” She added that in one of the previous races, the motor controller was damaged in transportation. However the team competed in several other categories and for design documentation it was praised as one of the best in the world.
