VIT University Student Team excels at International Aero Modelling competition!

Mumbai,23rd June, 2016: “Team Vimaanas” of VIT University, Vellore has been awarded the 2nd prize in the “Design Report” of the Micro Class category at the recently concluded SAE Aero Design East competition, held in Fort Worth, Texas, USA. This is the first time in the history of the SAE Aero Design competition that an Indian team has been conferred with this award.

75 teams from all across the globe participated in the competition (Georgia Institute of Technology, Wroclaw University of Technology, University of Michigan, Mcgill University, etc) with several institutions from India (IIT Kanpur, NIT Jamshedpur, Manipal Institute of Techology, etc) also taking part.

The SAE Aero Design competition, conducted by the SAE (Society of Automotive Engineers), encourage young and budding engineers to apply the concepts of aerodynamics and engineering sciences, to real life challenges. The competition challenges competitors to design and test a radio con- trolled vehicle that can have a controlled take-off and landing, while carrying maximum cargo. Teams from all around the world demonstrate their respective ‘mini aircraft’ and are evaluated on several aspects such as payload fraction, maximum payload lifted, oral presentation and design re- port.

“We started on designing our model in early September with an open mind and a focus to excel”, said Navin Samuel, part of Team Vimaanas, 2016.

“This time around, we really delved deep into our concepts before we started the manufacturing phase of our aircraft. We made sure that our plane met the design requirements of the competition, without compromising on the speed, weight and payload lifting capability of the aircraft. We are all extremely proud of the hard work we put in as a team throughout the season, and we surely seemed to have reaped the benefits!” Navin said.