I was assigned to the "Oliver 2056" team. This was the team that converted a sofa into a derby car. The sofa frame was extremely useful, serving as a superb structural "hull" to mount the vehicle hardware. The team also determined that its mass would be beneficial since it was a derby-style race. Two utility wheels situated on a simple steering mechanism were mounted on the front of the sofa. Two rear wheels obtained from the remnants of a couple of ten speed bikes were mounted on the back of the sofa.   One of the rear wheels was "pre-torqued" with two tension springs and a chain. The idea was to "release" this wheel at the start to improve the initial acceleration of the vehicle.   Unfortunately, the team did not have an opportunity to determine the boost in performance when using this internal drive mechanism.

From my observations of the entire group of students during the build part of the competition, it was obvious that the teams with engineering and/or physics students were cluttered with brilliant, individual ideas. However, considering the short amount of time involved in building the vehicles, this may have made it difficult to agree on the optimum combination of ideas and implementing those ideas in the respective team vehicles. Interestingly enough, I believe the winning team, "Darkside," had only one engineering student.  

Needless to say, the Junkyard Derby was extremely entertaining.   I've always enjoyed interacting with students on "fun events" like the Derby.   Having a group of extremely enthusiastic participants made the event even more enjoyable. Long live the spirit of Oliver 2056... Whatever that means... And wherever the sofa ended up.

Eric Vigilia,'85, a Warren College grad, is an aerospace engineer for NAVAIR at NAS North Island in the Air Vehicle Strength Group.