South Dakota School of Mines and Technology - Alt Fuel Vehicle

Swagelok Kansas City | Little Rock | Omaha | Quad Cities is thrilled to help sponsor a group of enthusiastic, passionate and talented young engineers who are designing and building a snowmobile for use in environmentally sensitive areas like national parks and other pristine areas. Using alternative fuels, the prototype will be entered into the SAE International Clean Snowmobile Challenge in March 2018.

The SDSM&T Alternative Fuel Vehicle-Electric Snowmobile Team is a student design team that is a part of the Center for Advanced Manufacturing and Production that builds a diesel snowmobile from the ground up using an existing conventional snowmobile. The vehicle is then entered into an annual SAE Clean Snowmobile Challenge which takes place the first week of March each year in Houghton, Michigan.

The premise of the competition is to assist in atmospheric research over polar ice-caps and glacial regions where emissions from an internal combustion vehicle will skew test data. The team works to improve upon electric vehicle drive technologies by testing equipment under severe conditions utilizing a versatile chassis from Polaris Inc., as a platform. By using off-the-shelf components and drive systems from industry leaders, the team builds a diesel driven vehicle that performs at the same level as the gasoline equivalent.

Good luck, SDSM&T Alternative Fuel Vehicle team!