SR-4 (In Development)

SR-4 | In Development

SR-4 will be our first multi-occupant vehicle and is currently in development. The design process spans several disciplines:

Aerodynamics

We are designing aerodynamic shells, conducting Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations to lower inertial and skin friction drag acting on the vehicle.

 

 

Battery Pack

We are determining cell arrangements for building SR-4’s battery pack. With a combination of hand calculations and thermal simulation, we are optimizing the battery pack’s volumetric density while maintaining safe operating temperatures.

 

 

 

Infotainment and Industrial Design

Unlike single-occupant vehicles, aesthetics and usability are important to SR-4’s interior and exterior design. The vehicle will contain a multiple-display information and entertainment system with design spanning all levels of the software stack.

 

 

 

Power Electronics

In addition to the low-voltage systems we have developed on our existing vehicles, we are pioneering new board designs for power management and conversion: a  battery management system (BMS) with active balancing and a maximum power point tracker (MPPT) for optimizing solar array power.

 

Structures and Mechanisms

We are evaluating the structural properties of space frame and composite frame designs for SR-4 using finite element analysis (FEA) and performing numerical optimization in MATLAB on these designs.

After design and evaluation of systems such as brakes and steering, we machine and manufacture the mechanisms ourselves.