Propelled toward victory

A scabbed-over road burn on Erik Chamberlain’s forearm serves as a reminder of a defining moment for a group of Portland State engineering students who competed at the annual ASME Human Powered Vehicle Challenge last weekend.

Chamberlain and a group of four other PSU students built their own Human Powered Vehicle (in layman’s terms, a bicycle) for the Reno, Nev. competition, an event that measures how well students can design and build durable, fast and reclined bicycles.

During the endurance portion of the competition, Chamberlain took a hairpin turn too fast and crashed the bicycle, snapping one of its custom-made bike chains. It was one of many crashes the teammates took while pursuing victory in the competition.

“We all got some scrapes on us,” Chamberlain said.

The five-member PSU team finished the endurance race in sixth place, a lower-place finish than any other team in the competition. Even so, that sixth-place finish was enough to help them secure a third-place overall ranking out of the total 17 teams, beating out some of the nation’s top mechanical engineering schools.

The American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) Human Powered Vehicle Challenge West calls college students from around the nation, all of whom must be mechanical engineering majors and part of their campus’ ASME program, to compete to see who can build the best bicycle.

The human powered vehicles students build are always bicycles, and almost always recumbent, or reclined. The competition is split up into three categories: single rider, multi rider and utility bikes.

The five Portland State students–seniors Chamberlain, Bryan Voytilla, Kenneth Lou, Levi Patton and Ben Bolen–competed in the single rider category, and have been working on designing and building their bike since summer 2007. In the single rider category, the PSU team participated in four competitions: design, sprint, endurance and overall ranking.

Portland State landed fourth place in men’s sprint, had fifth places in design and women’s sprint, a sixth place in endurance, and ended up with the third place overall ranking. The Missouri University of Science and Technology and Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, which have two of the nation’s top mechanical engineering programs, were the only two teams to rank higher than Portland State.

PSU’s bicycle looks like most other recumbent bicycles. The rider sits in a reclined position on a seat that looks as if it was taken right from a lawn chair. The seat is balanced between wheels on either end, such as any other bicycle, but the pedals are near the front wheel instead of in the middle of the bike. The rider steers using handles at their side.

To help prevent wind resistance and injuries, the team built a fairing, or a plastic shell that covers the bicycle and rider while racing. Patton, one of the five main teammates, spent hours researching and designing the shell, for which Portland company Tap Plastics Inc. donated materials.

During the endurance race, in which team members take turns racing such as in a relay, the team chose to not use the fairing at all because it was faster to trade off the bike. But not having the fairing did have consequences, especially when they crashed.

“You kind of gamble a little bit. You try to go 25 (miles per hour) on a hairpin turn,” said Voytilla, who had his own share of “battle wounds.”

This is the third year in a row that the PSU team has achieved a third place overall ranking in the ASME Human Powered Vehicle Challenge West.

This year, the team assembled the bicycle with the help of a horde of other volunteer engineering students, as well as a few friends and family members. Paul Andrews, one of eight other mechanical engineering students who traveled to Reno with the group, used his experience as a former bike mechanic to help assemble a large portion of the bicycle, Voytilla said.

The group members, who all participate in the student fee-funded group ASME, acquired materials for the bicycle from various companies around Portland by buying equipment with the group’s student fees as well as getting materials donated. Companies such as Premier Gear and Machine Works and Terra Cycle donated parts, while the engineering department’s machinist, Chuck Heino, helped the group fabricate the bike.

Right now, the bike is out of commission. Chamberlain’s crash, along with the multiple other crashes it suffered during the endurance race, took their toll.

“[The bikes] all look nice during the design competition,” Voytilla, who worked with PSU during the competition last year. “Then after the endurance race, they’re all chewed up. Duct tape is an engineer’s best friend.”

The five students built the bike and competed in the challenge as a part of a senior capstone class geared toward mechanical engineering students. Although the capstone class is still only worth six credits, it lasts all school year.

“It really is a pretty substantial project,” said Derek Tretheway, an assistant professor of mechanical and materials engineering and the instructor of the class. “It happens because of the students, the dedication to get it done … it’s overall pretty impressive.”

Tretheway said that most of the other schools in the competition have many more resources this group of PSU students, anywhere from twice as many people designing and building the bike to about twice as much money for parts and labor. The bike cost the PSU team about $12,000, members of the group said.

Part of that cost was to pay for a wind tunnel, which the team rented out to get practice riding the bike.

Voytilla, who rides on the PSU cycling team, said that this project was valuable to him because he has always wanted to work professionally designing and building bicycles.

“It’s always been a dream job for me,” he said.