A another school boys dream. Actually this was done in my senior year at Georgia Tech. Although "a psychology major", I was embraced by my pure engineering peers to help design and build Georgia Tech's first Formula One race car to race in May of '87 in Texas.

Besides a more than full time load at school, building and selling computers (a good business back then), I had to put in close to 2000 hours on this project during the school year. It was a true team. We actually had team meeting where various people would sit and explain various technologies (with their merits) to everyone in the group, for us all to then pick what we thought would be best for the team. We did not always pick right (a bad choice for a suspension), but we did it as a team and all lived with the consquences. We never heard, "I told you so".

I designed, tested, and fabricated all UI's for the car: the adjustable seat, the cockpit, the one touch fire-control system, the quick-release steering and the guage/warning system. I also designed, but did not implement a cluchless steering wheel mounted shifter (which is now standard equipment on all real Formula One cars and even finds its way into some production cars as a tiptronic transmission).

Our hard work payed off, altough we did not win the overall event (our suspension broke in the endurnce race), we were the friendlest team (the top finishers all finished because of our assistance), and we finished 1st in the design competition! That was thrill for me, as my work included stuff not seen on any previous entries in the competition.

My non-human factors work included getting sponsors, marketing, making the body, and doing anything in the shop to help. A great team, a great job, a fast car (0-60 in 3.5 seconds), and a great experience.