University of Rochester Human Powered Vehicle Team

Human powered vehicle offers ‘so many things’ in one project Members of the Human Powered Vehicle Challenge Team can take their senior engineering capstone project on the road.

A great article about our team from the University of Rochester mechanical engineering department!

Mechanical Engineering : University of Rochester Mira Bodek of the University of Rochester Human Powered Vehicle Challenge team at the start line of the women’s drag race during the E-Fest North ASME HPV Competition, which was held at Michigan State University. (Photo by Obed Badillo)

The results are in! Vespula finished with an overall rank of 14th out of 43 teams at ASME E-Fest North HPVC 2019! In only our second year and with only 2.5 months to finish our vehicle (as a spring semester senior design project), we are incredibly excited about this accomplishment. Our score breakdown is as follows:

Overall - 14th
Engineering Design - 6th
Men's Drag Race - 19th
Women's Drag Race - 27th
Endurance Race - 27th

Big congratulations to our newfound pals, ASME- University of Wisconsin Milwaukee HPVC for winning the Innovation Award for their sleek tilting trike. We'd also like to congratulate South Dakota State University Human Powered Vehicle Team, who gave us tons of valuable advice throughout the competition, on winning 3rd overall.

With day 3, E-Fest has come to a close! The endurance event is a 2.5 hour long race and obstacle course, where teams compete for the most laps. We finished in 24th in the race with 33 laps, with a final endurance score of 27th. Jack was our first rider, who maintained 5th place for the first 40 min. He also had our fastest lap time, with 2 min 57 sec.

Day 2 of E-Fest North has come to a close! We found out we placed 6th in the design event out of 50 teams. Very exciting to hit the top ten in only our second year!

For the drag races, Nick completed the men's run, coming in 19th, only 0.61 seconds away from the tournament qualification cutoff. Mira completed the women's run, coming in 27th. Onto the endurance race tomorrow!

Day 1 of ASME E-Fest North 2019 has almost wrapped up! Jack, Nick, and Mira did a great job with the design presentation. The safety check went well with the aide of ASME- University of Wisconsin Milwaukee HPVC and Phillip Van Asten, who helped ensure our hydraulic brakes were ready to go! Looking forward to the drag race tomorrow!

Thank you so much to AEXA Aerospace, LLC. for sponsoring our team this year! We are so grateful for your support.

And we’re off! Keep watching for updates.