A list of important learning resources

Lights out Alice!

This is a list of important websites and resources that will help in figuring out things faster and also learn new things.

Matlab:

Blogs on Matlab:  http://matlabhelper.com/category/tutorial/
                              https://nickhigham.wordpress.com/
                              http://matlabguide.com/
                              http://undocumentedmatlab.com/
Youtube:               https://www.youtube.com/user/optiplex17
                              https://youtu.be/T_ekAD7U-wU
                              https://www.youtube.com/user/MATLAB
Begineer's course: https://matlabacademy.mathworks.com/
                              http://courses.coursovie.com/courses/matlab-programming-for-engineers/preview
                              http://courses.coursovie.com/courses/matlab-programming-Examples/preview

For Modelling and simulation: https://iversity.org/en/courses/modelling-and-simulation-using-matlab?r=07201

Cool engineering blogs:

http://workshopwale.com/blog/
www.theansweris27.com
http://carbibles.blogspot.in/
www.mahekmody.com

How to understand OpenFoam:

http://www.sourceflux.de/blog/101-things-read-starting-openfoam/

How to make Physics Engines:

https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/library/wa-build2dphysicsengine/
http://brm.io/matter-js/
http://brm.io/game-physics-for-beginners/
https://gamedevelopment.tutsplus.com/tutorials/how-to-create-a-custom-2d-physics-engine-oriented-rigid-bodies--gamedev-8032
http://buildnewgames.com/gamephysics/
https://gamedevelopment.tutsplus.com/tutorials/how-to-create-a-custom-2d-physics-engine-the-basics-and-impulse-resolution--gamedev-6331
http://www.ign.com/articles/2012/10/01/the-most-impressive-physics-engine-youve-never-seen



FEA:

https://www.simscale.com/blog/2016/11/learn-finite-element-analysis-fea/
https://www.nafems.org/
https://caeai.com/blog
http://feaforall.com/
http://www.stressebook.com/engineering-resources/

CFD:
https://www.simscale.com/forum/t/books-and-resources-for-cfd/36870
https://www.cfd-online.com/Links/onlinedocs.html
https://www.cfd-online.com/Feeds/blogs.php
http://www.innovative-cfd.com/CFD-blog.html
https://www.cfdnewspaper.com/

Read on Alice!

Ahmed Body (A re-post from cfd-online.com)

Lights out Alice!

I have figured it out Alice! Or at least i would like to believe that till the next explanation strikes me (won't be too long though). My life is definitely is cosine curve. Now, first i will explain why it is not a sine curve. Initial value of sine curve is 0 and then rises to 1 and then oscillates. No, i was born with a lot of resources and the best parental guidance. Then somehow i managed to mess it all up. After messing it up, i try and bring myself round and get back to 1. But, seems i am still on that curve and i am yet to reach 1. Or is it an asymptote Alice? What if i am never meant to get back back to 1? What if i am a damped oscillation with no force, resulting in a depleting maxima every time?

Wait! Hold on. That's what happens when i let my brain lose, even for a second.

Getting past that soul wrenching, life gutting thought, this post is about something new i learned today about CFD application in automotive sectors. This is a repost on the same taken from the link given below:

https://www.cfd-online.com/Wiki/Ahmed_body

Figure has all dimensions in mm.



The Ahmed body was described originally by S. R. Ahmed in 1984 [1]. Three main features were seen in the wake:

1. The A recirculation region that is formed as the flow separates at the top of the vertical back surface of the model

2. The B recirculation region that is formed due to the separation at the base of the model.

3. The c-pillar vortices that form as the vorticity in the side boundary layers roll up over the slant edges.

The wake was shown to be highly dependent on slant angle. For slant angles less than 12°, the flow remains attached over the the slant. The flow is essentially two-dimensional and has low drag. Between 12° and 30° the flow becomes much more three-dimensional as the c-pillar vortices form. These reach maximum strength at 30°. The drag increases significantly as the low pressure cores act on the rear surfaces. Past 30° the flow separates fully off the slant. This results in a sudden decrease in drag and weaker c-pillar vortices.

Effect of Aspect Ratio: Venning et al [7] showed that the aspect ratio of the rear slant had a significant effect on the wake. The wider bodies ceased to reattach at slant angles of 25°, suggesting that the critical angle lowers as aspect ratio increases. They also provide vortex core location from experimental data that can be used for validation [8].

Description of the test case: The Ahmed body (Fig. 1) was first defined and its characteristics described in the experimental work of Ahmed [1]. Two configurations with slant angles of 25°and 35°are considered as a test case. For this configurations detailed LDA Measurements have been performed by Becker, Lienhart and Stoots [2,3] in the LSTM low-speed wind-tunnel with a cross-section of 1.87x1.4 m2 (width x height) with a bulk velocity of 40 m/s. The test-section of the wind-tunnel was 3/4 open (only ground plate present). The distance between the body and the plate representing the ground is 50 mm. In the experiment perform by the Ahmed [1], flow velocity was taken 60 m/s, Reynolds number was 4.29 million based on model length.

References:

[1] S.R. Ahmed, G. Ramm, Some Salient Features of the Time-Averaged Ground Vehicle Wake, SAE-Paper 840300, 1984

[2] H. Lienhart, S. Becker, Flow and Turbulence Structure in the Wake of a Simplified Car Model, SAE 2003 World Congress, SAE Paper 2003-01-0656, Detroit, Michigan, USA, 2003

[3] H. Lienhart, C. Stoots, S. Becker, Flow and Turbulence Structures in the Wake of a Simplified Car Model (Ahmed Model), DGLR Fach Symp. der AG STAB, Stuttgart University, 15-17 Nov., 2000

[4] C. Hinterberger, M. García-Villalba, W. Rodi, Large Eddy Simulation of flow around the Ahmed body. In "Lecture Notes in Applied and Computational Mechanics / The Aerodynamics of Heavy Vehicles: Trucks, Buses, and Trains", R. McCallen, F. Browand, J. Ross (Eds.), Springer Verlag, ISBN: 3-540-22088-7, 2004

[5] S. Krajnovic, L. Davidson, Large eddy simulation of the flow around a simplified car model, SAE 2004 World Congress, SAE Paper 2004-01-0227, Detroit, Michigan, USA, 2004

[6] M. Minguez, R. Pasquetti, E. Serre, High-order large-eddy simulation of flow over the “Ahmed body” car model, Phys. Fluids, 20, 9, 2008

[7] Venning, J., Lo Jacono, D., Burton, D., Thompson, M., and Sheridan J., The effect of aspect ratio on the wake of the Ahmed body. Experiments in Fluids 56, 2015.

[8] Venning, J., Vortex locations for the longitudinal structures in the wake of the Ahmed body. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.1.1301.4882

Decided to let go, but we all know how long that decision lasts...

Lights out Alice!

Hope you are getting enough sleep and rest these days, since I am not getting both (i think but am not sure) and am largely lethargic in my actions, and since I have lost all my studying habits, I am heading face first towards the wall of doom that ends with the pain of recurring failure that once again turns up to put you down.

After a sudden climactic talk with Param yesterday night, wherein the question of "friendship being over" was raised, the call came today wherein I was expecting a heated discussion on why the thing that happened, ever happened. But, to my dismay, the usual Param was on the call and hence, everything but fruitful discussion on the situation took place. Param was as usual, harping on the small talk, the usual "I will fail because there is a lot to study and I have not gotten round to any of it", the usual "what should I do" things. I am not saying that it is a load of crap, but am saying this that after mentioning all of this, a person should be ready to take help, which Param refuses to do  (although now that i read this sentence, I do realise that asking for help is not an easy thing).

Where does it leave me?

Nowhere, I suppose. I don't do small talk, that's it. I used to do that for Param and for the sake of not being rude. I would like the small talk wherein you let me help you with an issue and I can learn from the discussion, mutually benefiting both of parties and making me more understanding than I started out with. Baseless, meaningless discussions where you are only giving me less than 1% opening into your mindset, ideologies and habits are something that doesn't excite me. I guess, I need to slowly fade away, like the state that was a few months back, not start any conversation but not be discourteous so as to not reply to a conversation.

I would like the opportunity to be a shoulder that you can rest your weary head on, but I can only offer it so many times. Rejection is not a happy feeling but just leaving the "offered shoulder" out in cold without rejecting or accepting is the worst. In conclusion, this leads me to think that I am offering too much on the table with the returns not coming. It is not that I haven't been patient, I have been. It's been around four years now (quite a long time).

I think it's time to call it quits.

"To say goodbye is to die a little." - Raymond Chandler

Don't you cry Alice! Everything happens for the best (I hope!)

They say it is tough and i can tell you from experience, it is the worst that you could ever have to do

Lights out Alice,
Getting money from people is not a child's play. Sure, but how extremely difficult and herculean a task it can be is only truly seen in racing.

I came across this article from Jalopnik that truly summarizes what it takes to land a sponsor, with an interesting take towards the end.
https://jalopnik.com/how-to-get-sponsors-to-pay-for-your-broke-ass-to-go-rac-1819341360
Here is the article below(for you lazy folks):

I’ve been racing cars professionally for almost 15 years now, and as soon as people find out what I do, the questions start coming in hard and fast. Questions like “What’s the fastest you’ve ever gone?” and “Have you ever had a bad crash?” and so on. But the two I get asked the most often are these: “So you race NASCAR?” and “How do you get sponsors to pay you?”

I don’t really mind answering those same questions over and over (except for the NASCAR one; that’s fucking annoying.) But the sponsorship question is the hardest one by far, mainly because there are so many parts to it that any response turns into an hour-long dissertation on the commercial state of motorsports—and also results into said person never asking me another question ever again. At least it has that going for it.

To understand motorsports sponsorships you first have to understand the business of professional motorsports. A race team is a business like any other business. It has expenses—cars, drivers, crew, equipment, logistical, office, accounting, so much coffee, etc.—and needs to bring in revenue to cover those expenses. Where we go off the rails is in how we bring in that revenue.

Race teams don’t have paying customers like a normal business (I’ll leave the pay driver conversation for another day) so the only real source of income for teams is sponsors.

As you can see by just looking at various cars, in the various series around the world, there is no one type of company that has an interest in sponsoring motorsports. Red Bull, Rolex, Visit Florida, UPS, and Viagra have all graced the body panels of race cars all over the world. None of them have anything in common other than the value they, individually, see in racing.

Now some of you might read this and think, “Why would Holland want to tell me how to get sponsors to go racing? Isn’t this like taking money out of his own pocket?” Actually, no! It isn’t.

But there are so many people out there getting it totally wrong that they actually turn potential sponsors off and screw it up for the rest of us. More importantly, if more potential racers start doing a better job pitching and working with sponsors, it helps bring more sponsors into racing, making the sport healthier and hence more attractive to other sponsors. So there is a method to my madness.

Now let’s find out how to get you jokers paid.

Rule #1: It’s not me, it’s you

When speaking with a sponsor, the amount of money you need to go racing is totally irrelevant. The only thing that matters to the sponsor is how much return they get on their investment.

This is by far the most important concept to get your head around when approaching a sponsor, and by far the one that almost every single one gets wrong.

It’s so important I’ll say it again. The only thing that matters is the sponsor’s ROI.

Imagine you run the Super Go-Fast Racing™ team. And imagine you’re meeting with the CEO of a widget company to ask for sponsorship. Your team needs $100,000.

The WidgetCo. CEO has that much in her marketing budget but also options on how to spend it—she can take out ads online, do radio or TV spots, or even make some good old fashioned email blasts.

All of those methods are tried and true, but, more importantly, their response rate can be directly measured and tracked—proving or disproving their effectiveness.

So let’s say the WidgetCo CEO decides to spend $100,000 of the marketing budget on online ads on a fictional automotive website that we’ll call Jalopnik.com. God, that name is incessantly stupid; who would ever name a website that? Let’s call it Puff-A-Lumps.com instead.

The CEO is all set to purchase ad space knowing that if she spends $100,000 on ads on Puff-A-Lumps.com, she will get an increase in business worth $500,000 from those ads (a 5:1 ratio is considered good; 10:1 is exceptional.)

Now you, the would-be racing mogul, are here to ask for the same $100,000. How do you show her you can give the same 5:1 return as online ads can?

Businesses exist to make money. If they give you some of their money, they are going to expect to make even more money in return. If they can’t show someone how they are going to make money by giving a racing team some, then end of story.

It’s that simple—but there is an exception. Keep reading to the end.

Rule #2: B2B is how most sponsorships occur

One of the big myths of sponsorship is that it’s only about PR and marketing. To be fair, there is absolutely a marketing component to almost every sponsorship deal. However, the primary driving force behind most of these deals is B2B (Business to Business).

What is B2B? In short it’s the exchange of products, information or services between companies rather than consumers (which is known as B2C). B2B works thusly:

Company A has something that Company B wants. Company A says OK, you can have it, but it will cost you. Company B says OK what will it cost us? Company A says “Well, we have this race team…”

Look at a race car sponsored by a big box store, for example. The first thing you see is the big store logo everywhere. The logical assumption is that the store is writing some fat checks to be involved in that program.


But look again a bit closer. Do you see all of the other big name logos like Coke, Energizer, Belkin, Crest, Dove, and so on? What do you think all of these companies have in common?

Yes. Their products are all sold at that superstore near you.

The store wants to sponsor a race car program but doesn’t want to write a bunch of big checks all by themselves. So they go to some of their retail partners who have been asking for better placement and promotion for their product at their stores nationwide.

The company gets better exposure for their product, which directly translates into more sales and the store gets funding to sponsor their race team. Deal done.

Rule #3: Be realistic

Do not expect to hit a home run your first time out of the gate. Even if you can get a sponsor a solid 5:1 ROI, most sponsors are going to shy away from someone without a proven record.


For a second dose of reality, do not expect to raise your entire racing budget from one sponsor. Title sponsors usually provide no more than 50 percent of your budget at max. You then have to go to secondary sponsors to bring in the remaining funds. This is generally true in every form of racing.

That being said, signing a primary sponsor makes the operation more attractive to secondary sponsors.

Which leads me to my next bit of advice: always have enough budget in the bank to go it alone. If a sponsor signs on, happy days! You don’t have to spend as much of your own money.

Rule #4: Logos on cars don’t do shit
Well, logos on cars don’t do shit own their own. There needs to be a concerted marketing effort behind the logo on the car, to engage consumers and get the full benefit of the sponsorship. In the industry this is known as “activating” the sponsorship.


Your proposal can’t be, “I have a race car and it gets seen by a lot of people, therefore, if you put your logo on my car you will get exposure and people will buy your product.” There needs to be a plan to engage those consumers.

Where else will you car be seen? Car shows, magazines, TV? How else are you able to get your sponsor’s logo—and more important the company message—in front of the people that may want to buy their products? If you can’t do any of that, then the logo on your car is irrelevant.

You can expect a sponsor to have to spend $1 in activation expense for every $1 of sponsorship to maximize the investment. So in our fictional sponsorship deal, you, the owner/driver of the Super Go-Fast Racing Team™ is, actually asking for the CEO Of WidgetCo to spend $200,000 of her budget, not $100,000.

Rule #5: Come with stuff

Do you already own the car you plan racing? A trailer? Tools? If the answer to any of those questions is yes, then congrats, you are ahead of the game.

Going to a sponsor empty handed is a tall task. If you are starting with nothing, you’re basically asking the sponsor to pay to get your program up and running. Technically, then, the sponsor doesn’t need you at all to go racing.

You may counter with the fact that you’re a really great driver with lots of potential and have won all kinds of races, but, to be completely honest, great drivers are a dime a dozen. Race team owners love to call us the loose nuts behind the wheel—if one nut doesn’t fit then you just replace it with another.

Rule #6: C.R.E.A.M

For a lot of sponsors it’s more attractive to sponsor you with product, or at least a discount on product, than cash. Think things like tires, parts, motor oil and so on.

ut almost every proposal I see is focused solely on getting cash and totally ignores product sponsorships. If you were budgeting for an item you need to go racing, getting it for free is the same as cash.

Discounts on products are some of the easiest sponsor deals to put together. If you can get a company to give you a 30 to 40 percent discount on a product you need, that’s money saved on your end and most likely nothing more than unrealized profit on the sponsor’s side, as 30-40 percent is usually the profit margin on a lot of products.

Product sponsorships are also very attractive to sponsors because you are actually using their products in competition. It adds weight to the old “win on Sunday, sell on Monday” saying.

If that’s not enough, one last good bit about product sponsorship is that the sponsor typically wants to make sure that their product is seen is the best light, so they are more likely to provide additional support to make sure that their product is working at its best.

For the past couple of years at Pikes Peak I’ve worked with companies like Pirelli who had a tire engineer on hand to make sure I could get the most out of their tires. Alcon and Pagid who optimized my brakes, and JRZ did the same with my suspension. More importantly all of these companies were involved all the way through, giving me much needed engineering support.

This type of support is off-the-charts invaluable, and all at no cost to me.

Rule #7: Your rep is everything

Be warned that in racing (and in the real world) your reputation is the single most valuable thing you posses. Sponsors whose products and reputation aren’t up to par can drag you down with them. When you sign a deal, you are joined at the hip with your sponsor. Their reputation is your reputation and vice versa.

Several years ago I raced a Volkswagen GTI in the Pirelli World Challenge Touring Car series. We built the car with support of several product sponsors (see rule #6). One of those sponsors was a well known VW tuner who had a short shift kit for the GTI.

We debuted the car at Mosport in Canada, one of my favorite tracks, and we were quick out of the box. But during the first practice I had an issue with the gear changes. When I tried to engage fifth it felt like I was getting third as the engine revs would go up as I released the clutch, not down as they should on an upshift.

A post session tear down revealed that was indeed the case. Unfortunately during one of these mis-shifts, I had over revved the engine. While it was still functional, it was also down about 15 horsepower due to a damaged valve. I still managed to set a track record during the race but was only able to get a third place finish in the race due to the missing ponies.

I had to go back to the sponsor after the weekend and tell them that I couldn’t represent their product anymore, as I didn’t want someone purchasing their flawed product based on my endorsement.

The opposite of that was earlier this year at Pikes Peak where I ran a salvage title Corvette Z06. The stock Z06 has a well-known overheating issue and my car had an extra 200 HP, which wasn’t helping matters. There were a number of partners we worked with to control the issue, one of which was fluids supplier Motul.

As expected during the race, my engine temps started creeping up. Mid-way through the run I was seeing 320 degree oil temps, the point at which the Z06 starts shutting down to protect itself. More importantly, it’s above the temperature where oil can start to fail.

As blowing an engine on the side of a mountain at 130 mph is not something that would be conducive to my continued existence, I was more than a bit concerned. However, having worked with Motul, I knew that their product was capable of holding together. I was able to continue to push to the top and grab fourth in class.

Truth be told, I was offered a substantial amount more to sign with another supplier, but one with a product that I felt was much less capable. If I had just gone for the money grab, the post on the race could have been a lot less positive—or an obituary.

Rule #8: Don’t jump!

There is nothing more soul-shattering than trying to land a sponsor. I will pitch a hundred potential sponsors just to land one deal. That’s been every year for the past decade and a half.

Most companies you approach will tell you give you a flat-out no, or simply not respond. However, the hardest ones come from sponsors that actually show some interest. Once you get an initial positive response, it’s amazing the things that you’ll do to try to get that contract. Changing proposals to fit the whims of a half dozen different VP’s? No problem. Multiple PowerPoint presentations? Hell yes. Fly out to meet with the big boss? Sure, what time’s the flight?

Then you wake up to an email that begins “Sorry...” And weeks and months of work mean nothing.

All I can say is, keep trying. If you’ve paid attention to my above rules and you keep pushing eventually you’ll get there. If not, maybe the reality is OSB (Other Sports Beckon.)

Rule #9: Babysitting the bill payers
So let’s say you are successful, and after all the blood, sweat, tears and PowerPoint presentations, you finally landed a sponsor for your Super Go Fast Racing Team™.

Great! Now the hard work begins.


I spend more time taking care of my sponsors then I do driving cars. From the outside, motorsports all looks like champagne and glory, but the reality of being a professional race car driver is that it’s a job just like any other job. Don’t you get sprayed with champagne at your job?


I mean sponsor event appearances, media days, trade shows (You think anyone wants to be at SEMA?), dinners where you hear bullshit stories from company VPs, and so on. All of these things add up to a full-time job and then some. And that’s just the stuff that’s in the contract.

This conveniently leads me to my next point. Always under-promise and over-deliver. If you’re contracted to be at an event for an hour, stay for two. If you’ve said you’ll do two Facebook posts a week, post every day.

All of these things get noticed by a sponsor. The more value you bring, the easier it will be getting that sponsor to sign on again for year two.


Oh sorry, did I forget to mention, most deals are year-to-year? After one year the deal is done, so one of the first things you’ll need to do is start working on the proposal for next year.

Rule #10: Have a hook-up

Last but not least: if you have rich parents then ignore rules #1 -9 and go straight to enjoying your career as a race car driver. As with everything in America, it’s easier when you just start rich.




It's difficult Alice!

Cutting tools

Lights out Alice!

I came across a post in reddit covering cutting tools used in different machines, and like it for the nomenclature and sound classification of the tools.



Hope this helps Alice!

The dark art of Race tyre engineering

Lights out Alice!

Yes, i know that pun was intended (and if you didn't get the pun in the title of the post, greetings sarcasm impaired creature of the world), but bad jokes are my forte.

In this world of knowledge at our fingertips, all that prohibits us from knowing everything and excelling is our own conscience. The laziness inside us that forces us to prohibitively delay and procrastinate on everything that we do, be it as simple as a search online on some topic that we lack knowledge on.

After procrastinating this question in my mind for over a year (yes, i am a champion level procrastinator (p.s: Champion level procrastinator: one who could be a world champion achiever if not for his procrastinating lifestyle)), i finally got myself round to searching it online.

The question: What is scrubbing a race tyre and why is it important?

The answer was found on this website: https://m.tirerack.com/tires/tiretech/techpage.jsp?techid=67

Before i start quoting them, i would like to say that this website is a treasure trove of information on tyre data and is a good starting point for information on little things related to cars and tyres that lazy people like you and me would never go through a book to know about.

You can read the entire article over on their page (i strongly recommend you to do that one not-so-lazy thing today), but i will quote the most important paragraph:



One of the reasons radial racing slicks are so effective is they feature shallow tread depths, and their contact patch acts as a single unit. However, any tread design that breaks up the contact patch into smaller elements or adds additional tread depth (required to enhance wet traction) will increase tread block squirm and reduce dry performance. This means that tires typically provide their worst wet traction and their best dry performance just before they wear out. It's also important to remember that the heat generated every time a tire is driven activates bonding agents in the rubber. As this process is repeated continually throughout the tire's life, its rubber compounds gradually harden and lose flexibility, reducing the tire's grip. Therefore, a shaved new tire will provide more traction than a tire worn to the exact same tread depth after being driven for thousands of miles on the road.

Tire shaving is an effective means of permitting more of a tire's performance capability to be realized early in its life. And in many cases, shaved tires used in competition actually have a longer useful life than tires that enter competition at full tread depth.

The process removes tread rubber and reduces tire weight by several pounds. A shaved tire's tread profile will usually result in a slight increase in the width of the tire's contact patch, putting a little more rubber on the road. The resulting shallower tread depths reduce the tire's slip angle, increasing its responsiveness and cornering power by minimizing tread block squirm.

Minimizing tread block squirm also reduces heat buildup and the risk of making the tire go "off" by overheating its tread compound. Depending on the severity of overheating, the overworked areas of the tread compound may turn blue, tear, blister or chunk.

Stay safe Alice!

The Mechanics of Fluids can be cool, if you want

Lights out Alice!

Greatness is everywhere. It is just that we never take the time to see it. In this mad rush we would like to call daily life, all we ever do is lie to ourselves as to what is important in life.
Everyday i make mistakes, every day i lose a battle on some front, and i am okay with it. It kills me to the core to see my conscience dying everyday, being unable to shake my very being from the shackles of constant failure that paralyze my ability to succeed day in and day out and in essence, to succeed at all. I have gotten so used to failing to meet my goals everyday that i am unfazed by such failure, to the extend that procrastination in the worst form is taking over my lifestyle, and though i am aware of it's existence, i can only watch as it leads in its wake a terrible remnant of destructive, constrictive and decaying habits.

I keep on my board over 10 pending items, yet somehow i find time to waste over fictional televised issues of apparent international concern. I believe that the level of procrastination that i am currently at is the most painful and yet painless one to be in. Painful, because i sit here typing as my future dims and the shining light to eternal content is waning gently, but constantly. Painless, because even though i can feel it, breathe it, loathe it and yes, write about it, i am unable to stop this monster called procrastination, its destructive generals halfheartedness and indiscipline.

Man, this fight with the monster inside seems to be the one i am always losing, but the real struggle and the biggest torture is that i don't fail, or i don't get killed. No, the monster will not let me go that easy. It wants me to feel my life slipping, my dreams fading further and further away from me as i sink deeper into the quicksand of mediocrity and adjustment. 

The biggest pain that this monster is inflicting upon me is not physical pain, not emotional strain, it is the irk that i will feel for the rest of my life, the irk that will tell me when i will be part of a middle class "decent" pay society, when i will have a "settled family" and "responsibilities", that i could have risen to be something better and beyond what the society pulls you down to, that i could have been someone, but i chose wasting my time watching TV soaps over building a future, over disciplining my life.

p.s: Don't worry, my fast forgetting memory would forget about discipline faster than it forgets names of people it should remember and i will go back to the comfort and care of procrastination very soon, who would welcome me back with loving arms.

Ah i see, you are looking for wisdom on how fluid mechanics is cool, so let me link it below:

http://www.explainthatstuff.com/aerodynamics.html

For starters, i have been a student studying fluid mechanics for a while now and it gets to me every time that the books i read on the one thing that is everywhere is able to turn it into something that is so remote, unimaginable and alien a concept that we all just end up mugging the formulas and asking ourselves why we thought it would be a good idea to study the subject in the first place.

Well here it is, the one paragraph from that article that lit my mind on fire (forgive my puns):

Boundary Layer:
The idea of the boundary layer leads to all kinds of interesting things. It explains why, for example, your car can be dusty and dirty even though it's racing through the air at high speed. Although it's traveling fast, the air right next to the paintwork isn't moving at all, so particles of dirt aren't blown away as you might expect them to be. The same applies when you try to blow the dust off a bookshelf. You can blow really hard, but you'll never blow all the dust away: at best, you just blow the dust (the upper layers of dust particles) off the dust (the lower layers that stay stuck to the shelf)! The boundary layer concept also explains why wind turbines have to be so high. The closer to the ground you are, the lower the wind speed: at ground level, on something like concrete, the wind speed is actually zero. Build a wind turbine that's way up in the sky and you're (hopefully) reaching beyond the boundary layer to the place where the air speed is a maximum and the wind has higher kinetic energy to drive the turbine's rotors.
Stay inspired and Lights out Alice!

Just another lazy sunday, or is it?

Lights out, Alice!

Waking up to the chatter of birds and the first rays of sunshine that plays truant with your curtains that were drawn oh so tiredly yesterday night. Nope, this exactly not how Sundays are. You wake up to the scolding of your parents for sleeping in, the mad rush of the vociferous children playing along the corridor trying hard to forget the horrors and tortures of the prison called home.

Kids are meant to be free, and Sundays are meant to be lazy. But I also want to be a formula one driver (V8 supercars will equally awesome) and we all know that none of the above is going to happen anytime soon.

If you delay on what's required to be done at that particular moment, you are procrastinating, but the fact this delay is happening does not hit until it is too late. Your mind is playing games at you, with itself. You are surrounded by the pretence that whatever delay that is occuring is well justified and accounted for and for that matter, everything is under control. No, it is not. It never is. If there was one thing that Shakespeare has taught me, it is this : "Security is mortal's chiefest enemy." Security is like the world that you are viewing through your eyes. This source of vision has been right so many times that would trust it in a heartbeat. But how does one know that all that one sees is correct. We can be lied to by our eyes. But since we rely on it so much and don't double check, it can lead to all the problems in the world.

Figure out a way and Lights out Alice!

It's Monday and i found a Friend

Lights out Alice!

I found a friend. Friends actually. I make it a point to drive out all people in my life who don't stand up to the scrutiny of my intellectual standards. Funny thing is, I myself am not aware of what all are my standards, how I ended up with such a standard, or even the fact that if I myself would be able to pass the scrutiny of such standards.

I pride and frown on the achievement and deception that even after three years of sharing a classroom, I am unfamiliar with the names of most of my classmates. Sneering myself upon a pedestal, an imaginary high-horse that somehow puts me on a peg above the rest. I loathe this version of myself and it's safe to say that this guy sucks.

But, I found a few people who could penetrate through the uncouth and repulsive behavior that i aggressively display and get to the vulnerable me. Param, Pit, DC, CK and Chemical are all brave examples of the same. These men and women have given me a second chance, some even more in being a better person with them, rid of all judgement and looking down upon. I pity myself for such behavior and I can say that all I want is nothing more, than to be a humble, respectful and logical human being that loves his parents and family and unequivocally reciprocates all the sacrifices that they have made for him.


Thank you P, M, R, C, Mji, SKB, Param, Pit and DC for being there. I know these times will never come back and you can rest assured that I ensured that I enjoyed and savored every last bit of it.

Addition on 25th Sept, 2017:
Param, if you must know, and if you ever read this, I always wanted you to rise to the top, actually, I want to be rising to the top with you, me supporting you every step of the way. The best in all of us, is what I see and the best I wanted you to be. I am sorry that my advances or my repetitive scheduling of a meet (which mostly ended in a failure) caused you trouble, but I understand that it is a confusing time for all of us. We understand very little of the world and how it functions, yet our brains tells us otherwise and tells us that we have "figured it out". The simple truth is, it was me being needy and selfish and that is something i will resent.

You know, if I could take back the things i said, i would. Actually, I wouldn't, because, that is the problem. That's just who I am. I am incapable of swallowing feelings for the greater good. I vent them out under the cover of "truth", where it is actually a farce meant to shrug the responsibility of my failures and shortfall to the listener. Damn, I actually am a very selfish and hateworthy human being.

Can I be better Alice?

Something's wrong

Lights out Alice!

Fear. Fear of failure, fear of overconfidence, fear of being wrong, fear of just being afraid. There is a lot of fear that rules our lives.

It's Convoluted

Lights out Alice!


Turns out, people you don't trust are more reliable and trustworthy than ones that we trust.

Being grown up means being okay with not being okay.

Well, i am in a fix (just as always)

Lights out Alice!

If by some Godforsaken punishment for your crime or repentance for unjust actions you have been reading my earlier posts (why doth torture thyself?), you would know that i had been struggling over a decision that would steer my life in a particular direction.

Yes, i hear you, that everything you do in life has consequences, but some consequences are more consequential than others. I have been mulling continuing with ESI for quite sometime now and i can't tell which one is the right decision.

Here are the details below:
I want to remain in Engineering and not just business and management, which ESI is right now. But, going forward, we can always venture into product development and racing, once ESI is stable. But is it worth the wait? Is it worth the sacrifice that i have to make for the first two years to go into this? The only option that remains if i go into ESI is a government job, which will make most of the certifications and design work that i have done pretty useless (or at least that seems to be the case from the outside). One option would be to go into ESI, while prepare for higher studies in the background, and then achieve that. But is that a guarantee?

Well, you just laughed at the previous sentence, didn't you? In life, there are NO GUARANTEES! But humans as we are, idiots that we seem to be, we keep thinking that security comes in the form of certain jobs. Certain jobs just ooze security as parents, and as parents (or my father to be exact) you are of the opinion that these are the only jobs available for a child to join.

I need to put my put down i suppose. Let it all go, choose a side, and see what stays.
Take a decision, then work to make it right!

Well, i keep thinking that because of ESI, i keep myself engaged, use it as an excuse for my inefficiency and that otherwise, i will slip into the comfort of laziness and put my efficiency on a downward spiral.

Don't know man...i don't seem to have an answer, even after considerable time and thought has been spent on this.

My partner in the company keeps telling me that he needs a partner and not a helping hand, and yet all i do is be his clerk. He hands all of his work down to me and then expects me to pick up the slack. To be honest, picking up the slack is fine, because that is what partners do, but i think this is borderline.

I don't even have somebody to advise me on this since i come from a family of employees, government or private and no one has any idea of a startup and how it works.

What am i gonna do Alice? Lights out!

Wow! This battle is hard

Lights out Alice!

I am in midst of a battle with my mind over control of my body (don't ask who is fighting my mind, because i don't know too). And it is safe to say, like it is the recurring theme of most of my blogs, i am losing.

I can't convince myself otherwise. On one hand i am this forgiving, rational guy who weighs his actions for their consequences and on the other hand there is this outlaw who is hell bent on breaking every sane responsibility/work that makes life worth living.

I am not good. I keep on falling into the same pitfalls of lazy and procrastinating habits that i possessed a few years ago during my high school. Even though they say that people change, i don't think it is that easy to change someone's habit. Believe me, i am trying, although not hard enough is something that i will concede to.

All this brings back are scary memories of my high school failure in performing academically. I knew stuff, same as i do now, am interested in learning a lot more, but when there is a question paper and an hour or three to solve them, i am unable to perform.

The worst part is that i am sitting here realizing this, yet someone it is not motivating enough  for me to stop all the idiocies that i have been doing. Call this being born with a great family or wealthy family, i have been spoilt with everything that i needed in my life.

This makes me complacent, prone to failure and giver upper.

This makes me sad, yet i must say that Lights Out Alice! 

This is FSAE

Lights out Alice!

The article that i came across today and that i am going to share below captures the very essence of Formula Student and why it is THE THING that you should devote your college life to.

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/key-points-successful-formula-sae-team-emily-anthony?trk=v-feed&lipi=urn%3Ali%3Apage%3Ad_flagship3_feed%3B9kjlnM0g%2Fsp2hpV2WaFh%2BQ%3D%3D

The above is the link to the article written by Emily Anthony, Captain of the Pitt Univ FS team. Let's hear it from her:

Key Points for a successful Formula SAE Team:

I was one of the captains for the University of Pittsburgh Formula SAE team for the 2015-2016 season. Riding off of the team’s successes in the previous year at Michigan International Speedway, the Hockenheim ring, and the Red Bull Ring, the team was ready to tackle another season with a North American tour in FSAE Michigan, Formula North, and FSAE Lincoln. Frankly, we killed it: 11th/120 in Michigan, 16th/30 in North, and 8th/80 in Lincoln. Not bad!

We’ve seen nearly every team at some point have an off year, a bad funding situation, or a catastrophic accident that leaves the team empty handed when May and June roll around for competition. How can we avoid these failures? How can we be better year after year? How can our organization grow and thrive? 

Team structure is the foundation of your organization.

First and foremost, how is your team managed? That seems to be a repetitive question when team captains talk to other captains over a beer and dinner in a pizza joint close to the track. What is the winning formula? How do you do succeed at these competitions?

In short: there is no answer. That is the beauty of Formula Student. If there were a winning formula (pun intended), each vehicle would be identical, every presentation would be the same, there would be no innovation, and the competition would stagnate. Boooooring.There is one point that I can say with 100% confidence:

You need a plan.

There are specific things that each team can do that work for the high level teams which are detailed in this article. These are not quick fixes, nor are they a complete solution. However, they are steps in the correct direction; as long as you are pointed the right way, you can make your own path!

First is a captain proposal:

1. Have a captain that serves as a liaison between SAE/Formula Student, the school, sponsors, and the team
2. Have a captain that serves as a chief engineer
3. Have a captain that serves as a chief financial officer

What? 3 team captains? But my team only has 10 students on it! I’ll get to that later.

The intent with this setup is to lessen the workload on a traditional 1 captain setup. Additionally, this builds a foundation for a tiered management system.

The liaison captain, or what we call him at Pitt, is the Executive Director. This individual does not need to be an engineering expert; we’ve had business students as well as engineering students fill this role. What this individual needs is confidence when speaking to sponsors, school officials, and competition officials. The Executive Director is the face of the team. They must have the ability to properly manage documentation of all types, hold students accountable for their projects, maintain organization of the office and shop, plan events, and handle all competition responsibilities. This person must know and understand the FSAE rules* as well as understand how to find information for the team - not necessarily know it all. This person is the Formula SAE expert and the team expert; not the car or finances expert.

The Chief Engineer’s role is pretty clear cut: hold students accountable for their design and manufacturing responsibilities, maintain organization of the SolidWorks PDM (or Dropbox, Drive, or whatever you use to organize your CAD files), make the final engineering decisions when there is a disagreement, and must be a full car expert. He shouldn’t design the entire vehicle, but if a lead can’t make it to competition, he should be able to present his teammate's portion in Design**.

Finally, the Chief Financial Officer’s role is to manage the team’s finances. At Pitt, we have two university accounts. These need to be monitored; invoices and receipts must be collected and students must be held accountable for the money they are spending. The CFO also organizes sponsor information and is responsible for the Cost Report and the Presentation event. Business students like Accounting, Finance or Marketing thrive in this role. Broaden your horizons and get more students this way. More on that later.

Below is the layout of the Pitt team. Forgive the incompleteness – it’s from a draft. The Executive Director is blue, Chief Engineer is red, and Chief Financial Officer is green. Their team leaders fall below them.

Some caveats: we are not unique in this setup and this setup is far from foolproof. Have suggestions? Share them in the comments.

We started this setup in the 2014-2015 season after a Team Captain studied abroad with UAS Munich and learned from the German FS teams how to properly manage a team. We’ve had tremendous success with this organizational style and I attribute most of that to him and our friends at UAS Munich.

*As does the rest of the team, but the exec should be the best at knowing the rules. Read the rules.

**Every team member should be able to present at least one portion of Design by himself successfully, but you should have multiple students with that capability. Pitt is successful in the Design event because of our ability as a team to present the sections of the car - not just as individuals. Full system understanding is critical.

Recruitment is a full-time effort.

I served as the Internal Affairs lead for Pitt’s 2014-2015 team where recruitment was my primary responsibility. We just came off of a poor season plagued by a young team, poor recruitment, major engineering oversights, and poor competition results. It was far from a failure considering the circumstances, but we were not satisfied with how everything turned out. Recruitment was vital to build the program back up.

• Recruitment for the next season starts the second you get home from competition.
• Recruitment does not end. Ever.
• Recruitment is not limited to University events – go to events in your city and get on social media. Most schools have “Pitt Class of 2020”-esque pages for incoming freshmen. Get students on there. Don’t spam the page. Look for engineering and business students. Talk to them. Introduce them to the team.
• Go to freshman engineering and freshman business class seminars and talk about the team. Keep it at a low technical level - these guys may not even know what a transmission is, so don't start talking about intricacies of the drivetrain system!
• Have a new member powerpoint/orientation planned for when they come down to the shop. Give them:

1. Who - who to talk to if they want to get involved in something specific
2. What - what is FSAE? No, this isn't a Formula 1 fanclub (well... depends on who you ask). Give them the macro level stuff: this is an engineering design and project management competition where we design, build, and race open-wheeled, formula-style race vehicles. Again, don't talk about the intricacies of the drivetrain system.
3. Where - where is the shop? The office? Where are meetings?
4. Why - why do we do certain things? Show them (briefly) the rules and some competition information.
5. How - how can they get more involved? What is the next step to becoming a full team member?

• Do not forget about upperclassmen – they are, typically, more useful than freshmen for these projects!
• Learn names. Make these students feel welcome.
• Freshman work (clean the shop, bend a tab, hold this wrench) sucks. Do the freshman work with them.
• Have recruit-specific meetings where you teach them about Formula and the team. Leave the sub-team specific meetings to the specific leaders.
• If money and space allows, bring your freshmen to competition.

We had a wonderful recruitment class in 2015 and now these students are all Team Leads and Team Captains. I expect them to get top 10 in Michigan in 2017 and build the best car Pitt has ever had. They are a great example of a fully established fact: these freshmen are your future team’s lifeline. Take recruitment seriously.

There is never enough sponsorship, and sponsor relationships are vital.

Sponsors keep most teams afloat and a new key sponsor can bring your team to the next level. Pitt has fostered a few new sponsors in the past year as well as maintained our long standing ones and that has allowed the team to do some fantastic innovation. For example, Investment cast, CNC, and 3D printed parts that we are incapable of making at our University are instead outsourced to sponsors. Imagine what you can create (fixtures, uprights, etc) without the geometric constraints of a manual machine! Through building these relationships. we've learned that sponsorship is a full time, full team effort. 

• Thank your sponsors periodically. Send them updates over email as the year progresses. Thank them on your social media accounts. Invite them to your events. Send them gifts (t-shirts or photos work well) after the season is over.
• Never pay full price without asking for a discount first.
• Learn how to solicit donations properly. This is a great resource (pdf warning): https://www.civicus.org/new/media/Writing%20a%20funding%20proposal.pdf
• USA teams: did you know that Formula SAE is a 501(c)3 organization? From their site: "SAE International is a 501(c)(3) organization, and thus, exempt from federal income tax. It is also classified as a public charity under sections 509(a)(1) and 170(b)(1)(A)(vi) of the Internal Revenue Code. SAE Collegiate Chapters and SAE Collegiate Design Series™ teams are considered SAE International, not independent entities." Read more about how this benefits your team here: http://students.sae.org/chapters/collegiate/manual/finance.htm
• Have a professionally made sponsorship brochure or packet. Bring it everywhere. Have business cards. Your school’s marketing department may be able to help you with this. Here’s Pitt’s, for reference (pdf warning): http://www.engineering.pitt.edu/WorkArea/DownloadAsset.aspx?id=2147536868 

Deadlines are everything.

As soon as SAE deadlines were announced, I put them in my personal Google calendar and the team’s Google calendar (psst take the hint: you should have a team Google calendar) and made it available to the team. 

• Consider using a project management software. We use Asana: https://asana.com/
• You know, you can submit documents early.
• My last point is the #1 thing you should take from this article: have prescribed design deadlines and manufacturing deadlines. You must have a complete CAD model at least 6 months before your first competition. You should have, bare minimum, a month* of testing time. For you NA teams, this design deadline is November 15. If a part is not in the model, it does not go in the car. Enforce that. Have part numbers and create drawings** after the deadline (2 weeks). 

*A friend at Stuttgart recommends raising this to 3 months minimum. I should clarify here - 1 month of testing with a complete car before competition, so April to May. If the weather allows, of course you should be testing with a rolling chassis before then! Summer testing is also very helpful and can let the team test new designs and concepts for the next prototype.

**To add to the last point: Create a part numbering scheme that is identical to the Cost Report numbering. Your CFO will thank you later. Have a chassis deadline before your CAD deadline. Have the tubes delivered and welding supplies ready on the first day of manufacturing season.

Meetings must be short and sweet.

Have general body meetings as well as technical meetings. Keep the hard engineering discussion out of the general body meetings - these are reserved for team management, deadlines, and events. Keep agendas to 5 items or less.

***Take advantage of resources offered by Formula SAE.***

Yes, it's that important. What are those resources?

I've already mentioned SAE's 501(c)3 status. We should all be aware of the SAE student membership benefits as well. There is also a pretty long list of equipment suppliers (software, primarily) that teams have access to as SAE chapters.

Did you know that you can have lecturers (we’ve hosted Steve Fox and Edward Kasprzak) come in and teach your team a variety of things for free? Tire testing, team management, aerodynamics, materials testing, and more are covered. There are over a dozen topics covered by the SAE Industrial Lecturers: http://students.sae.org/chapters/lectureship/lecturers.htm

There are tons of software perks as a Formula SAE student. For example, SimScale, a cloud-based FEA/CFD simulation tool, is free to Formula SAE students. Pitt alumni Jim Shaw wrote a great article regarding FEA/CFD and has great resources in this article if you cannot afford software: http://www.simscale.com/blog/2016/10/digital-design-formula-sae/

Small addition: you should read Pat Clarke's blog. He touches on a variety of subjects including design, team management, and sponsorship. It is a must-read for captains and new team members alike. His most recent post (as of July 2016) is entitled "Back to Basics".

Documentation, documentation, documentation.

I’ve already covered this a little bit. Documentation is vital to a team's success, whether it is a receipt or a design report. As engineers and businessmen in the real world, a paper trail follows us with every decision we make. We must learn how to manage that paperwork now.

• Every receipt you get should be filed and accounted for. This will make budget proposals to the University/sponsors and spending tracking a lot easier.
• Your design report starts at the beginning of design cycle, not 3 weeks before the submission deadline. Your university may have a writing center where students and faculty offer revision and proofreading services. Use those! Consult best practices for your drawings and get feedback from your professors. Something to consider from the 2017-2018 FSAE rules:"S6.2.4 (Design Report) - These documentsmay be graded as part of the Design Event score, and will be used by the judges to sort teams into the appropriate design groups based on the quality of their review."Want a good bay? Write a good design report.
• Your business presentation begins with your business logic case, which begins with your team management goals for the year, which begin right after competition of the previous year. Notice a common theme? Plan ahead.
• Have an organized Google Drive/Dropbox/PDM with complete file names (Part1.sldprt does not fly) and comments on revisions.
• Have a backup of your CAD model. Have a backup of the backup. Backup your CFD and FEA. Backup your meeting minutes. Get the idea yet?
• GET EVERYTHING IN WRITING. Whether it is funding promises from the school, deals for testing locations at a local restaurant’s lot, or the fact that the chassis lead bought you dinner last week, it needs to be in writing. Many fantastic teams have been, for lack of a better term, screwed when someone says “I didn’t agree to do that” or “I didn’t volunteer to do that”.

Play nice with the University.

The University is probably your lifeline and they can cut you off in a microsecond.

• Follow the rules.
• Meet their deadlines.
• Don’t piss the wrong people off.
• Go to their events. Smile. Shake hands.
• Don’t be irresponsible.

Nothing else has to be said here. It's this simple.

Hold others accountable without being the “bad guy.”

I struggled with this starting out. For some teams, this organization is a class (senior design, etc.) and for others, this is a purely extracurricular club. Pitt is a hybrid, but mostly volunteer students. Regardless of format, holding the senior design students responsible for their projects is easier – their grade depends on it; however, with the volunteers, what is the secret to motivating them?

Holding each other accountable while being constructive and positive is sometimes a difficult task. Tensions are high, expectations are higher, and many students degrade into pettiness and bad attitudes. The only thing you can do as the team captain to combat this is to not fall into the negative trap. Be positive. Be encouraging. Offer help. Do not be condescending. Be crystal clear about your expectations and reiterate these. Do not think the sky is falling, and if you do, do not show that you think the sky is falling. Keep your cool. Do not try to be everyone’s friend. Do treat everyone with kindness and respect. And, when the time comes, do not be afraid to hurt someone’s feelings by reassigning a project to another team member. The team is bigger than one individual.

I failed at many things listed above early in the year. I was a loose cannon, was receptive to the negativity (versus perceptive and avoiding it) and it brought me and the team down. Do not play into this. Michelle Obama's quote from her speech at the Democratic National Convention in 2016 applies here: “When they go low, we go high.”

In short, be a leader. Motivating your team is the most difficult and most important factor in a successful season.

Respect yourself.

We’re going to get very serious for a moment. Many team captains joke that they have lost years off of their life because of the stress involved in managing an organization of this caliber. Frankly, that is off-putting. There is no pride in developing an anxiety disorder or depression because the stress is too high. Take care of yourself. Take a shower every day. Eat 3 meals. Sleep. Don’t neglect yourself, your apartment, your friends, your fish, or your studies. You are a person first, a student second, and a team captain/member third. If you are feeling overwhelmed, ask for help from your team, your advisor, or school counseling.

At the end of the day, this is just a student club.

Conclusion - what is success?

A friend from TU Valencia asked for clarification: what is success? That is what your team must decide. We are all on different levels and success is determinant on that level - are you a top 10 team vying for top 5? Your successes will be different from a team looking to finish endurance or make it to competition. Step 0 would be to identify a goal and work towards it. The 2016 goal for Pitt FSAE was to get more points in competition than we have before, and we knocked it out of the park. Make your goals:

• Comprehensive
• Within the bounds of FSAE and Formula Student expectations (read: rules)
• Reasonable based on your available resources
• Aligned with your Business Logic case and Design philosophy
• Clear to your University, your sponsors, and your team

Nothing beats having everyone on the same page. Best of luck to everyone in the seasons to come, and I invite any discussion and insight in the comments.

Facebook: facebook.com/PittFSAE

Twitter/Instagram: @PittFSAE

engineering.pitt.edu/FSAE