Tag Archives: ETS Quebec

Results of the ASC 2022 Road Race

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Wrapping up the American Solar Challenge, the chart above shows the final official distances. The chart places optional “loops” driven at the end of each stage, even mid-stage loops. At the bottom of each bar is the final placing, with a star marking MOV (Cruiser) cars. The notation “(Tr)” identifies cars that trailered or were deemed to have trailered.

Below is a logarithmic visualisation of the MOV (Cruiser) scoring. The final score (last bar in each group) is the product (visually, the sum, since the chart uses logarithms) of seven factors:

  • The distance driven d (in miles)
  • The distance driven with penalties d’ (in miles)
  • The average number of people p in the car
  • The reciprocal of the total external energy usage E (in kWh)
  • The practicality score P (out of 100)
  • The speed derating T (1/70.86 = 0.014 for AppState)
  • In grey, the reciprocal h of 171,780 (the longest distance driven, times 100)

This is equivalent to the way that the scores are broken down officially (since C = d’/1717.8 and D = d×p).

The final score for AppState is 1/4.2 = 0.24, as in the official results. Esteban (Poly Montreal) achieved the highest score through low total external energy usage, but was demoted to third place after missing a turnoff early in the race, which prompted this retrospective modification to regulation 12.11.C:

“Any team leaving the tour route must rejoin the route at the same intersection where they left the route or they will be considered to have trailered from their last completed route step before going off route. Their Load On Trailer Time will be the time that they went off route.”

PrISUm (Iowa State University) was forced to withdraw early on due to electrical issues, so scores 4th in the MOV (Cruiser) class.

Challenges in the ASC 2022 Road Race

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True to the name, there have been some challenges in the American Solar Challenge now taking place. On the first stage, Esteban (Poly Montreal) missed a turnoff, prompting this modification to regulation 12.11.C:

“Any team leaving the tour route must rejoin the route at the same intersection where they left the route or they will be considered to have trailered from their last completed route step before going off route. Their Load On Trailer Time will be the time that they went off route.”

PrISUm (Iowa State University) was forced to withdraw early on due to electrical issues

“Unfortunately things did no go as planned for PrISUm. Due to safety concerns for both the car and our team, we did not want to drive the car any farther. It is unfortunate that there was an electrical issue, which is hard to quickly and safely fix on race. We are very proud of our team performance at FSGP, compared to the last couple of years. Thank you to everyone for all of your support and following us throughout our journey.”

Canadian team Éclipse (ÉTS) had a major crisis on stage 2:

“On our 2nd loop in the city of Casper, our topshell detached from the vehicle; no injuries. The damage from this incident to the vehicle is not minor, but we worked very hard to get it back on the road! Thank you to all who helped!

Solar panels replaced, topshell corner redone in carbon fiber wet layup, tightened security attachments, lights picked up, stronger canopy, MPPTs repaired and even two flat tires all under 24h our convoy made it to time at stagepoint #2 in Lander, Wyoming just minutes from closing! The vehicle is in shape, today we are driving to Montpellier, Idaho.”

Illini (University of Illinois) had a narrow miss on the same stage:

“Today on our way to Lander, the team and Brizo faced a very near collision. As the convoy was waiting to turn left along the route, a semi lost control and tried to swerve around a pickup in front. The semi crashed a few feet from Brizo and the pickup truck landed mere inches from our chase car. Thankfully the entire team and Brizo were unharmed. However due to lost time, we had to trailer part of the second stage. Tonight we arrived in Lander and are ready for the rest of the American Solar Challenge.”

Official times for the first two stages are summarised in the chart below. The chart places optional “loops” driven at the end of each stage, even mid-stage loops. MIT leads the SOV/Challenger class, followed by Principia and Kentucky. The MOV/Cruiser scoring system is more complex, and only distances are shown here. However, Minnesota does appear to be ahead.

Latest news had most solar cars arriving at the Montpelier, Idaho checkpoint (including AppState and, I believe, Berkeley):

Follow the remainder of the race with the ASC car tracker (or just the dashboard). You can also check out the official ASC social media at        (click on the icons).

ASC 2022 Road Race Team Photo

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Above is the official American Solar Challenge team photo (slightly cropped). From left to right, the teams are:

Stars (★) mark cars in the MOV (Cruiser) class.

Follow the race with the ASC car tracker (or just the dashboard). You can also check out the official ASC social media at        (click on the icons).

World Solar Challenge 2019: even more charts

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Adding to my earlier list of World Solar Challenge distance/speed plots, here are 8 more (mostly circulated previously on Twitter). Night stops and notable events are marked on the bottom of each chart in a highlight colour. Control stops are in black.

Michigan traditionally comes third in the World Solar Challenge. They were third again this year. Their chart shows no drama, just fast, steady racing.

Control stop times for Michigan: Katherine: Sunday 12:29:00, Daly Waters: Sunday 16:08:02, Tennant Creek: Monday 12:13:30, Barrow Creek: Monday 15:14:24, Alice Springs: Tuesday 10:02:07, Kulgera: Tuesday 13:42:10, Coober Pedy: Wednesday 10:25:19, Glendambo: Wednesday 14:21:01, Port Augusta: Thursday 9:14:26, Adelaide: Thursday 14:56:00.

Western Sydney, in their beautiful car Unlimited 3.0, battled electrical issues, motor problems, and a wind gust that finally took them out. They still found time to help out Sonnenwagen Aachen on the road south. The photograph in the chart is mine.

Control stop times for Western Sydney: Katherine: Sunday 12:55:00, Daly Waters: Sunday 16:59:06, Tennant Creek: Tuesday 11:51:31.

There was no such drama for ETS Quebec (Éclipse), just steady consistent driving, finishing as best Canadian team, 2th North American team, and 9th in the world. That’s why they received my consistency gem.

Control stop times for Éclipse: Katherine: Sunday 13:27:04, Daly Waters: Monday 8:55:47, Tennant Creek: Monday 16:08:23, Barrow Creek: Tuesday 11:13:27, Alice Springs: Tuesday 16:10:27, Kulgera: Wednesday 11:59:00, Coober Pedy: Thursday 9:48:25, Glendambo: Thursday 13:56:55, Port Augusta: Friday 9:32:09, Adelaide: Friday 14:21:48.

Swedish team Jönköping University (JU) also had plenty of drama. They were forced to stop under cloudy skies with a flat battery and they needed an overnight repair. But they still finished tenth!

Control stop times for JU: Katherine: Sunday 12:51:56, Daly Waters: Monday 8:07:49, Tennant Creek: Monday 14:31:05, Barrow Creek: Tuesday 9:41:27, Alice Springs: Tuesday 14:13:37, Kulgera: Wednesday 12:39:00, Coober Pedy: Thursday 9:53:47, Glendambo: Thursday 13:51:40, Port Augusta: Friday 10:04:55, Adelaide: Friday 14:44:20.

Antakari had a smooth and largely uneventful race, apart from a couple of stops of a few minutes each. The GPS track shows them hunting around for a good campsite each night. They finished 7th (just ahead of NITech).

Control stop times for Antakari: Katherine: Sunday 13:15:43, Daly Waters: Monday 8:56:38, Tennant Creek: Monday 15:06:40, Barrow Creek: Tuesday 9:55:51, Alice Springs: Tuesday 14:17:59, Kulgera: Wednesday 10:34:05, Coober Pedy: Thursday 8:45:34, Glendambo: Thursday 12:58:06, Port Augusta: Friday 8:33:08, Adelaide: Friday 13:07:11.

Nagoya Institute of Technology (NITech) also had a smooth and largely uneventful race, finishing 8th (just behind Antakari).

Control stop times for NITech: Katherine: Sunday 12:56:50, Daly Waters: Monday 8:06:31, Tennant Creek: Monday 14:42:02, Barrow Creek: Tuesday 9:38:31, Alice Springs: Tuesday 14:40:56, Kulgera: Wednesday 10:22:50, Coober Pedy: Thursday 8:45:20, Glendambo: Thursday 13:01:29, Port Augusta: Friday 8:38:35, Adelaide: Friday 13:24:10.

The team from Durham University crossed Australia on solar power, in spite of minor electrical problems (they are the first UK team to do so for many years). Unfortunately they only managed around 2830 km, not quite reaching Adelaide. In the past, cars have been permitted to drive on Saturday mornings, whereas this year, cars had to cease driving on Friday evening. Judging from the graph, Durham might not have realised this for the first few days.

Control stop times for Durham: Katherine: Sunday 14:26:58, Daly Waters: Monday 10:34:22, Tennant Creek: Tuesday 9:39:42, Barrow Creek: Tuesday 13:45:32, Alice Springs: Wednesday 10:53:29, Kulgera: Wednesday 15:59:45, Coober Pedy: Thursday 14:36:36, Glendambo: Friday 10:01:30, Port Augusta: Friday 14:42:19.

Swedish newcomers Chalmers Solar Team managed two control stops, but were slowed significantly by the hilly terrain in the first part of the route. They therefore trailered at around 735 km.

Control stop times for Chalmers: Katherine: Sunday 14:56:54, Daly Waters: Monday 12:49:32.

My Personal WSC Gem Awards Part 1

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The faster than lightning gem goes to team 8 (Agoria, formerly Punch). They built a fantastic car, and drove it at the maximum safe speed, giving them a well-deserved win. Congratulations!

The best new team gem goes to team 6 (Top Dutch). They did everything well: fund-raising, media, construction (the build quality of the car is superb), logistics, testing, and racing. A well-deserved fourth place! Other new teams would be well-advised to emulate the approach taken by this team.

The most beautiful car gem goes to team 21 (Twente) for their tiny little car. It took a lot of clever engineering to make a car that small! The aero drag on the car is, I understand, around the same force as the weight of a large (1.5 l) bottle of water. Sadly, a wind gust overturned the car during the race, but here again the car perfectly fulfilled its task of keeping the driver safe. A wonderful car!

The consistency gem goes to team 92 (ETS Quebec / Éclipse). While cars elsewhere were crashing and catching fire, they continued to drive at a very consistent speed (lowest standard deviation of the ten leg speeds – see the pink line in the graph). They finished as best Canadian team, second North American team, and ninth in the world. Well done!

American Solar Challenge 2018: The run to Burns

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I recently got my hands on the GPS tracker data for the American Solar Challenge last July. Above (for the 6 Challengers completing the stage) and below (for the Cruisers) are distance/speed charts for the run from Craters of the Moon to Burns, which seems the stage of the route with the best data (at this time of year I haven’t the time for a more detailed analysis). Click on the charts to zoom. Small coloured circles show end-of-day stops.

Stage times were 15:Western Sydney 8:05:16, 101:ETS Quebec 8:20:13, 2:Michigan 8:25:08, 55:Poly Montréal 8:42:52, 4:MIT 9:07:58, and 6:CalSol 9:30:12 for Challengers, and 828:App State 10:22:37, 559:Bologna 12:13:57, and 24:Waterloo 15:29:12 for Cruisers (note that Bologna was running fully loaded on solar power only, while the other Cruisers recharged from the grid).

The data has been processed by IOSiX. I’m not sure what that involved, but I’ve taken the data as gospel, eliminating any datapoints out of hours, off the route, or with PDOP more than 10. Notice that there are a few tracker “black spots,” and that trackers in some cars work better than in others. The small elevation charts are taken from the GPS tracker data, so they will not be reliable in the “black spots” (in particular, the big hill before Burns has been truncated – compare my timing chart).

ASC 36: Road Race Day 6 wrap

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The American Solar Challenge have released official stage 3 timings, summarised in the chart above (click to zoom). Michigan and Western Sydney are only minutes apart. ETS Quebec / Eclipse is in third, and gaining, thanks partly to the brilliant tactic of finishing Day 3 just a few metres from the Stage 2 finish line in Lander. Given the battery impound rules, this gave them substantial additional solar recharging.

Although the American Solar Challenge is far from over, I’m already giving my “Most Improved Team Gem” award to ETS Quebec / Eclipse (team 101, formerly 92). ETS came 18th at WSC 2013 (completing only 1530 km), and 8th at ASC 2016 (after Michigan, Dunwoody/SER, Toronto, Missouri S&T, Principia, AppState, and PrISUm). With their car Éclipse X, however, I think they have reached the world top 12 level, along with teams like Toronto and Stanford. I really hope to see them at WSC again soon! And, it must be said, their compatriots in team 55 (Poly Montreal / Esteban) are not far behind them.

In the Cruiser (MOV) class, the “cactus” diagram above tells the story so far. For each car, the first coloured bar shows the number of person-kilometres (distance driven times the average number of people in the car). Penalties have reduced this person-kilometre amount, so my calculation of the average number of people in the car is a little off. The second coloured bar shows the external energy input, which is the number of charges (including the pre-race charge) multiplied by the battery capacity. This bar points downward, because large values are bad. The third coloured bar, which is the final score, is the first bar divided by the second (all bars are scaled so that the highest value is 100%). Minnesota and Onda Solare have been running on the same basis as the Challenger (SOV) cars – no external recharging during the race. This is an incredible achievement!

However, the regulations specify that Cruisers should arrive in less than 53 hours (dashed green line in the top chart), with time penalties if they do not, and with cars deemed to have trailered after 62 hours (dashed pink line). On performance to date, I estimate that Minnesota will arrive in 59.0 hours, and Onda in 59.7, which means that Minnesota’s score will be multiplied by 30%, and Onda’s by 23%. Onda can still win if they recharge from the grid and finish the race at 70 km/h or so. Eindhoven’s Stella Vie could do that, but I’m not sure that the Italian car can. They may have left recharging too late, having allowed Minnesota to dictate what kind of race was going to be run.


Western Sydney wins Stage 3, Michigan recharges (picture credits: 1, 2)

ASC 19: Scrutineering Day 4

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This morning (in Nebraska) marks the start of the last day before the American Solar Challenge track race. Above, ETS Quebec (Eclipse) are catching some early-morning rays. They are through scrutineering, as are Poly Montreal (Esteban) and Minnesota. However, 17 cars still need the all-clear. I’ll continue to update my list with pictures and numbers.

As people may know, I maintain a database of information, and a needlessly complex script produces that list. I’m beginning to wonder whether the script is developing opinions of its own, but whatever it says, I think that the two teams from Quebec are looking pretty good for the race!