The Society of Advanced Mobility Land Sea Air Space (SAE) Aerodesign Competition requires that competitors attempt to design, build and fly a model aircraft capable of lifting the maximum possible payload given certain design constraints.
UBC's team won awards for best design and best overall, beating 30 competitors from the western region as well as the top team from the East.
This is the fifth year a UBC team has taken part in the nine-year-old competition, and the third time it has won.
Team leader Kevin Wilder, who graduated in May from Mechanical Engineering, is a veteran team member and team pilot. He credits hours of hard work and team effort for the victory.
"We use a practical design philosophy as opposed to an academic one. We tried to identify good common sense areas to focus on, whereas other teams try a lot of whiz-bang fancy stuff," Wilder said. "We tried to get as much performance out of every part as we could."
The team did score some competition firsts though, particularly with the design of a constant speed propeller system similar in principle to that used in the Dash 8 aircraft. Although the team did not use the constant speed propeller in competition--they couldn't get the bearings required--they scored top marks for their technical report and design. Other design features included low rolling resistance wheels, a larger wing and lightweight components.
The competition is divided into two categories: design and flight. The design portion comprises a written report on the rationale of the project, engineering drawings of the aircraft and an oral presentation. The flight portion is concerned with the amount of payload lifted by the plane and the accuracy of the performance prediction.
UBC's plane lifted 12 kilograms, almost half a kilogram more than predicted. One other competitor lifted slightly more, while the plane that lifted the most weight took off with 13 kilograms.
"We could have lifted more," said Wilder, adding that smoother runway conditions at the competition than at the Pitt Meadows airport where the test flights were carried out meant the team never needed to push the airplane to get it off the ground with the predicted payload. Flying with considerably more weight than the predicted amount would have cost the team points.
Prior to the competition, the team flew between 20 and 40 test flights using a prototype plane. The competition plane was tested only twice before the competition.
"The prototype flew so well we knew the competition plane would fly without problems," Wilder said.
The team was very well prepared for the competition following the test flights and after putting between 40 and 70 hours a week into the design and construction of the plane between September 1995 and the competition.
"We were very well organized this year," said team member Chris Elyea, a graduate student in Metals and Materials Engineering. "Kevin's four years of experience at the competition helped us, as did having an incredibly dedicated team."
Team members other than Wilder and Elyea include: Mike Baker, Geoff Cattrall, Kristen Durham, Terence Fan, Elaine Oum and Matt Rektor, all engineering students.
Mechanical Engineering Assoc. Prof. Sheldon Green served as supervisor. Mechanical Engineering Instructor Dean Leonard worked closely with the team and has been involved with UBC's efforts since it first entered a team in the competition.