U of M SAE Aero Team best in North America, 2nd in the world!

University of Manitoba engineering students have soared to new heights with a big win at an international aerospace competition.

Members of the University of Manitoba Society of Automotive Engineers (UMSAE) Aero Design Team design and build radio-controlled aircraft, entering their creations into international competitions, pitting their work against that of students of other universities from around the world.

The UMSAE team has a record of success at this competition, but in  this spring`s competition they exceeded their previous accomplishments. The University of Manitoba team took first place in all static events and second  overall, beating out all other North American teams including Canadian teams  from Ryerson, Windsor, McGill and Alberta, but also American teams from Florida, Kansas, Ohio and Michigan. Manitoba was edged out only by  a team from Minas Gerais, Brazil.

“To achieve this level of success in competition against leading  engineering schools from around the world is indicative of the outstanding calibre of the engineering students at the University of Manitoba and a  testament to this team’s exceptional design skills and hard work,” says Jonathan Beddoes, Dean of the Faculty of Engineering. “The Faculty and University communities congratulate the SAE Aero Team for their  accomplishment and for once again proving that University of Manitoba engineers are among the best anywhere.”

The goal of the competition is to lift as much payload as possible  given a set of constraints determined by the international body. Teams are  judged not only on how well the plane actually flies but also on payload lift  prediction and oral and written design presentations. The UMSAE team had been boasting that their nine-pound plane could lift 31 pounds of payload.“We are really excited to see the result of all the hard work that  went into the project throughout the year,” says Kris Goodmanson, UMSAE Aero  Team Leader. “We’ve learned so much. The team is already looking forward to continuing this success into next year!”

In the Standard Class competition, they won second place losing out to a Brazilian team who had won their national competition. The UMSAE team missed first place by a single point, carrying a record weight for a U of M  team of over 35 pound, slightly under the 37 pounds carried by the Brazilian  aircraft.

Goodmanson notes: “We beat all of the American, Canadian and European teams in our classification–a great accomplishment. All of our faculty and our sponsors should be proud of our dedicated team.”

And, for the second year in a row, the UMSAE team won the NASA Systems Engineering Award, worth $750.

Amber Skrabek