Engineers race through curves in soap box derby

While Fifth and Forbes avenues were dead quiet, traffic was raging up University Drive… While Fifth and Forbes avenues were dead quiet, traffic was raging up University Drive Saturday morning.

A sparse crowd of builders, friends and parents lined the curb as squat hand-built soapbox racers whipped around the curves of University Drive in Engineering Student Council’s E-Week Soap Box Derby. Despite the cold and the fact that it was 10 a.m., students from all departments of the School of Engineering turned out either to drive or to watch their creations in action.

The racers were judged not only for fastest time, but also which racer could stop closest to the finish line. The Material Science and Engineering Physics Team took first place, though the Mechanical Engineering Team had the best braking time. The participants were then awarded points based on their ranks, which were contributed to their overall totals for E-Week.

Regardless of whether their racers won, drivers described maneuvering their creations as a bit of an adventure.

“The cobblestone is pretty rough and it’s hard to see,” said Lauren Kokai, driver for the Bioengineering Team. “I didn’t really touch the brake, because I wanted to speed.”

Though her vehicle was on two wheels while rounding the curve, Kokai added, “I trusted our handiwork. There’s a lot of creativity put into this car.”

The races were a culmination of weeks of work put into constructing and modifying the racers. Builder Craig Anderson, a junior who helped build the chemical engineering students’ “Gremlin,” explained that the cars themselves are used from year to year with the teams making modifications as necessary. The cars run on gravity alone and must be designed with an optimal center of gravity in order to move the fastest.

Bill Bennett, senior builder and driver for the material science team, helped to assemble “Big Red” several years ago. A veteran of Cub Scout derbies, he explained that this year the team spent about 30 hours on modifications, including new disc brakes and emergency brakes.

“It’s the details that make the difference,” Bennett said.

There are no spending limits for the racing teams since they are supplied with contributions from their respective departments. However, the Bioengineering Team took a particularly economical route to developing their racer, which bore a giant blue and red cardboard heart on the back. Samuel Audia, a junior and one of the builders, explained that their car’s base was actually constructed with parts of a workbench.

“Everybody’s got their expensive car, and look at us, only $60, and we came in fourth in the qualifying round,” Audia said before the races began.

“It’s one of the more traditional events and it’s one of the most engineering oriented events,” said Desiree Bonadonna, an E-Week chair.

She added that some designs were more effective than others and some departments felt that car construction fell more into their area of expertise than others. She said that the mechanical engineers in particular get into it and strip many of their old Student Automotive Engineering cars to make racers. They also help guide freshmen through the process despite the fact that they’ll become rivals in the future.

“The freshmen’s was made from a K-Mart shopping cart, so it didn’t work too well,” she said. “The mechanical engineers kind of take the freshmen under their wing, so it’s kind of a bonding experience for the freshmen.”

In addition to Saturday’s derby, ESC has held a variety of activities for the School of Engineering during the past week, including sumo wrestling, Kool-Aid Pong and a weeklong game of Assassins. Pitt engineers also visited Frick Middle School to teach eighth graders about engineering, competed in the Cathedral Olympics and participated in an “ingenuity competition,” in which students had to eat two bags of Popsicles and then construct a bridge from the sticks.

For each particular event, E-Week competitors are awarded points. The mechanical engineering department won the overall competition for E-Week and received the Shamrock Cup, which is passed down, along with a trophy for their department to keep, by E-Week victors from year to year at the Shamrock Ball Saturday. The mechanical engineers also chose Children’s Hospital to receive the funds raised by E-Week’s events.

“E -Week has been going on for about 50 years,” Bonadonna said. “This is the one week where classes are actually canceled on Friday – the dean actually encourages it – and so it gets a lot of participation.”