AMU student team’s design wins big in Hybrid Electric Vehicle competition

Thursday, December 23, 2021

At a time when climate change is sending the world hurtling down a road to more extreme events; ‘Team Green Warriors’, a student team of the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) Z H College of Engineering and Technology (ZHCET), the collegiate club of the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) has manifested that we are still not out of time to pump the brakes.

Their design of a three-wheeled Hybrid Electric Vehicle, ‘Jackdaw’—which won an overall, All-India fifth rank in advanced hybrid category, first position in project plan, fourth places in IPG car maker dynamic evaluation, grade ability test, design validation plan and in organizing committee review and a fifth position in endurance run in Efficycle 2021- SAENIS, a national level design competition for three wheeled advanced hybrid electric vehicles sponsored by Honda, Maruti Suzuki and ICAT—will help in improving the air quality and lower carbon emissions.

The team members, Syed Taimoor Ali (Captain), Anant Agarwal (Vice-Captain), Mohd Saif Usmani (Manager), Abhishek Kumar (Treasurer), Arquam Hashim Siddiquie, Haisam Khurshid, Harsh Varshney, Mohd Sameer, Mohd Sohail said: “We designed the vehicle keeping in mind that it is imperative to decarbonise transportation, which has been responsible for about a quarter of the world’s carbon dioxide emissions. There are concrete signs that automakers are truly committing to electric vehicles than at any time before”.

“We came up with the idea of an aerodynamic vehicle that is ergonomically designed and engineered for performance and safety and we are glad that our efforts to provide environment friendly mobility solution have received nation-wide recognition at the recently held online Efficycle 2021. The vehicle has been designed with features like Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS), seat belt reminder, adjustable headlamps, infotainment system and other reliable safety features”, they added.

Speaking on the challenges of transitioning to remote work during the pandemic restrictions, the team members said: “It was a challenge to learn and apply skills without going to the college, but with the guidance of faculty advisors, Mr Nafees Ahmad and Dr Syed Fahad Anwer and mentoring by senior students, the daunting task of designing the vehicle that could run on human power, but also has an electric plug-in became easy”.     

Congratulating the student team, Prof Mohammad Muzammil (Chairman, Department of Mechanical Engineering) said that this achievement will go a long way in motivating other students to follow the path ‘Team Green Warriors’.

The team members underwent training after a rigorous screening for the selection, said Yogesh Kumar, Student Chairperson, SAE ZHCET Club.