Down Under with Top Dutch (update)

On Sunday 13 October, the Groningen-based Top Dutch Solar Racing team took its place on the starting line at the Bridgestone World Solar Challenge in Australia. This event marks the culmination of two years of hard work for the team, which consists of students from the Hanze University of Applied Sciences, the UG and the Noorderpoort College. The student team has spent the last few weeks preparing mentally and physically for the 3,000-kilometre coast-to-coast race across Australia in a solar-powered car.

The team will be racing in the Green Lightning, a solar car they have designed and built themselves. The seven-day race will start in Darwin, Australia’s northernmost city, and end in the southern terminus of Adelaide. Each day from 13 to 18 October, the Green Lightning will have between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. to cover as much ground as possible.

Each team member has a key part to play. Friso Resink, for example, is a student of Applied Physics at the Faculty of Science and Engineering and is responsible for the electronic strategy along with another team member. Put simply, that means that he and this team member have designed a data-processing model that uses a wide range of data to calculate the speed at which the solar car needs to drive in order to complete the race.

Update: Debuting Groningen Top Dutch 4th in Solar Challenge!

The Groningen Top Dutch Solar Racing team finished fourth in the Bridgestone World Solar Challenge in Australia. A wonderful achievement for the debuting team! Together, students from the UG, Hanze University of Applied Sciences, Friesland College and Noorderpoort have worked extremely hard for 2.5 years to achieve this great result.

Last Sunday, the Top Dutch team started from pole position at the start in Darwin. A number of exciting racing days followed. The Green Lightning solar cell car turned out to work great. A sandstorm was survived and today the car reached the finish line fourth in Adelaide. The Agoria Solar Team from Belgium came in first, followed by the Tokai University Solar Car Team from Japan and the University of Michigan Solar Car Team from the United States.

Two Dutch dropouts

The car of team Twente crashed due to the sandstorm during one of the racing days. Unfortunately they could not continue and the lead position was lost. After that, team Delft took the lead, but with only 250 kilometers to go, the car caught fire and unfortunately they also dropped out. The Groningen Top Dutch team is the only team of the Challenger category to finish as a whole in South Australia.

Social media

You can follow the Top Dutch Solar team via:

• Facebook
• Instagram
• LinkedIn
• YouTube