Challenge X - Students Improve the Chevrolet Equinox

So much is at stake. Our personal freedom is linked directly to the mobility that our transportation choices allow and the automobile is central to our way of life. Building on the success of more than two dozen advanced vehicle student engineering competitions promoted by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Natural Resources Canada, and leading industry partners, DOE partnered with General Motors to sponsor the most ambitious project to date – Challenge X: Crossover to Sustainable Mobility.

The 2007 Challenge X was the prove-out of a multi-year program that challenged seventeen universities from across the country to improve the efficiency and capabilities of a Chevrolet Equinox GM crossover, while minimizing the vehicle’s environmental impact. What makes the program so unique is the real-world structure the college teams encountered. Challenge X participants followed GM’s Global Vehicle Development Process (GVDP) to develop, engineer, and integrate advanced technology solutions into their team’s Equinox. These are the same processes they will follow after graduation and throughout their engineering careers. 

Teams followed the four distinct phases of GM’s GVDP method over a four year period during the competition. These phases included use of math-based modeling tools for vehicle design and subsystem control, transitioning from computer models to prototype work on vehicles, refinement and calibration, and pre-production and concept vehicle testing. The end game was evaluation in terms of real-world parameters.

This year’s big showdown was held at GM’s Milford Proving Grounds outside Detroit.  After careful safety and technical inspections, the teams put entries through their paces in acceleration, braking, handling, fuel economy, emissions, drive quality, and trailer towing testing. Scoring placed an emphasis on total vehicle performance in relationship to the base Equinox supplied to the teams. Testing measured many of the qualities important to end consumers, just like an actual production vehicle.

The range of technologies showcased in this competition was truly impressive.  Universities converted the Equinox to advanced technology hybrid powertrains using highly-efficient diesel or turbocharged spark-ignition engines. Fuels were primarily bio based, including B20 biodiesel and E85 ethanol, with some teams going to more exotic highly-dilute and boosted spark ignition engines and ultra lean burn hydrogen assisted combustion strategies. Three teams used hydrogen as a supplementary or secondary propulsion source. Notable technology included a plug-in hybrid from the University of California Davis team, a hydraulic hybrid developed by the University of Michigan, and a dedicated hydrogen fuel cell for primary propulsion on the University of Waterloo entry.

Mississippi State, the overall winner this year, designed its vehicle with a through-the-road parallel electric hybrid drive with GM’s 1.9-liter direct injection turbo diesel running B20 biodiesel. Sound efficient? It was. The Mississippi State entry delivered a 48 percent improvement in fuel economy over the production Equinox. A similar powertrain configuration was used by the University of Wisconsin-Madison team to claim second place honors. Third place Virginia Tech took a different tack using split parallel hybrid architecture with an E85 fueled, 2.3-liter turbo spark ignition engine. Ohio State University finished fourth with a through-the-road parallel electric diesel hybrid like the Virginia Tech entry, which featured belt-alternator-starter technology for electric performance assist.

This was year three of the four year Challenge X program. As with actual production vehicles, year four will move vehicles outside the laboratory and onto the test track. The final 2008 competition will concentrate on real-world consumer acceptance of these advanced technologies and on-road durability and reliability of the vehicles. Green Car will bring you a full report on how these exciting technologies perform in 2008, so stay tuned.