Penn College to host international Baja SAE competition

Williamsport, Pa. — After traveling for 19 years for international competitions, Penn College's Baja SAE team will compete right at home this year.

Penn College is hosting the Baja SAE competition for the first time on May 16-19 at its Heavy Equipment Operations Site in Brady Township. More than 100 teams representing colleges and universities from 34 states, Canada, and Brazil, will compete in Baja SAE Williamsport. The competition requires teams to design, manufacture, and build a single-seat, all-terrain car to survive various challenges.

The first two days consist of technical inspections and presentations. Then, four of those tests — acceleration, hill climb, maneuverability, and suspension and traction — are scheduled for May 18. The following day features the marquee event: a four-hour endurance race over a rugged 1.1-mile course.

Despite hosting, the Penn College Baja team is not allowed to inspect the competition site or course layout prior to the event to avoid gaining an unfair advantage.

The campus's close proximity to the competition site does give the Penn College team some extra last-minute preparation time.

“There have been some years that we just literally finished the car as we wheeled it into our trailer to drive over 1,000 miles for the competition,” said John G. Upcraft, instructor of manufacturing and machining and the team’s faculty adviser. “That has really limited our time for testing and tuning and fixing any last-minute problems.”

“We’d be working and see that we have some problems and be like, ‘OK, we’ll solve it on the road because we needed to leave four hours ago.’ Now, we’ll have the time to fix anything and drive 15 minutes down the road. I’ll take 15 minutes over 15 hours any day of the week!” said team captain Marshall W. Fowler, of Sellersville, an engineering design technology student.

Despite the usual time crunch, Penn College has excelled at Baja SAE. The team has registered 14 top-10 finishes in the endurance race since 2011, including two wins in 2022, the last year two-wheel-drive cars were permitted at the competition.

For Baja SAE Williamsport, the Penn College team is updating its four-wheel-drive system, implemented in 2023. That extensive work includes a new frame, front suspension, and continuously variable transmission engagement system.

The students design and manufacture about 95% of the car’s parts.

“Last year, we shoved a four-wheel-drive system into a two-wheel-drive frame. Everything was tight,” Fowler explained. “We’ve changed some of the geometry of the frame to allow for better driver clearances and passages of the four-wheel-drive system through the actual car.”

Engineering design technology student Casey B. Campbell, of Kennerdell, developed the new engagement system with key parts made by Brian P. Rogers, of Kunkletown, majoring in automated manufacturing technology.

For competitive reasons, the team can’t reveal much about the engagement system except to describe it as “smoother and more reliable.” They can discuss the benefits of the experience, though.

“When I see my parts that I designed working on the car, it makes all the hassle worth it,” Campbell said.

“The parts I’m making here for Baja are way more complex than what I’m doing in the classroom,” Rogers said. “It’s cool to see my hard work is actually paying off in the end.”

“Baja takes the theoretical and puts it into a real, hands-on application before we get out into industry,” Fowler added. “When future employers start asking questions, we already have tangible products that we can give them. It really gives us a step up when it comes to employment.”

Fowler designed the new front suspension as part of his senior capstone project.

“We took what we had last year and saw what worked and what didn’t work. Then we shrunk a lot of things, changed some materials and reduced around 50% of the weight from last year’s front suspension,” he said.

The students have also lightened up their vehicle, reducing its weight from 394 pounds to about 360 pounds.

“Dropping that weight will make our car faster, and we had a fast car to begin with,” Upcraft said. “I’m confident that we will have one of the faster cars at the competition.”

Winning the endurance race requires not only a fast car, but also a sturdy one. Traditionally, the endurance course breaks cars. For example, at Baja SAE Ohio in September, only about 20% of the cars completed at least 40 laps. Penn College was one of the few teams to do so, finishing ninth. Thirteen cars didn’t complete 10 laps.

“If we don’t break anything, I expect us to be at least in the top five, hopefully number one,” Campbell said of Baja SAE Williamsport.

“Hopefully, we can put it all together for this home race and bring home another victory,” Fowler said. “That would be really awesome.”

Failure to reach that goal would not be from lack of effort. Team members have spent countless hours throughout the academic year and school breaks researching, designing, and manufacturing the best car possible.

“I think this month (April), I made it home before midnight four or five times. It takes a lot,” Campbell stressed. “But it’s our choice to be here. There’s nothing else I’d rather be doing. We come here on Saturday and Sunday because we want to, not because we have to.”

“These guys are super, super dedicated,” Fowler said. “They’re putting in weekends and late nights. All of our lives have been dedicated to this. We couldn’t do this if everyone wasn’t pushing as hard as they are.”