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Meet HWR-11 - HWRacing's first EV!

The 2022 Formula Student competition was a pivotal moment for the history of HWRacing. Three years after its last appearance at the FS2019 competition, HWRacing went to Silverstone with lots of new technologies that had been developed during the last few years. HWR-11 featured a mostly unchanged mechanical side, with a steel tubular spaceframe, adjustable pushrod suspension and 10-inch wheels, but major upgrades were brought in all other aspects. The biggest change was the switch from an internal combustion engine to an electric powertrain. This brought major challenges consisting of the design of a battery pack, the implementation of complex safety systems to protect the driver, team members and marshals, the programming of a new vehicle control unit and a Sevcon Gen8 motor controller, and finally the redesign of the driveline of the vehicle to accommodate the new power and torque characteristics of the Emrax 228 motor. In addition to the challenges brought by the new electric powertrain, the team ventured into the world of composites with its first-ever carbon fibre front and rear wing.

Car on display in pits

The vehicle build provided numerous challenges as the team had never worked with high-voltage electronics and composites, but thanks to the work of the 30 team members, the car was completed in time for the competition, and was unveiled at the Silverstone pits and was taken to scrutineering to verify its legality.

Car being worked on

The scrutineering process was a great learning experience for the team. Having brought the team’s first EV and aero package to the competition, the team wanted to try and understand if the design principles that were being followed were suitable to develop a successful car for the Formula Student competition. The team’s vehicle did not pass scrutineering, but the lessons learnt during the scrutineering process have put the team in an excellent position for the future.

team in pits

Despite not being able to pass scrutineering, 2022 was a very successful year for HWRacing. Thanks to an improvement in all of the static events compared to the last 3 entries to the competition, the team managed to score 264.5 points. This score placed HWRacing in 20th place overall giving the team its third best result ever! HWRacing achieved 5th place in Business, 11th place in Cost and 18th place in Design; these are some of the best results ever for HWRacing. In addition, HWRacing was the third best first-year EV, this is a result that the team is very proud of as it shows that the hard work that was carried out over the last year paid off.

Team and car on track

Having developed a solid base for future development, HWRacing’s aim for next year is to improve the designs that were developed this year and try to build a vehicle that will be able to successfully complete scrutineering and complete all dynamic events. In addition, the lessons learnt from the excellent results in the static events this year will help the team further improve the team’s placement in the static events propelling the team towards the top of the Formula Student event!

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