2011 International Conference of Information Technology, Computer Engineering and Management Sciences

Transmission System Design of FSAE Racing Car Based on Computer Technology

Huijuan He, Danlei Zhou, Shiqing Peng

Institute of Automobile Engineering, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan, 430070,China
E-mail˖hehuijuan1314@163.com

Abstract—Transmission system is a very complex system in The rule of 2010 FSAE requires that all participating
vehicle, which affects vehicle acceleration performance and teams can only use CF188 engine provided by the committee.
fuel economy significantly. In order to get an excellent The detailed parameters of this kind of engine are listed as
performance of the FSAE Racing car, based on the computer follows:
data analysis, three-dimensional scanning of models and Maximum net power: 24kw/6500r/min
computer virtual assembly, this study discussed the design of Maximum torque: 38.8N.m/5500r/min
transmission and provided a method to modify a CVT to 4- Transmission: V-shaped cog belt automatic CVT and
speed manual transmission. The principle and basis of the transmission with shift CAM
design of transmission system are founded in the manufacture
Shift pattern: Gear shift of Hand operation rod
and experiment of the FSAE racing car.
Clutch type: Wet shoe block automatic centrifugal type
Keywords-FSAE; computer technology; transmission Primary gear ratio(CVT): 0.703̚2.88
Transmission gear ratios˖
I. INTRODUCTION High gear: 3.514 2.47̚10.12
Low gear: 5.857 4.12̚16.87
Dynamic test of the Formula SEA of China (FSAE)
includes acceleration, autocross, endurance, fuel economy Reverse gear: 3.828 2.69̚11.02
and so on. The performance of the racing car in any dynamic Note: Before shifting, the driver should remember to stop
events is highly related to the design and manufacture the engine and close throttles, or it may damage some
standard of the transmission system. mechanical parts even result in accident.
As this kind of engine was designed for ATV, if the
II. CHARACTERISTIC AND REQUIREMENT OF engine and its original transmission system are used directly
TRANSMISSION SYSTEM OF FSAE RACING CAR in the FSAE racing car, the acceleration performance and
fuel economy can hardly reach the lowest prescript limit and
it is impossible to have a good performance in the
There is always a contradiction between the acceleration competition. As a result, changing the design of transmission
performance and the fuel economy in automobile. That is, system becomes necessary, and its improved alternative is to
high level of power performance always accompanies with change the CVT automatic transmission into the 4-speed
poor fuel economy and high fuel consumption. In order to manual transmission..
get a good fuel economy, it has to sacrifice the acceleration Because the period of the design and manufacture is less
sometimes. Researchers face the same problem when they than half a year, there isn't enough time to design a new
design and manufacture the FSAE Racing Car. The priority transmission system. Therefore, we expect to choose a
task of the design of the transmission system is to coordinate manual transmission with suitable gear ratios from the
the conflict between power performance and fuel economy. market. After repeated comparison and calculation, the 4-
FSAE is a fixed-space racing program. The road and speed manual transmission of Auto cars is selected for use.
traffic environment that the racing cars face in the The parameters of this transmission are listed in Tableĉ:
competition is not as complex as that to road vehicles, which
is an important aspect in which FSAE racing car is different TABLE I. PARAMETER TABLE OF AUTO 4-SPEED MANUAL TRANSMISSION
from regular vehicles. As the FSAE car run on on
Ratios of all 1st gear 3.583
motorsports circuit, the design of transmission system
gears 2nd gear 2.166
mainly focus on how to have a good acceleration ability in 3rd gear 1.333
the high friction coefficient road and determining a 4th gear 0.900
reasonable and economic top speed to meet requirements of Reverse gear 3.363
the Dynamic Test in FSAE. What’s more, the transmission Final Ratio 4.350
system of FSAE racing car is also required to be small in size, .
light in weight and easy to be installed into the car
B. Connection of Transmission and Engine
III. OVERALL DESIGN OF TRANSMISSION SYSTEM FOR Design the mechanism for the connection between the
THE FSAE RACING CAR engine and transmission after having selected the gearbox.
Its overall arrangement plan is shown in Figure 1:
A. Determination of the structure of transmission system

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DOI 10.1109/ICM.2011.339
 scanning must overlay over 15% with previous one to
accurately join all point cloud. The spool thread of scanner
lens should be perpendicular to the measured object ÿ s
surface, and the best distance from the lens to the objectÿs
surface is 500-900 millimeters. During the joint and
optimization of the point cloud which are scanned from
different angles, the first step is the input and triangulation of
data. Filter the input point cloud data and eliminate mixed
spots in the software automatically to obtain the three
dimensional image of the swept object. Then optimize data,
delete the unsatisfactory data, excise border drifting data on
both sides, and delete the aerosol orphaned spot. Finally,

split joint the two selected point clouds to generate the ideal
Figure 1. Connection of Transmission and Engine curve. After dealed with many pieces of spot clouds splice,
the CVT outer covering clouds is shown in Figure 2.
The dynamical system is designed to have a mid-engine After completed the cloud splicing, select the cloud to
rear-drive layout, and the symmetrical allocation of engine carry on the surface modeling. Simplify the parts that are
and gearbox is to ensure a reasonable distribution of overall excessively complex or parts that have little effect on actual
axle load. The power from the engine is delivered to the 4- size, while emphasize on modeling work of necessary
speed manual transmission by one pair of helical gears, so locations like threaded holes. The completed work is shown
the best match of engine and transmission system can be in Figure 3.
attained by adjusting the gear ratio. Through a reasonable
installment allocation of engine and transmission in the car,
the axle shaft of the Alto car without transformation can be
directly used in the FSAE car, which greatly improving the
reliability of the transmission system.
TableĊ which was proved by MATLAB shows that the
calculated results of two transmission designs’ performance
of acceleration performance and fuel economy respectively
for the original CF188 engine with CVT and the improved
design with the 4-speed manual transmission. It indicates
that both of the performance indexes have largely been
improved after the re-design.
TABLE II. FACTORS OF TWO TRANSMISSION’ S POWER AND
FUEL ECONOMY FUNCTION Figure 2. Completed Spliced CVT Outer Clouds
Acceleration
Fuel Consumption
Item time in 75m
˄L/100km/h˅
˄S˅ ˅
FSAE racing car with 6.79 16.5.
CF188 engine with CVT
FSAE racing car with 4- 4.98 12.8
speed manual transmission

C. Fixture of Gearbox and Engine

For it is a pair of reduction gears that transmitts power
between the gear box and the engine, the requirement for
the fixture of engine and gear box is high. The method of
rigid fixing can reduce the influence of factors, like engine
vibration and frame misalignment. Three-dimensional
scanning of model can be used to obtain the accurate data
of size for precise assembly of gear box and engine. The Figure 3. Improved CVT Outer Curve Model
three-dimensional scanning is based on the Rapidform
software to joint and pre-treat the point cloud, then we build
the curve surface from the point cloud by using the The three-dimensional scanning and modeling of gear
Imageware software and induct the result into CATIA for box are created in the same way as described above, the
substantialization and the overall Virtual Assembly. completed model is shown in Figure 4.
In the process of scanning of partial mechanism, every

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 decompose the complex three-dimensional motion into two
sub-plane movement. It completes the back and forth
movement through shifting fork, and rotation movement
through the four-bar mechanism linked with universal ball
head. In motion simulation, through observing whether
interference and dead movements exist in the overall
mechanism, we determined the feasibility of the total
mechanisms.


Figure 4. Curve Model of Gear Model Input End

After completed the modeling of CVT shell and

transmission input end, induct both models in the CATIA for
the simulating assembly to obtain more precise assembly
size. In order to avoid the instability of the engine output
shaft and the gear box input axis bracket, add bearing seat at
the transmission gearbox shell to support two axes. The
center distance of two axles can be simultaneously identified
judged by the location dimension of bearings. Between the
transmission gearbox and the CVT shell we take a piece of Figure 6. Shifting Mechanism
aluminum linking sheet as intermediary to join both the CVT
shell and gearbox to the aluminum sheet with bolt joint. The
IV. CONCLUSION
aluminum sheet can not only guarantee the rigid fixture
between the two, but also realize the seal of lubricating oil as According to the design of transmission, the actual
the splashing oil lubrication is used between the reducing manufacture assembly is made. The result of the real vehicle
gear pair. The result of final assembly is shown in Figure 5. test shows that the acceleration performance (75m
acceleration) and fuel economy of the transformed system
are better than the original CVT system in theory and actual
performance. At the same time, the extensive use of the
computer-aided design in the design greatly reduces
unnecessary steps in the actual manufacture process, which
makes the real vehicle manufacture and assembly accurate
and smooth. At last, the transmission system works stably
and has excellent performance in the competition.
REFERENCES
[1] Jiarui Chen, Automobile Mechanics, Beijing: China Machine Press,
2006,5, 133-166J. Clerk Maxwell, A Treatise on Electricity and
Magnetism, 3rd ed., vol. 2. Oxford: Clarendon, 1892, pp.68–73.
[2] Wangyu Wang, Automobile Design, Beijing: China Machine Press,
2004.8, pp.78-109.
 [3] Zhisheng Yu, Automotive Theory, Beijing: China Machine Press,
Figure 5. Final Assembly 2009.3, pp.75-86
[4] Pin Zhou, Zhengfeng He, Matlab Numerical Analysis, Beijing :China
Machine Press,2009.1, 80-118
D. Design of Gearshift Mechanism
[5] Xuayu Sheng, Catia Movement and Mechanics Analysis Example
To make the transmission better meet the need of the Tutorial, Beijing :China Chemical Industry Press,2008.4,pp. 13-100.
FSAE car, a new set of gearshift mechanism has been [6] William F. Milliken, Douglas L. Milliken, Race car vehicle dynamics,
designed referring to that of a Formula One racing car. It is New York: Society of Automotive Engineers,1995. 8.315-398
modeled in the CATIA after made relative motion analysis,
as is shown in Figure 6. In the same shift lever, two different
movement transmitting mechanism are allocated, which

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