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Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology is one of 17 universities competing in EcoCAR: The NeXt Challenge, a three year international competition where teams are challenged to design, build, and test a hybrid vehicle architecture utilizing alternative fuels to reduce the energy consumption and emissions production of a 2009 production GM vehicle [ 1 ]. Teams are presently in year one of the competition where students choose an architecture, specify components, and design the vehicle. Design includes both the mechanical integration of the parts as well as design of the supervisory control system for the hybrid system. Year two of the competition is the build phase, and year three is the optimization and refinement phase. The design phase lasts approximately 9 months and most teams will completely replace the original powertrain with a hybrid powertrain.

Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology is one of 16 universities that competed in EcoCAR: The NeXt Challenge, a three year international competition where teams were challenged to design, build, and test a hybrid vehicle architecture utilizing alternative fuels to decrease the energy consumption and emissions production of a 2009 production GM vehicle on a well-to-wheels basis [1]. A hybrid-electric vehicle is a complex system of subsystems requiring the use of advanced modeling tools, distributed control, and rapid-prototyping. The main goal of the competition is to expose students to the tools, methodologies, and development processes of the automotive industry and to give them a running start if they choose to enter that field. Consequently, the goals of the Rose-Hulman team are to learn the use of these advanced tools, apply these tools to design and realize a hybrid-electric vehicle, and then translate that knowledge into general courses offered to all students at Rose-Hulman.