Creating Energy Efficient Car, Bengawan Team UNS Wins 2nd Place of Prototype Category at KMHE 2021

FT-UNS – Bengawan Team of the Faculty of Engineering Universitas Sebelas Maret was successfully joined and secured the runner-up position in the Prototype Category of the MPD Gasoline Class in the Energy-Efficient Car Contest (KMHE) 2021. The winning team consists of five students of Mechanical Engineering: Raiddin Muhammad Agiel, Rani Dwi Larasati, Hamdan Rizqi Pratama, Yogie Muhammad Lutfi, and Febri Bagus Sampurno. The team was under the guidance of Fitrian Imaduddin, S.T., MSc., Ph.D. 

KMHE was held on 15-20 November 2021 in the Universitas Negeri Surabaya (UNESA). The contest was created as a place to implement the engineering knowledge of the participants by creating an energy-efficient car. The competition has three stages: collecting the car report, making a virtual inspection video, and doing the on-track competition for those who pass the elimination round. 

In the KMHE 2021 Bengawan Team made a car that uses gasoline. As explained by Raiddin, their team set a goal to create an alternative gasoline car with efficient fuel consumption. They performed some research and studies on this issue for a year to meet the regulation of the competition. 

“Senapati was built from the development process of our previous car ‘Shankara’. Senapati dimention was measured by calculating its dimension with the chassis and driver posture. The material was carefully selected to make the car light yet has strong endurance. After that, the aerodynamics simulation of the vehicle body was also important to know the air resistance value when the car is running and sliding. A low air resistance value indicates that the car is running far away with less fuel.”

Afri Yusuf Nurmansyah as the team general manager said the main idea was to build an efficient car with lightweight so that the car receives glide power. He also expressed his happiness on his team achievement. He hoped in the future Bengawan Team can keep the performance and many people will know them. 

Rani Dwi, one of the team members also expressed her gratitude. She said the achievement was beyond the team’s expectations. Rani was so pleased to achieve the runner-up title because they have worked hard both to fulfill the technical and non-technical requirements. “This achievement is a blessing from Allah SWT and we cannot get this opportunity without the great support from the lecturers, department, university, and our seniors. For the next competition, I hope Bengawan can achieve better achievement by performing innovation and research.”

Translator: Annisa Firza Early