ADVERTISEMENT
site_logo
  • Campus
  • Happening
  • Opinion
  • People
  • News
  • #BeInspired
  • Careers
  • 40 under 40
  • Exams
  • What The FAQ
  • Videos
    • Straight Up
    • Odisha Literary Festival 2020
    • Campus Convo
    • Careers After Corona
    • Express Expressions
    • Q&A With Prabhu Chawla
    • ThinkEdu Awards 2020
  • Web Stories
  • edex_worksEDEXWORKS
ADVERTISEMENT
IIT Madras

Published: 02nd September 2021     

IIT Madras' Team Avishkar wins Most Scaleable Design award at European Hyperloop Week

The team is on an ambitious journey to develop Hyperloop, a high-speed train that travels in a near-vacuum tube clocking speeds of over 1,000 km/h

Edex Live
Edex Live
f_icon t_icon i_icon l_icon koo_icon whatsapp_icon email_icon Google News

Share Via Email

IIT_hyperloop_facebook

Team Avishkar | Pic: Facebook

Three years ago, a bunch of highly motivated students, branding themselves as Team Avishkar at the Centre for Innovation, IIT Madras, embarked on an ambitious journey to develop Hyperloop, a high-speed train that travels in a near-vacuum tube clocking speeds of over 1,000 km/h. Initially, it was only a student project meant for competitions, but today, Avishkar’s Hyperloop pod prototype is globally recognised. Earlier this month, Team Avishkar won the “Most Scalable Design Award” at European Hyperloop Week and one of the top five teams in other award categories.

It wasn’t easy, especially after the pandemic played its part. “We were preparing for SpaceX Hyperloop competition in 2020, but it was cancelled due to COVID. All our research and manufacturing stopped for four to five months and we were asked to go home. The team had to go through a rebuilding phase. Then, European Hyperloop Week competition was announced. Taking into account the safety of team members and travel restrictions, we took a difficult call to participate virtually,” said Neel Balar, team Avishkar lead, told Express.

Hyperloop being a hands-on project, students found it difficult to work from home. In April, IIT-M granted special permission for the team to return to campus for manufacturing and testing the novel technology. But then, the second wave struck and for one more month they wouldn’t manufacture the pod. Time was running out. After relaxations kicked in, they worked tirelessly to ready the pod for the European competition.

Kishan Thakkar, co-lead, said the team has completely revamped the sub-systems with entirely new and highly efficient technologies. “For instance, friction braking requires mechanical contact and causes wear. But now, the team moved to contactless Eddy Current braking mechanism. The Linear Induction Motor
(LIM) and custom inverter for the LIM has been designed from scratch to replace the BLDC motors for propulsion.”

Neel Balar said the team was currently working on cost-effective tube infrastructure. “We will be building a 500-metre prototype tube at IIT-M soon. We have done a basic study of energy, costs, demand and other business aspects for a Hyperloop corridor between Bengaluru and Chennai to assess the economic feasibility of Hyperloop in India. We found that Hyperloop will be feasible than travel by air or car. On an average, it can offset the carbon footprint of two lakh passengers. The travel time between the Bengaluru and Chennai will reduce to a 30 minutes from the current six hours journey.”

Hyperloop has been a buzzword in India for the last few years. Several companies have proposed routes like Mumbai-Pune and Chandigarh-Amritsar. SpaceX founder Elon Musk proposed the idea of Hyperloop to the world in 2013 through a whitepaper — ‘Hyperloop Alpha.’

telegram
TAGS
IIT Madras Hyperloop Team Avishkar

O
P
E
N

ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
telegram
ADVERTISEMENT
Write to us!

If you have campus news, views, works of art, photos or just want to reach out to us, just drop us a line.

newsletter_icon
Mailbox
edexlive@gmail.com
fb_icon
Facebook
twitter_icon
Twitter
insta_icon
Instagram
ADVERTISEMENT
Facebook
ADVERTISEMENT
Tweets by Xpress_edex
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT

FOLLOW US

The New Indian Express | The Morning Standard | Dinamani | Kannada Prabha | Samakalika Malayalam | Cinema Express | Indulgexpress | Events Xpress

Contact Us | About Us | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use | Advertise With Us

Home | Live Now | Live Story | Campus Trip | Coach Calling | Live Take

Copyright - edexlive.com 2023. All rights reserved. Website Designed, Developed & Maintained by Express Network Private Ltd.