Surabaya, IO – Spektronics, the pride of the November Tenth Institute of
Technology (Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember – “ITS”), has received
an international acknowledgment as the second and fourth place winners
in the Institution of Engineers Malaysia (“IEM”) Chemical-E-Car Presentation Competition held on Saturday (23/10/2021). This is Spektronics’
sixth win in a competition this year.
IEM Chem E-Car is a prototype environmentally-friendly car competition held jointly by IEM and University College Sedaya International (“UCSI”)
Malaysia. In the competition, participants create innovative chemical reaction-based autonomous car prototypes that can be stopped at a specifc
spot after being run. Furthermore, the car must be able to “kick” a soccer ball into a goal and drop bowling pins.
The Spektronics team sent two strong sub-teams: Spektronics N1, headed by Wahyu Febianto (Department of Electronics Engineering, 2020), with M. Rafi Revansyah (Department of Chemical Engineering, 2020) as a member and Naning Retno Astuti (Department of Chemical Engineering, 2019) as manager, under the guidance of Prof. Setiyo Gunawan, S.T., Ph.D.; and Spektronics NG, headed by Bernardus Krisna Brata (Department of Chemical Engineering, 2020), with Abdul Quddus Al Kahf (Department of Chemical Engineering, 2020) as a member and Rahardian Mahendra Daniswara (Department of Material Engineering, 2019) as manager, under the guidance of Juwari, S.T., M.Eng., Ph.D.
The online competition held on 13-23 October necessitated technical adjustments in its execution. For example, the competition was comprised of a video presentation with animated movement of the car prototypes, followed by a quiz and question session. Competing with 27 other teams, Spektronics N1’s car was themed “simple and different.” “Simple” refers to how its movement system works, while “different” refers to the fact that it was the only team that employing a turbine to turn the car’s wheels. “Our innovation was to use a 3D Pelton water turbine that we built in cooperation with Tridiku Surabaya. We use an idler gear to change the direction of gear rotation in the rotary pusher, so the wheels and the rotary pusher have different rotation directions,” Wahyu stated in the press release distributed to Independent Observer on Sunday (24/10/2021).
To respond to the challenge, N1 uses a high concentration reaction to
generate oxygen and high pressure within a safe range. The high-pressure gas will push the water in the sealed water vessel, and the water
will shoot out to the turbine and start it turning. The team uses a 2:5 turbine to wheel spin ratio (for each 2 spin of the turbine, the wheel spins 5 times), with turbine to idler gear spin ratio between 2:17. In short, the turbine, wheel, and rotary pusher spin ratio is 2:5:17. The faster the turbine spins, the faster the rotary pusher spins, and the faster the car runs. “Because the rotary pusher spin is fast, it will also kick the ball hard. It’s one of the advantages of our N1 car,” he said proudly.
Other than Spektronics N1 winning second place, Spektronics NG won fourth. NG’s prototype is an electric car run by a thermoelectric generator with an autonomous hydraulic system that allows it to stop automatically at a stipulated distance. NG Team Head Bernard stated that the car runs by reacting the decomposed hydrogen peroxide in the hot side with the melted shaved ice in the cold side. “The temperature difference can be used to generate electricity, which in turn turns the dynamo and runs the car,” he said.
The second difference between the Spektronics N1 and NG cars is their
systems. NG produced a car run by a thermoelectric generator that utilizes
a temperature difference, while N1’s car is pressurized. “The two cars also
have different autonomous systems. NG uses a hydraulic system, while
N1 uses a calculation of pressure in a reactor,” he said. “They are good
in that it’s easy for people to understand how they work, but we need
to pay attention to their weight. We need to fnd a way to reduce their
weight so that they can be run on less power in the future.”
Bernard went on to express his hope that the ITS Spektronics Team
will continue to achieve its best in future competitions and develop its
innovations to complete maturity. “I also hope for support from outside,
so that our team can spread the fame of our alma mater and bring pride to
Indonesia in international forums,” he said. (est)