deBotech teams up with Uberwurx
deBotech teams up with Uberwurx to create composite body panels for the Range Rover Sport. deBotech created and made modifications to these composite body panels which included the Upper and Lower Front Fender Flares as well as the Upper and Lower Rear Fender Flares, the Upper and Lower Spoilers and the Side Vent Covers. Uberwurx counted on deBotech to create, modify, paint and assemble the complete composite body kits and once again deBotech delivered.
Meet Our Teaming Affiliate:
AS9100 and ISO:9001 Certified Machining Division of Southern Prestige Industries, Inc.
PRECISION PROCESSING SYSTEMS
deBotech continues to advance itself into the Aerospace market and has developed strong relationships with certain respected companies in the North Carolina area. One of these companies is Precision Processing Systems, the machining division of Southern Prestige Inds. Inc., Jim Wilson is the President and CEO of Precision Processing Systems. His knowledge along with the extensive experience of his staff have earned him and his company respect in both the Military and Aerospace industries of which he has supplied products for 20 plus years. deBotech, Inc. and Precision Processing Systems both hold the coveted AS9100 Certification, the Aerospace Quality Standard, which ensures that they provide top Quality Manufacturing and Service in these demanding and specific arenas and all of the industries that they serve. PPS and deBotech continue to strive to develop new processes and new advances to support not only our Military agencies but the Aerospace and Automotive Industries as well to provide the highest quality products available in the marketplace. With the combination of expert machining and cutting edge composite technologies, the two companies stand together to support our customers and our country. To learn more, visit www.southernprestige.com and view their bio on The Wall Street Journal
AEROSPACE, AUTOMOTIVE, RACING,…….…FURNITURE
That’s right you heard us correctly – deBotech, Inc. even produces furniture. As a Customer-Focused Company, we build whatever the customer wants. Jim Moore of Hancock and Moore Furniture is presenting this Carbon Fiber Coffee Table at the upcoming Chicago Furniture Show. This table is 100% carbon fiber with wood pedestal and aluminum uprights. This, however, is not our first time out in the furniture industry. Hans deBot aka CarbonHans of deBotech also worked very closely with Phil Frank Designs to build the 100% carbon fiber Spyder Table several years ago. Check out the pics below, click on the link for more info on the Spyder table and Good Luck to everyone at the Chicago Show.
http://www.carbonfibergear.com/carbon-fiber-pfd-spyder-table-by-phil-frank/
DASH NOW AVAILABLE FROM DEBOTECH:
Complete 100% Carbon Fiber Dash for the Sprint Cup and Nationwide Series. deBotech manufactures these from SFI approved materials and uses their Advanced Manufacturing Techniques to ensure the Best Quality, Reasonable Prices, and Fast Delivery. The complete Dash package weighs 3.09 lbs for a dramatic weight savings. Our customer’s satisfaction is our #1 priority!!!
COMING SOON TO www.dbtparts.com
Meeting Customer’s Product Needs as well as Costs.
deBotech continues to meet our customer’s unique needs for strength and light-weight characteristics while still offering the best prices in town. The pictures below represent different material lay-ups for different customer’s needs.
100% Carbon fiber = Offers the ultimate in high strength to weight ratio.
Carbon/Kevlar = Offers extreme durability while keeping the high strength to weight ratio.
Carbon/Fiberglass = Offers some strength to weight ratio but significantly reduces costs.
100% Fiberglass = Offers extreme savings as an alternative material.
Whatever your needs – deBotech will meet or exceed them. As one of our AS9100 and ISO:9001 Quality Objectives, we make sure that our customers are satisfied. Read what some of our customers have to say at our entrance page and through-out our website at www.debotech.com
Work vs. Play time @ deBotech with CarbonHans
We take work very serious here at deBotech BUT boys will be boys! Take a look at how we let loose and play (with dry ice)!!!!!
Good Luck Teams @ Bristol
We want to wish everyone Good Luck at the upcoming race in Bristol and give you a backstage pass to the hot items Featured by the 2011 Teams:
Fast, Sleek, Light-Weight & Bad-to-the-Bone = CarbonHans’ handiwork…… Presenting the Buell 1190RS
Erik Buell Racing will be displaying a pre-production example of its new 1190RS Carbon Edition street-legal Superbike during this coming weekend’s Powersports Dealer Expo in Indianapolis, Indiana.
Like the name indicates, the Carbon Edition will be a special version of the bike with many carbon-fiber pieces, including carbon fiber bodywork, secondary muffler, radiator shroud and fairing brackets. It will also have an Aim Sports digital dashboard, Öhlins suspension and more premium components, but all street versions will come with magnesium wheels and the same spec of 1190cc V-Twin engine.
No horsepower numbers were available at post time, but the finished product is claimed to weigh under 400 pounds wet, so light in fact that among the optional racing kit parts available will be a ballast kit so racers can add weight to the machine to meet minimum weight requirements.
The minimum weight limit for a twin-cylinder machine in the 2011 AMA Pro Superbike Championship is 380 pounds, as it comes off the racetrack.
A fiberglass bodywork kit will also be available for those wishing to go racing in AMA Pro Superbike, where carbon fiber bodywork is not legal, and the standard race kit will include a racing exhaust system and Engine Control Module (ECM).
“I’m sorry, but I don’t have a lot of specific details on it,” Erik Buell Racing founder Erik Buell told Roadracingworld.com Thursday evening. “We just came to the Indy Dealer Show so we could talk to people a little bit about it. We don’t have any brochures to hand out here or anything.
“We also have the [current] 1125RR AMA [Superbike] with us down at the show in AMSOIL colors, because we just announced the three-year title sponsorship deal with them, and when we wheeled the bikes into the hall we could tell the 1190RS is a lot lighter than the 1125RR racebike. I mean you can just feel it pushing it around.”
Buell said other examples of the 1190RS are currently undergoing regulatory testing with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of Transportation (DOT), and testing is going well.
“We’re just finishing up the EPA and DOT testing, and the emissions look really, really good,” said Buell. “We put a couple of catalytic converters in the muffler. It has a secondary muffler because it has a pretty high output engine, and we wanted to make sure it was well legal. And it’s actually 2 decibels under the limit and well controlled. But to do that we needed more muffler than we could fit under the bike. There just wasn’t enough room. And it also makes us world-legal because you have to have a high, rear-pointing exhaust outlet for Japan to pass the sound test. So it will be legal there.”
If all continues to go well with testing and the company does not encounter any unforeseen problems the first Erik Buell Racing 1190RS street-legal Superbike could be in a customers’ hands by the end of March and another 99 examples (at least) will follow it out the door before the end of 2011. Price has yet to be announced.
But in the meantime, Buell is going to enjoy showing the EBR 1190RS this weekend in Indianapolis and showing, yet again, what is possible by him and his dedicated and talented group in East Troy, Wisconsin.
“It’s really rewarding for all of us,” said Buell. “To get this done we’ve been working really, really hard for the last year-plus. We’ve been designing all these new parts and getting everything together and finally doing kind of what we want to do, a real, genuine street superbike.
“It’s high-end, it’s expensive but it is absolutely premium. Where we are — and we’re tiny right now — this is the first bike we have to do as a small-volume manufacturer, but we wanted to do it right so that if you rolled it out against the best Ducati, Bimota or any high-end exotic it would be no-joke, the real deal. This is a wonderful bike. This can stand up to anything like that in the world, any limited high-end bike. That’s why it has an Aim dash and high-end rods and Ti [titanium] valves and high-end valve springs, premium stuff.
“We thought about showing it [in Daytona] first, at a consumer show, but we thought the dealers really are the core. The customers are the real business, but the dealers are really important, you know? We wanted to show it to the sportbike dealer network to make the statement that we are in the sport motorcycle business with EBR. That’s what we are. That’s what our focus is – pure sport motorcycles.”
Asked if he was going to put the first production version of the EBR 1190RS aside for himself, Buell, a former Pro road racer, said, “I was just telling the guys the other day, ‘I’ve got to have one of these,’ but I don’t have any money. My money’s all tied up in the business. I’ve got to have one of these. It’s so beautiful. It’s so very, very nice, and it’s exactly the kind of bike I would love to own. I just don’t know if I can afford it right now. I’ve got to sell my car and drive a Pinto or something. I’ve got to have it.”
As published in RoadRacingWorld, February 17th edition by David Swarts, ©Copyright 2011, Roadracing World Publishing, Inc.
Photos by Steve Anderson/Courtesy Erik Buell Racing
deBotech’s Carbon Fiber/Composite Parts Lead to Big Victories at Daytona – Part 2
Continental Tire Grand-Am 200
deBotech congratulates Team Manager, Joe Vardi, and drivers, Nick Longhi and Matt Plumb, along with the rest of the team members of Rum Bum Racing!
On January 28th, the bright blue and yellow #13 Rum Bum BMW M3 racer, driven by Matt Plumb and Nick Longhi drove to victory at Daytona International Speedway.
Using their custom-made deBotech air box and components, Rum Bum Racing secured the pole position for the Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge Grand-Am 200. When the green flag dropped, Rum Bum Racing never looked back. This is the team’s 2nd straight victory at the Grand-Am 200 in Daytona. Way to Go!
Be sure to watch the Speed Channel’s coverage of the Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge Grand-Am 200, Saturday, February 5th at 3pm for the race and special features.
deBotech’s Carbon Fiber/Composite Parts Lead to Big Victories at Daytona – Part 1
Rolex 24 at Daytona:
deBotech congratulates Riley Technologies and the winners of the Rolex 24 at Daytona.
In the Rolex 24 at Daytona race held over the weekend, deBotech’s long time customer, Riley Technologies, had cars in all of the top 4 positions at race’s end.
With thirteen of their cars in the race, using deBotech’s carbon fiber body kits and components such as splitters and air boxes, Riley-built cars took 7 of the top 10 spots in the event.
deBotech is proud to be a part of these winning teams and congratulates them all for all of their hard work!
Daytona or Bust
CarbonHans is headed for the 24 hour race in Daytona. The bus is loaded with gas, premium quality carbon fiber parts and good friends. Lets Roll!!!
deBotech’s New Member of the Team
deBotech is pleased to announce that Brandon Nichols, an Aerospace Engineer, has joined our team. Brandon will be working closely with Hans in the design support of several new projects that are currently under-way and also working closely with our customers to ensure that their composite products meet their requirements as well as the requirements of our QMS system and the AS9100 set of standards. We are excited to have him on-board and welcome him to our family. Find out more about Brandon below………………………..
Brandon Nichols – Bio
I was born in Greenville, North Carolina. My father was a police officer and my mother was a school teacher. In 2003 I began attending NC State University, majoring in aerospace engineering. During my time at NC State I was involved in the design and construction of a rover which could be used to explore the surface of Mars and drill into the soil to look for signs of life.
After my undergraduate work was complete, I returned to NC State to continue my studies. I worked as a student tutor during graduate school and also did copywriting work for the student radio station WKNC. During graduate school I also worked on a second robotic spacecraft, this one designed for exploration of the Moon. After completing my master’s degree in May of 2010, I worked as a freelance engineer and taught math classes at a local community college in Raleigh.
I enjoy movies, science fiction and historical novels and I am slowly learning how to cook. I also am a fan of video games and baseball and I write in my spare time.
I have relocated to Mooresville and have found deBotech to be an exciting and engaging place to work. I look forward to learning and growing as an engineer and becoming more skilled in a variety of areas.
deBotech, Inc. starring in 2007 Red Bull Air Racing with Champion Mike Mangold
deBotech, Inc. starring in 2007 Red Bull Air Racing with Champion Mike Mangold! Check out these daring Red Bull Air Racers in this awesome video with some of deBotech’s cool Carbon Fiber parts that helped make it all possible!
Creations by Carbon Hans of deBotech, Inc.
Hans deBot, a.k.a. “Carbon Hans” of deBotech, Inc. created this master piece last year in conjunction with their neighbor Riley Technologies for Hans’ good friend Joe Vardi. “Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder” but anyone who saw this carbon fiber creation thought it was Beautiful. Artfully done in a short time span seems to be Hans’ gift to the masses. Although he wishes for more time on projects, he is able to turn projects around in a hurry to meet his customer’s stringent time constraints for race or test days, etc. His ability to do this comes from his Engineering background as a Graduate of NC State Engineering school but also and maybe most importantly because he strives for perfection in everything he does. Check out the photos below to see if you agree – Carbon Hans is an Artist!
DEBOTECH ACHIEVES 100%
deBotech concluded their AS 9100 Surveillance audit on November 19, 2010 with a PERFECT score!!! The SAE AS 9100 Rev. B standard is a quality standard for the Aerospace Industry and it encompasses the ISO:9001 2008 standard as well. Quality and Customer Service have been our driving forces since the inception of deBotech and to further enhance these we began working toward developing our Quality Management System in early 2009 and achieved our initial AS9100 certificate within 9 months with a score of 99% our first time out. Since last year we have continuously improved our processes to further ensure that we meet and exceed our customer’s expectations and that the quality and repeatability of our products is second-to-none!
AS9100 Checklist
Al and Hans
Alisha, Al and Jamye
Race on over for a sneak peek…
Get a sneak peek on what it feels like to be a NASCAR Driver!
Race on over to dBt Performance Parts under the 50/50 GiveBack Event tab to find out how you can WIN a NASCAR Racing Experience!
We want to make you a NASCAR Driver!
In honor of our upcoming race at Charlotte Motor Speedway in Charlotte/Concord, NC – deBotech, Inc. wants to make you a NASCAR Driver! Check out dBt Parts on Facebook under the 50/50 GiveBack Event tab to learn how! Good Luck and Happy Driving!!
I’m ready to surf this wave:
I’m ready to surf this wave: “There is this tidal change taking place. What’s really happening here is being driven through these more flexible, more tolerant, lightweight [carbon fiber, composite] materials.” according to Mayer from Today’s Machining World.
Interesting Article on the future of Carbon that Hans found on Today's Machining World blog called "How It Works – Where's The Steel?" by Barbara Donohue
You might not normally think of making things out of carbon, but lately the material of the future is carbon fiber reinforced polymer (CFRP) as used in the new Boeing 787 airliner. In a whole different approach to commercial aircraft design, body sections of composites act as both skin and structure.
Work pieces made of graphite, another form of carbon, are machined for use in many industries. Graphite’s electrical conductivity and high temperature capability suit it for a wide range of applications.
More fiber
A composite material is made up of two or more different materials that keep their individual characteristics. For example, fiberglass contains a plastic material reinforced with glass fibers. Many metal/metal composites or metal/ceramic composites are also in use, but won’t be covered here.
In a fiber reinforced composite, the geometry of the reinforcement fibers, whether parallel, random, or woven and the proportions of fiber and resin (epoxy or various plastics) can tailor the mechanical properties of the material to a particular application. In high stress areas, different configurations of materials, like layered sandwiches, provide added strength.
In an aircraft such as the 787, composites’ high strength-to-weight ratio allows designers to minimize the weight of the craft, reducing fuel consumption. CFRP and other composites also generally require less frequent maintenance, and this reduces upkeep costs. Over the life of the airplane, the savings could add up to the original cost of the plane.
Composites also fit well in such large precision components as wind turbine vanes.
Cutting carbon
When machining graphite and CFRP, you’ll need to take into account their special characteristics.
First, rather than cleanly shearing as metal will usually do these materials fracture, leaving you with fine graphite powder or little chunks of plastic and carbon. The powder from graphite or small shards of carbon fiber is abrasive and can quickly wear cutting tools.
These materials generally have a higher coefficient of thermal expansion than most metals, so they can shrink and grow more than you’d expect with changes in temperature. In precision work, especially, you must work in climate-controlled space and allow parts or blanks to come to room temperature before cutting or inspecting.
Because these materials are somewhat porous, you need to cut them dry, so they won’t absorb coolant which can cause problems later on.
These materials are expensive. A 12-inch square of CFRP an inch thick might cost $1400, or 40 or 50 times the cost of a similar-sized piece of graphite and 150 times the cost of aluminum stock, said Peter Guercio, vice president of sales and application support at Graphite Machining Services, Inc., Tempe, Ariz.
Composites, by their nature, are created at near net shape and often the only machining required is a bit of milling along the edges and drilling holes. Because the parts can be quite large, too large for available machining centers, much drilling has been done by hand, said Kevin Mayer, aerospace manager at Sandvik Coromant, Fair Lawn, N.J.
Graphite material and applications
Graphite is a form of carbon. It occurs in nature, but the type of graphite used in industry is manufactured to exacting specifications.
“What we use is petroleum coke, a byproduct of oil refining,” Guercio said. The process, which takes three to six months, starts with superheating and cleaning the petroleum coke, mixing it with binders and then subjecting it to heat and pressure. Then the material is graphitized, a heat treating process that changes the material’s structure.
Graphite is available in many forms and grades for different applications. Machining parts with a good surface finish requires a fine-grained grade of graphite, for example.
The blocks of graphite his shop starts with are 12” x 20” x 40”. “Basically, you’re dealing with a coffin that weighs 1200 or 1300 pounds,” Guercio said. The first step in machining is to saw the blocks into pieces.
Applications for graphite cover many industries. Graphite crucibles take advantage of high temperature capability. EDM tools take advantage of graphite’s electrical conductance and stability. Bearings and bushings make use of graphite’s low wear rates and lubricity.
Many industries use graphite parts, including semiconductors, glass working, electronics, electrical and mining/refining. “I’m actually shocked what people use graphite for,” Guercio said.
Composite materials and applications
The fiber or fabric reinforcing material, pre-impregnated with epoxy or other polymers, known as “prepreg,” is laid into a mold of the desired shape. It is cured, often under the pressure and heat of an autoclave. The mechanical properties of a composite depend on its components, their proportions, and the process by which the part is assembled and cured.
The many kinds of composites have innumerable applications. The carbon composites discussed here have been used for decades in military aircraft and now in commercial craft and ground-based vehicles. The place many people encounter carbon composites is in recreational equipment like tennis rackets, golf clubs, masts for windsurfers, bicycle frames.
Machines for graphite and CFRP
Since you shouldn’t use coolant with these materials, you may want to use a cold air gun, which can both cool the tool and remove the dust from the cutting area.
When machining graphite, you need to keep three things in mind, said Bill Howard, product line manager for vertical machining centers at Makino, Mason, Ohio.
First, you’ll need a fairly high RPM spindle. Graphite cuts freely, so it’s pretty much wide open —you can cut it as fast as you want. Makino offers 20, 30, 40 thousand RPM machines. Horsepower and torque are not that big of a concern. Since cutting forces are small, he said, you can have aggressive feed rates.
Second, you need to have a control capable of extremely precise feeding. It’s one thing to have a car go fast if you’re going in a straight line. But if you’re contouring in 3D your control needs to be able to control overshoot and under-shoot. “Once you start spinning the spindle at high RPM, you need to have control over the feeding,” Howard said.
Lastly, you need to be able to handle the dust and keep it away from the operator and the workpiece. “The concept we use is to put a slight vacuum in the work zone and pull air in at the top of the operator door and across the work zone,” said Howard, creating turbulence so the dust doesn’t settle on table or workpiece.
“It’s a dirty business,” he said. “Mostly we have point-of-contact collection, as the graphite is being cut. We create custom dust collectors – at the tool or the fixture. ” The dust collectors have HEPA (high efficiency particulate air) filters to catch the extremely fine dust particles. “Particles of graphite tend to destroy your machine,” said Guercio. They’re abrasive. They conduct electricity.
Makino offers a number of vertical machining centers designed for graphite, and a multipurpose vertical machine, the S56, which, with a special graphite package, can machine graphite.
Tooling for graphite, CFRP, and other composites
Due to its abrasiveness, graphite can quickly wear down tools. For precision work, you should use carbide tools with appropriate coatings, Guercio said. “Make sure you use tools from well-known manufacturers,” he said, “or the coating will crack right off when you machine “graphite.”
You have to deal with multiple materials when you cut composites. Tool manufacturers have developed specialized drills and other tools to help alleviate some of the problems. Drilling presents particular challenges.
With sandwich composites, you may be drilling through layers of vastly different materials, such as titanium and CFRP. The CMD drill from Precorp, Spanish Fork, Utah, is designed to give consistent hole size from one layer to the next through different materials, said company president Rich Garrick.
Drilling CFRP may result in separation of the layers of material—delamination—or splinters of fiber may break out. Sandvik Coromant offers drills to prevent these problems. For composites with relatively high fiber content, splintering tends to be a problem. The CoroDrill 854 can alleviate this problem with extra cutting edges that sever the fibers on the hole diameter. For resin-rich composites, Sandvik Coromant offers the CoroDrill 856 designed to alleviate delamination problems.
Polycrystalline Diamond (PCD) coatings or edges help tools to last. Crystallume and Precorp have processes for incorporating a section of PCD in a tool just at the cutting edge.
Tricks of the trade
Shops experienced with machining these challenging materials have learned how to tame them. “Graphite is black magic, no pun intended,” said Guercio.
“You really need to know what you’re doing. Err to the side of caution, especially when tolerances are a concern. Take your time, measure your part, and gradually ramp up your feeds and speeds until you optimize [the process].”
When drilling through a part made up of layers of radically different materials, you should program different spindle speeds for each material.
Because graphite and composites wear tools so fast, you’ll probably want to monitor and manage the tools to keep good product coming off the machine. Howard suggested using laser automatic tooling measurement. The spindle periodically moves the tool into the path of the laser, which can not only measure the length and diameter of the tool as it spins, but some systems can detect the tool’s form and trigger a tool change if it is worn or if an edge is chipped
More to come
With development of advanced composites, you’ll be seeing more and more of them showing up in many applications. Even if a part comes in made from metal, it’s quite likely the customer has looked at making it in composite, Mayer said. “There is this tidal change taking place. What’s really happening here is being driven through these more flexible, more tolerant, lightweight materials.”
Meet The Wacpak
Here are some of the motorcycle enthusiasts that I know and have the privilege of calling my friends.
The Wacpak
We’re great at riding bikes but not so great with rafting The Gauley at Sweets Falls
Not so sweet being flipped at Sweets Falls
“Carbonize”
Which bike to “Carbonize” next??? deBotech and dBt parts are going to “Carbonize” a new bike. We will produce carbon fiber ram air covers, fenders, tank inserts and so on…….. We just have to decide which one to do. Let us know which one YOU want us to choose.
50/50 GiveBack Event!
deBotech presents Our Big 50/50 GiveBack Event on FaceBook!!! How it works is simple – the first 50 people that get 50 of their friends to like us will receive FREE dBt Swag. Thats right we said FREE!
Just check us out on Facebook @ http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=lf#!/pages/Mooresville-NC/dBt-Performance-Parts/135710356463621 and take a look at our 50/50 GiveBack Event Tab for instructions on how to WIN FREE dBt Swag!
It's Official!!!!
July – 2010
It’s official – deBotech, Inc. has opened it’s Online Store. Please visit www.dbtparts.com to view our current offerings. All of the products that you see on this dBt Performance Parts website are a result of deBotech investing the time, money and materials into the R&D and tooling/molding for these parts so that they become more affordable for everyone. Hans has wanted for years to be able to meet the demand of the smaller race shops or the week-end bikers. This is what he has come up with; we have several areas of products from NASCAR/Nationwide and Sprint Cup parts, Motorcycle products including Kawasaki and Ducati parts, RC Components and Go-Kart parts as well Exotic products. This is just the beginning, we have 100 products available for you to view and purchase online at this time but we have several more available to be purchased and even more in the R&D phase of production. We are always looking for your ideas for products that you would like to see and we welcome any photos that you may have as well. All of the dBt Performance Parts are 100% Carbon Fiber unless you specify otherwise when you order. We are confident that you will find our products superior to anything else on the market as well as the most reasonably priced. It is important to remember, these are parts that deBotech has developed and for our customers that have developed their own designs and/or tooling/molding, we hold you and your information in the strictest of confidence. Please visit our on-line store often as we will be adding more products and please visit us on Facebook @ http://www.facebook.com/pages/Mooresville-NC/dBt-Performance-Parts/135710356463621?!/profile.php?id=100001345395420 as well. We look forward to hearing from you and thanks to all of our customers for your continued support.
deBotech goes to the Olympics
University of Cincinnati Assistant Professor Grant Schaffner in the School of Aerospace Systems is the principal designer for a revolutionary new skeleton sled that was used in the Olympic Winter Games in Vancouver. Two Cincinnati-area businesses, ProtoStar Engineering and Machintek Corporation, jointly designed and built the new sled. The sled was ridden by John Daly, one of the three male athletes on the U.S. Skeleton Team. In addition, the sled shell or fairing (called a “pod”) designed by ProtoStar Engineering was used on the sled ridden by Noelle Pikus-Pace, one of the two female athletes on the U.S. Skeleton Team.
Schaffner’s aerospace research at UC in the College of Engineering and Applied Science is in the area of human health, survivability and performance in extreme environments.
“Mainly, I deal with astronauts in the space environment, soldiers in combat and athletes,” he says.
Schaffner is also the president of ProtoStar Engineering, an engineering consulting company based in Cincinnati, Houston and Phoenix.
The sled project began just one year ago when two of the principals of ProtoStar Engineering — Schaffner and Karl Schultz — sketched out a rough design for a revolutionary new sled on a piece of paper while meeting with staff of the U.S. Bobsled and Skeleton Federation (USBSF) and a representative of the U.S. Olympic Committee (USOC) in a hotel room in Whistler, Canada, following the Skeleton World Cup event there. To that point, ProtoStar Engineering had been providing technical consulting to the U.S. Skeleton team, mainly aiding with aerodynamics analysis and sled structural testing.
Acting on inspiration gained while observing the World Cup event and based on knowledge and experience gained during the past year, Schaffner drafted a preliminary design with the assistance of Schultz. The representatives of the USBSF and USOC liked the idea and told ProtoStar Engineering to run with it.
Schaffner and Schultz credited their experience gained while “bodystorming” (a term used by ProtoStar Engineering to reflect the philosophy of interacting physically with the products they work on) as playing a major role in the design.
“The ‘bodystorming’ term is a play on ‘brainstorming,’ except that you physically involve your body, too,” says Schaffner. “In our case, this consisted of getting on the sled and actually sliding down the track at Lake Placid. The coaches were quite impressed that I and two of my partners were able to make runs from the top of the track after only three days of very brief instructions and practice runs from lower on the track. Our final runs weren’t pretty and we had some impressive scrapes and bruises on our shoulders and arms to show for it, but we gained a real appreciation for the sport, the sled and the track.”
The bodystorming took the form of a three-day “crash” course (quite literally, as attested by the scrapes and bruises they received) in which the ProtoStar engineers learned to ride the sleds themselves, starting near the bottom of the track and eventually working their way up to completing two runs from the top.
Schaffner adds, “It was scary, but intense, exciting and fun at the same time. I can’t say that our sliding was pretty, but we sure learned a lot!”
What followed from the meeting in Whistler was an intense year of design and testing and re-design and testing, with many sleepless nights and hard work along the way. Opportunities for testing were very limited because there were no ice tracks available during the summer, when much of the development work took place. When prototype test results proved to be very promising, the project got a last-minute funding boost from the USOC to build a competition sled for the games. The funding was approved in late December 2009 and with just two months to go to the opening of the Olympic Games, Schaffner says “it was a mad dash to the finish.” The sleds were built just in time to undergo some preliminary runs in the few remaining events on the European portion of the World Cup circuit. While the competition experience was very limited, the results were promising enough that John Daly committed to using the new sled in the Olympic Games and Noelle Pikus-Pace replaced her existing pod with the pod designed for the new sled.
The sled frame was fabricated by Machintek Corporation, located in Fairfield, Ohio, and the pod was fabricated by deBotech Inc., located in Mooresville, North Carolina.
“Without the passionate support and extraordinary measures provided by people at ProtoStar Engineering, Machintek and deBotech, the sleds would never have been completed in time for the Games,” says Schaffner. “It was truly an extraordinary effort that made it happen!”
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