HyperXite: Pod Maintenance & Transport Vehicle
Summary:
The HyperXite team needs a new way to transport their 250 kg hyperloop pod from location to location for demonstrations and a mobile workstation to repair and maintain the pod outside of the lab space. This iteration of the transport vehicle is dubbed the “Pod Maintenance and Transport Vehicle” which is a redesign of the original “Pod Transport Vehicle” made the previous year. The team will utilize feedback from the HyperXite team to build off of the old design to tackle issues such as difficulties maneuvering the vehicle, injuries resulting from blunt extrusions and sharp corners on the vehicle, and no ease of maintenance of the pod. This project will help to ensure the team and pod both arrive safely and swiftly to any event they find themselves at and present their technological findings to the world.
Background:
The need for the transport vehicle arose due to the dangers of moving the large, unsecured hyperloop pod on carts around campus. The pod would not be held down, leaving the users at the mercy of every bump and crevice in the hope that the pod wouldn't fall off the cart or, worse, fall on one of them. In light of this, the original Pod Transport Vehicle (PTV) was constructed to address the need for a secure way to transport the hyperloop pod while also making it easier to slide the pod onto the demonstration track. An additional feature was planned for the PTV to be lifted on car jacks for the pod to be lifted but was omitted from the final design due to time constraints. The PTV succeeded in addressing its need but also suffered from several issues, including sharp corners that cut or bruise users and the low-to-ground frame catching onto small hills, making it difficult to move on anything but flat terrain. These issues began to see the need for a new iteration of the PTV: the Pod Maintenance and Transport Vehicle (PMTV).
Goals and Objective:
- To make the transport vehicle easier to maneuver
- To create a vehicle capable of lifting and securely holding the pod for extended periods, allowing for safe and efficient servicing
- To create a maintenance vehicle that is intuitive and safe to use
- To create a modular design with modular components that can be easily replaced or serviced
- To have a finished and fully assembled design by the end of the Winter Quarter
Team Contact:
Rachael Koo (Team Co-Lead):
Harbour Li (Team Co-Lead):
Sponsor Contact:
Roger Rangel
About HyperXite:
The UCI HyperXite team aims to produce a working vehicle of Elon Musk’s hyperloop concept through cutting-edge research and design work.
The hyperloop is a high-speed transportation concept proposed in 2013 with the goal of allowing transportation pods that can travel in low-pressure tubes, minimizing friction and drag to mimic vacuum conditions. In the original proposal, transportation pods can travel up to 760 mph from Los Angeles to San Francisco in 35 minutes. Despite numerous technical advancements, the hyperloop concept still faces commercialization challenges regarding system integration and funding in the United States. UCI HyperXite aims to research and develop solutions to these challenges and participate in the Hyperloop Global Conference, hosted in Toronto for the 2024-2025 academic year, designed to foster collaborative innovation to solve worldly transportation issues.
As the world races to cut back on the use of fossil fuels to reverse the effects of human-caused climate change, sustainability projects like the hyperloop concept are becoming increasingly important to develop. UCI HyperXite hopes to develop the Hyperloop concept and overcome the challenges associated with its key technologies so it can live up to its true potential as the “fifth mode of transportation”.
If you are interested in learning more about UCI HyperXite and our past work, please visit our website or contact us directly for more information. With your support, our team will be able to continue championing our cause and improve upon our numerous pod iterations. As a student-led project, we rely on many charitable donations to help fund components for our system and travel abroad for competitions. We’re grateful for all the donations we’ve received in the past, and to keep this project going, we hope to raise our goal of $15,000. Your contribution is critical to our project, and any amount you donate will be greatly appreciated!
Learn more about UCI HyperXite on our website:
https://www.hyperxite.com/about
If you would like to donate to our project, please view our fundraising page:
https://zotfunder.give.uci.edu/project/44425
All support is greatly appreciated! Thank you!