[Reply To UNIBEN] UNILAG Students Builts Their Own Car Too [Photos]

A group of students of the University Of Lagos (UNILAG), who have built their own version of energy-efficient car for the international Shell Eco-marathon, narrates about the challenges they face and the future of such a prototype.

The mentioned event is being hosted by three continents. This year’s competition took place in Manila, Philippines, February 6-9, 2014, Rotterdam, the Netherlands, May 15-18, 2014 and Houston, the U.S.A., April 24-27, 2014.



Parade during the opening ceremony of Shell Eco-marathon Europe 2014.

Nigeria flags may be spotted in front. Photo credit – Ronny Rozenberg/AP Images for Shell A reporter of The Nation, Tolu George, spoke to team manger Abraham Imohiosen.

Abraham, who is a 500 level Computer Engineering student at UNILAG, said that this year two more teams from Nigeria were building their fuel-efficient vehicles, in accordance with the invitation by Shell Nigeria:

University of Benin (UNIBEN) and Ahmadu Bello University (ABU). The participants of Eco-marathon are divided into several energy types (Gasoline, Diesel, Battery Electric, Alternative fuel and Hydrogen) and two categories (Prototype or UrbanConcept). UNILAG team entered the Battery Electric category.

The purpose of Shell-funded project is use eco-friendly materials and to create a car, which would show on track the best speed possible at the lowest energy consumption possible. The price of the machine also matters.

Every competition has a prize called communication award. It is usually granted to the team who succeeds in publicizing, communication with the people around and building a proper community around the project.

Abraham told that he gathered his team through some of the newspapers and through the UNILAG mobile. The supervising lecturers helped to pick the most-prepared students from the huge number of volunteers.

The first challenge of the group was lack of experience. However, the lecturers gave the proper support to the team and got the things going.

Secondly, some essential components, especially electrical, were not available in Nigeria. They had to be ordered in the UK and delivery time was quite long.

Thirdly, the lack of some tools and equipment slowed down the project. Some of the operations were completed manually.

Logistics challenges, misunderstanding between the students and the vendors and several other issues have also slowed them down.