Nuna 4

On Oct. 21, 2007, 46 teams from 21 countries will race custom-built cars from Darwin, at Australia’s northernmost point, a distance of 3,000 km/1,864 miles across the continent to the southern port city of Adelaide. Although the high-profile event will be replete with corporate sponsors and plenty of media hoopla, there will be no roaring engines, squealing tires or scent of high-test fuel. Competitors who cross the finish line in this event will do so with a quiet whirr, powered entirely by the hot Australian sun. Much of the media attention in the 20th anniversary running of the biennial Panasonic World Solar Challenge will be focused on the Nuna4 Nuon Solar Team, whose solar-powered electric cars have swept the past three Challenges (Nuna3 set an average speed record of 103 kmh/64 mph). Sponsored by Nuon Corp. (Amsterdam, The Netherlands) in conjunction with Delft University of Technology, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, financial backer ABN Amro (Amsterdam, The Netherlands) and more than 30 suppliers (Lightweight Structures B.V. for example), the team of 11 Delft University students will defend Nuon’s World Solar Challenge title with the fourth in its series of challengers, Nuna4.
(rest of article in Composites, Sept 2007)

Take a look at a Dutch TV programme about the manufacturing of Nuna 4!


Nuna 3

Lightweight Structures B.V. also supervised the conceptual and structural design of Nuna 3 and added its vacuum infusion expertise to the project.

Although two successful cars were built in previous years, a totally new design was made based on top level requirements. Since only one car had to be produced, a direct mould making principle was applied. A rough shape was milled in EPS foam, a PU putty is then applied over the complete surface which can be milled to a very accurate surface texture. Structural design principles from composite aircraft design were applied to make optimum use of the potential of composite materials and composite processing. FE modelling and analytical verifications were used to optimise the lay-up and local thickness.