Driveline
The vehicle is electrically driven. The big difference with a conventional electric driveline is that the battery pack is replaced with a hydrogen tank and a fuelcell. The power supplied goes around 1 kiloWatt. This should be efficient enough to be able to compete in the Shel Eco Marathon. Because of the low resistances that this vehicle has, during the race it should at least produce 220 Watt.
Fuel Cell
The fuel cell is seen as the heart of the whole vehicle. Here is the hydrogen transformed into electricity and water.
On the left side of the fuelcell is hydrogen, H2, through electrolysis converted into H+ ions where 2 electrons are released.
Those electrons travel through a power wire towards the electric circuit (this would be the motor in the vehicle or the lamp in the image) and end up coming back to the other side of the fuelcell. Here are more electrons needed so that the H+ ions en oxygen atoms get together to form water, H2O.
Chassis
During the last edition a new chassis was designed and produced. The complete chassis is made of aluminum, causing the total weight to be around 16 kilograms. The chassis is the skeleton of the vehicle. The body is not the only elemen attached to it, but also the powertrain and the wheel-suspension.
The wheel-suspension is a essential part of the car. This includes the suspension and shock absorber combination. Thanks to this combination is the vehicle comfortable and safe enough to drive. The unsprung mass, the part that is not protected by the shock absorbers, is of course the wheel, but also the brakes disks, calipes and the electric motors.
To keep the resistances as low as possible it is ensured that the everything is properly tuned and that the calipers do not touch the brake disks unless there is actually braking
Body
During the production of the body where there five different molds used. In every of these molds is there a part of the body produced through vacuum injection. Hereby is there a mix of carbon and epoxy resion the mold of the body placed, after which the whole is pushed by a plastic layer that is pushed against it by a vacuum. In this way, five different parts are created that together form the exterior of the vehicle.
The complete body, that is formed of different parts, is totally removable from the vehicle. This way is it much more easy to work with the internal parts of the vehicle. Only the base-plate of the vehicle is fixed to it.