By Olivia Chhlang | Reporter
“Float like a Cadillac, sting like a Beemer.”
Baylor Baja is an engineering club where Lightning McQueen’s famous line is tested by building an off-road performance vehicle from scratch.
According to the Baylor Baja website, the club is “dedicated to honing the skills of the engineering students at Baylor and preparing them for any challenge.”
The name “Baja” references the Baja 1000, a 1,000-mile race located in Baja Peninsula, Calif. and Baja California, Mexico, according to Highland Village senior Benjamin Sunderman.
Sunderman said the organization started in 2012 but picked up after COVID-19 as the club grew and the members began wanting to seriously compete. The experience gained from these competitions prepares engineering students for the real world, Kansas City, Kan., senior John Cary said.
“This club is the one that really owns the whole engineering process, that mimics after we get out of school for what it’s going to be like in the industry,” Cary said.
Cary is the chief engineer for Baylor Baja. His job entails making sure the vehicle designs are actually possible and all the parts fit together.
On the other hand, Sunderman is the team captain. He acts as a “manager” for the whole project, getting the team signed up for competitions and figuring out travel details.
Each year, the team works to build a car from nothing. The members split the school year into two parts, the first half being used for designing a car and the second half spent actually building it.
The first step is to create 3D models of every single part of the car and then assemble those 2,000 parts to form a car model. From there, they buy the raw materials and machine and sand all the parts together.
When it comes time to judge the car, there are two categories: static events and dynamic events. The static events include a business presentation, design presentation and cost report.
“We’re pretty much acting like a fake company trying to sell our product,” Sunderman said.
The dynamic events test the performance of the car, including its acceleration, maneuverability, suspension and hill climbing. These categories test the vehicle’s ability to navigate obstacles and how fast and far the car can go.
On the final day of competition, the car goes through a final test of endurance, a four-hour race against other universities to see whose vehicle can withstand the most terrain. Cary is the one behind the wheel.
“The first time that we started up the car and drove it was really cool,” Cary said. “It makes you kind of want to push and be better after that.”
Sunderman said this year they’ve appointed a finance chair and gained sponsorships to help with configuring a budget along with documenting the car’s statistics for the next year when they build a new one.
“There is a huge learning curve with a lot of the stuff we do,” Cary said. “We experienced it ourselves. We’re trying to flatten that curve for the people that come afterward.”
In their most recent competition, Baylor Baja placed 18th in maneuverability, 28th in endurance, 24th in suspension, 30th in hill climb and 35th in acceleration. They plan on furthering their success in Arizona next May.
