NIU Team Brings Home Top Prize At International Competition

The team took top honors at a recent international competition in California when the gasoline-fueled vehicle it created achieved a whopping 1,525 miles per gallon.

NIU's "Supermileage Team" bested 27 other competitors at the 13th Annual Shell Eco-Marathon Americas competition that took place April 3rd through the 6th at Sonoma Raceway in California.

By the way, the 1,525 miles per gallon mark nearly matches the distance between the NIU campus in Dekalb and the Sonoma Raceway in Sonoma County, California.

NIU Newsroom:

NIU’s Supermileage team earned first place in the Internal Combustion Engine Prototype category, the team’s best placement in its 10 years of existence at NIU.

The Shell competition pits teams of students from throughout the world against one another. The students design, build and drive single-occupant, ultra-fuel-efficient vehicles in an effort to create the most energy-efficient car.

It takes talent, time and ingenuity to hand-build the Huskie Rocket. Team members work from the ground up, starting with in-house designing all the way to machining and fine-tuning.

“These students really epitomize the capabilities and high quality of our students in engineering. They are extremely dedicated,” said Dean Donald Peterson of the NIU College of Engineering and Engineering Technology.

 

The team will return to Michigan again this summer for the Society of Automotive Engineers Supermileage Competition in Marshall, where NIU has placed in the top three nearly every year.

Here's a look at last year's competition: