Pointwise Sponsors SAE Design Competition

FORT WORTH, TX - Pointwise, Inc. is a sponsor of the SAE Aero Design West competition to be held at Thunderbird Field in Dutch Branch Park in Fort Worth, TX, on 18-20 March. Pointwise additionally sponsors two teams participating in the competition, the Jayhawk Heavy Lift team from the University of Kansas and the Assailing Falcons from the Vellore Institute of Technology in India.

"Working with students is a lot of fun," said John Chawner, Pointwise's president. "They're not as set in their ways as many of us older folks and their enthusiasm is contagious, especially when their designs start working. Sponsorship is an easy way for us to encourage them and share CFD software with them so they can focus on learning and achieving. We look forward to meeting all the teams in a couple of weeks."

Fifty-eight teams are registered for the competition, which is intended to provide undergraduate and graduate engineering students with a real-life engineering challenge. The competition has been designed to provide exposure to the kinds of situations common in the professional environment. Primarily a design competition, the competition requires students to perform trade studies and make compromises to arrive at a design solution that will optimally meet the mission requirements while conforming to the configuration limitations.

Teams fly their airplanes as part of the event. SAE Aero Design features three classes of competition, regular, advanced and micro.

In addition to this competition, Pointwise sponsors the following teams in other SAE Collegiate Design Series events:

* Jayhawk Heavy Lift from the University of Kansas, SDSMT Aero Design from the South Dakota School of Mining and Technology, Aftershock from Alexandria University in Egypt and the Ohio Northern University team, which will compete at Aero Design East in Marietta, GA, 29 April through 1 May.
* Hardrocker Racing from the South Dakota School of Mining and Technology and Spartan Racing from San Jose State University, which will compete at Formula SAE Michigan in Brooklyn, MI, tentatively set for 11-14 May.
* Spartan Racing from San Jose State University, competing at Formula SAE California in Fontana, CA, tentatively set for 15-18 June.
* Hardrocker Racing Gold from the South Dakota School of Mining and Technology, competing at Baja SAE Illinois in Peoria, IL, date not set.

For more information on the competitions, see students.sae.org./competitions.