澳大利亚留学网 黄文勇 报道

澳大利亚墨尔本著名的大学RMIT大学的汽车工程系在美国举行的SAE方程式赛车比赛中夺冠。在总分1000分的打分中，RMIT队获得887分，第二名的美国宾西法尼亚大学只获得768分。

SAE方程式赛车活动是世界汽车工程师协会主办的汽车设计大赛，共有1000多名大学工程系学生参加，赛事为3天。比赛汽车设计要考虑到设计造型、成本、耗油度、速度、以及最重要的耐用性。

RMIT大学队的成员全部是大四在读学生，赛车的材料全部是学生从社会筹集而来，包括一些赞助商。本次比赛获胜再次验证了澳洲的教学是学以致用的，皇家墨尔本理工大学的汽车工程是世界最好的！

“Who’s that little red car overtaking Cornell?” That’s the RMIT Formula SAE racer, that’s who – on its way past nine-times winner Cornell University to record RMIT University’s first win in perhaps the world’s biggest student engineering competition.

An RMIT team last weekend won the USA FSAE East Coast event at the Ford Proving Grounds in Romeo, just north of Detroit, with 887 points out of a possible 1000. The closest team, Penn State, gained 768.

Formula SAE is an international student design contest organised by the Society of Automotive Engineers. More than 1000 engineering students participate over three days.

Students set out to design a small Formula-type car, aimed at the weekend autocross racing market.

Prototypes are judged on a range of criteria, including design, cost, fuel economy and, most importantly, endurance.

Dr Simon Watkins, Associate Professor of Automotive Engineering at RMIT’s Bundoora campus, said: “Ours was probably the lightest car (150.5 kilograms) to win the race.”

It was powered by a single-cylinder Yamaha 450cc engine.
“This event is probably the most motivating thing I have ever seen in higher education,” Dr Watkins added.

RMIT’s team members in the US last weekend were Dean Cowling, Grant McPherson, Geoff Pearson, Jacob Rayner, Lee Mitchener, Brad Wischusen, Stuart Bajema, John Abakumenko and Jason Gray.

They are part of a bigger production team – all current or immediate past students enrolled in the Automotive, Aerospace, Mechanical and Manufacturing programs at RMIT, both TAFE and Higher Education.

RMIT students from any course or year can join the team.

According to Wikipedia, Formula SAE “takes students out of the classroom and puts them in the real world”.

It also creates career openings. “Big companies, such as General Motors, Ford and Chrysler all feel that this event acts as a screening process for them … Involvement in Formula SAE means job opportunity,” says Wikipedia.

Formula SAE has grown so much in popularity that events are taking place in many countries, including Australia, the UK, California on the US west coast, Germany, Italy and Brazil.

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