Lessons Learned
Lesson 1
As the design process progressed, areas of uncertainties arose. Though all requirements and specifications were given by the American Solar Challenge regulations, it was discovered that there concepts not covered by these regulations. For instance, designing the boxes to work with the current solar vehicle chassis was a challenge that had to be addressed. Also, designing the boxes so that all internal hardware from the current battery boxes can be transferred to the new boxes was also a challenge. It was learned that by determining all necessary constraints and requirements before beginning the design process will allow for a smoother design process.
Lesson 2
The battery boxes on the solar car need to interface with multiple other systems to be fully functional. From one aspect the battery boxes need to interface with the electronics controlling the car, as well as the solar arrays. Furthermore, in order to ventilate the battery boxes, the boxes must be tied into the solar vehicle ventilation system. By learning to consider other systems and the designers of these systems during the design process, the design process went smoothly. Learning to better interface with others and what they are designing helped in making this a better project.
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