Who are TAU Racing?
TAU (Team Aberdeen University) Racing was established in 2007 by a group of undergraduate engineers of various disciplines at the University of Aberdeen. The team’s goal each year is to design and build a single seat racing car to compete at Silverstone in the Formula Student competition.
During TAU Racing’s first year of competition, we took the event by storm – finishing 6th in a rain soaked endurance event and achieving an overall position of 24th out of 87 competing teams. We were also awarded the Shell Most Fuel Efficient Class 1 Car prize, the Airbus Teamwork Award and Alan Staniforth Best Newcomer Award. In 2010 we built on our success, optimising the 2009 car, once again finishing in the top 30 and were again awarded the Shell Most Fuel Efficient Class 1 Car.
2011 saw an ambitious redesign of the car in an attempt to gain more power and to finish higher in the dynamic events. This was achieved through introduction of a 4 cylinder fuel injected engine for the first time. Unfortunately, a lack of testing time and numerous electrical problems saw the TAU team retire from the event. With so many lessons learnt from the 2011 season and a large amount of testing of the TAU’11 car, hopes are high for a return to winning ways in 2012.
What is Formula Student?
Run by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE), Formula Student promotes careers and excellence in engineering, by challenging university students to design, build, develop, market a single seat race car.
Formula Student attracts entries from universities all over the World. For the universities, FS represents a valuable project that blends academic work and learning with the development of practical engineering skills.
Engineering and Technology companies know just how important the continuing supply of high quality engineers is to their success. FS graduates enter the employment market with a wealth of real experience to prepare them for success in that career.
"We were becoming aware in industry that while universities were turning out young graduates with excellent academic qualifications, they were lacking the sort of essential practical skills that were really needed in industry to be successful engineers - and this is what Formula Student aims to do - deliver young engineers who have got those essential practical experiences and expertise."
Wood CEng - FS Founder, IMechE Fellow
For the purpose of the competition, the students are to assume that a manufacturing firm has engaged them to produce a prototype car for evaluation. The intended sales market is the non professional weekend autocross or sprint racer. Therefore, the car must have very high performance in terms of its acceleration, braking, and handling. The car must be cost and fuel efficient, easy to maintain and reliable. Competing teams are judged in both static and dynamic events, with a maximum of 1000 points being awarded as follows.
The static events include the Design Event (150 Points), Cost Event (100 Points) and Presentation Event (75 Points).
Whilst the dynamic events include the Skid Pad (50 Points), Acceleration (75 Points), Autocross (150 Points), Endurance (300 Points) Fuel Economy (100 Points)
