Front bracing member jig built

Today we built a jig for our front bracing memebers. We reused the design from the front top plane jig to build these. Our jig basically consists of two boards attached with wooden blocks along its center and two blocks with slots milled in them to hold the metal tubing.

We have also discovered a way to help align our endmill and tubing when fishmouthing. The flutes on the endmill tends to distort the size of the endmill, so we wrapped a piece of paper around the endmill to give it a more smooth shape. We can then align this with our scale fishmouth cut diagrams to increase our fishmouth accuracy.

In addition to building the jigs for the front bracing members, we have also redone the right engine side member. The back of the car is now ready to be tack welded.

Solidworks crash course

Today we held a crash course in Solidworks for all the new people interested in joining Baja.

A lot of people showed up, and we hope that they continue to practice with Solidworks in their free time and eventually be able to design parts for our car using Solidworks!

Front footwell jig remade

Today we rebuilt the jig for the front footwell area. Our old jig was not stable enough and would tend to deflect or not hold the front top plane securely. As a result, we modeled a jig in Solidworks and then cut out a board of wood to spec.

We printed out scale drawings of the footwell jig in order to get correct hole sizes and then cut out the holes using the band saw.


Afterwards, it was only a matter of assembling the jig. We first attached the two main planes together with blocks of wood, then we screwed on the side control blocks of the jig.


The new jig is much more stable than the old jig and holds the front top plane much better. This will give us better results when we ultimately weld the footwell members to the front top and bottom planes.

ECST Welcome Back BBQ

Today we participated in the ECST Welcome Back BBQ held at the engineering courtyard. We took our car from the 2013 competition and drove it up into the courtyard to give the attendees a hands on demonstration of what it is that Baja does.


We met lots of people interested in Baja SAE and explained to them what it is our team does. We hope to see lots of new Baja members soon!

Remaking the aft bracing members

As a result of our aft bracing member fishmouths being fairly rough and gaps being present, we have decided to remachine the two aft bracing members. Tubing was bought at a local dealer and cut to appropriate lengths before we put it into the mill and started fishmouthing.

There were still some gaps between the members, so we used a grindstone to grind the fishmouths into the correct shape.

Front top plane jig rebuilt

Today we rebuilt the jig for the front top plane. This time we utilized levels and clamps to accurately build and hold the jig. In addition, we also put a cross member in place to support the jig and prevent it from moving.

Left back members machined

Today we cut and machined out the left side aft bracing member and left side impact member.

As you can see below however, our fishmouths our a little rough. There are some slight gaps at the junction of the members, but we believe that it is sufficient to be weldable.




In addition, we have decided to use rope as a jig, which was a technique that we learned from the prior 2005 team.