We are working on a project known as the shell Eco-Marathon.

It is a competition
whereby students are given the opportunity to design, build, test and drive the
ultra-energy-efficient vehicles.
Since, we are going to design a vehicle, we looked through the population and
vehicle statistics in Singapore to pin-point who our stakeholders can be. Our
stakeholders are young adults aged 25 to 34 and those that travel to work alone.
In order to identify our stakeholder needs, we carried out a survey on our own and
went through some survey results done with regards to Singaporeans concern with
transportation. We identified 4 needs. Firstly, they want to own a vehicle that is not
costly. Secondly, they want to travel to their destination quickly and safely. Thirdly,
they want to have great comfort and personal time while travelling. Lastly, they
want their vehicle to be eco-friendly.

Our approach to satisfy the needs is to develop a fuel-efficient vehicle. We believe

that by participating in the Shell eco Marathon competition, we will have a platform
to test our vehicle, which is a battery-electric urban-concept vehicle. In this
competition, there are 3 awards that are given out. There are the on-track award,
safety award and vehicle design award. These awards will challenge us to come out
with the most efficient vehicle in term of mileage and fuel used. Also, it challenges
us to come out with an aesthetically appealing vehicle design while meeting the
safety standard of a commercial vehicle.

Our approach is feasible because our project is in line with the general trend of
increasing popularity of eco-vehicle and technology and resources are available
locally to design the vehicle. We went through some case studies and set up 2
assessment factors to determine the feasibility of the project. They are the
economic standpoint and the technical standpoint,
From the economic standpoint, we noticed that cost of owning an eco-vehicle is
getting cheaper due to it being more fuel-efficient and rebates introduced by LTA to
owner owning an eco-vehicle. However, there is some uncertainty in fuel-economy
which affects the maintenance of the vehicle. Therefore, we gave an 80/100 on
economic standpoint.
From the technical standpoint, we found that we will not be facing any problem in
getting the resources and the access to technology to develop an electric vehicle.
We gave a 70/100 on technical standpoint.
Based on these 2 assessment factors, an overall score of 75 percent was attained.
This is a positive indication of the feasibility of the project.
The benefits of my approach to the stakeholders are firstly, the increase in fuel
efficiency due higher mileage with reduced fuel used, which in term reduce fuel
cost. Secondly, there will be a reduced in traffic congestion due to the vehicle being
smaller in size.
Our approach is better than existing solutions because the EV that we are designing
is smaller in size than commercial vehicle. As such, the road will be able to
accommodate more vehicle, reducing traffic jams and easing traffic flow.
Furthermore, these vehicles are more fuel-efficient which mean that lesser
resources are used as compared to a commercial vehicle for the same mileage
travelled. The exterior protection provided by the EV offers a better option for itself
than the motorbikes.

We will now move on to the concept generation and selection. NUS participated in
this year SEM and they were in the battery-electric Urban-concept category, which
is what we are participating too next year. The design of this year vehicle can be
seen here. There was some problems with this year car design which impede the
performance of it. Therefore, the team decided to search for ways to improve the
current design and employ new technology to rectify the problems and improve the
efficiency of the vehicle further.

I am in charge of the body shell. I identified 4 functions that our bodyshell need to
do. Firstly, it has to reduce drag acting on the vehicle. Secondly, it offers protection
to the driver. Thirdly, to provide ventilation for the electric component. Lastly, it has
to be aesthetically appealing. Under each function, different options were given to
address it. By selecting one option from each function, I came up with 3
combination of options which eventually become 3 different concepts as seen here.
I compare the 3 different concepts with this year design and emplyed some
selection criteria to determine which bodyshell concept to work on for the next
vehicle design. After the screening and scoring results, the final body shell design is
the combination of the first and second concepts. There are a few characteristics to
this bodyshell design but I just want to point out 2 important one. The first one is it
is an airfoil shape which will allow it to cut through the air more effectively and
reduce the drag on the vehicle. The second important characteristic is that there
are both fender grille and hood scope grille to increase the airflow into the electric
component to provide more cooling for the electrical component.