The NUTA_BOLTS Team from
Anambra State University
represented the country at the 2012
annual event that took place in
Silverstone Circuit, Northampton, UK
ARTICLE | SEPTEMBER 14, 2012 - 11:55AM

Amidst Nigeria’s struggle for relevance
in the global technology sphere, some
Nigerian undergraduates have
imprinted the country’s name on the
stone by clinching the title for the Best
African representative and Best New
Comers at the July 2012 Formula Student
Competition where they were charged
with the task of designing and
constructing a formula race car.

The Nigerian undergraduates
(christened The NUTA_BOLTS Team) who
are currently studying for a various
Engineering degrees at the Anambra
State University were Nigeria’s sole
representative at the annual event
whose 2012 series took place in
Silverstone Circuit, Northampton, UK.
Six other African universities (five from
Egypt and one from South Africa) also
participated in the competition the
competition that drew contestants from
222 universities around the globe.

The Formula Student is an educational
motorsport competition, run by the
Institution of Mechanical Engineers
(IMechE), in partnership with various
well-known companies in the industry.
It promotes careers and excellence in
engineering, by challenging university
students from across the globe to design,
build, develop, market and compete as a
team with a small single sitter racing
car. It provides the students with a real-
life exercise in design and manufacture
and the business elements of automotive
engineering. It teaches them all about
team work, working under pressure and
to tight timescales. It demands total
commitment, lots of late nights, and
many frustrations and challenges along
the way, but the net result is the
development of highly talented young
engineers.

The competition starts at the beginning
of the university year when teams start
to design their cars. They are to assume
that a manufacturing firm has
commissioned them to produce a
prototype car for the non-professional
autocross or sprint racer sales market
with the intention of selling one
thousand units. To encourage
innovation, there are very few
restrictions on the overall vehicle
design. Successful teams are those who
produce a car that is not only fast and
reliable, but also low in cost and easy to
maintain. The car’s marketability is also
enhanced by other factors such as
aesthetics, driver comfort and the use of
common parts.

The competition offers team the
opportunity to undertake real-life
challenges and logistics, and develop the
skills they will need when they go on
work in industry.

For the NUTA_BOLTS boys whose design
was judged the 7th Overall Best, fame
didn’t just come. They have been
working laboriously since 2008 forging
seemingly trivial but ingenious designs.
The first design they embarked on then
was that of a unique Nut and Bolt which
gave them the name (The Nuta_Bolts).
They went further designing many other
components like the key-holder-opener
using the conventional lathe machine,
they also modeled the speed cone of a
lathe machine and later designed a
miniature camera. They were on plans
to designing and producing a multiple
Grinding Machine when the IMechE
team visited their school.

Twenty one in number, the team, whom
Professor Bamiro (former Vice
Chancellor of the University of Ibadan)
suggests would make good
technopreneurs is armed with strong
willed and motivated students from the
fields of Mechanical Engineering,
Architecture, Electrical & Electronics
Engineering, Civil Engineering and
Chemical Engineering organizing
themselves as a modern company.

The team according to team Leader,
Onyenanu Ifeanyichukwu "has already
kicked off preparation module to build
the car and race it in Silverstone by July,
2013."

As contained in the communiqué issued
at the end of the 21st COREN Assembly
where the NUTA_BOLTS team presented
a lecture, the government has been
“requested to financially support the
team to enable them develop, fabricate
and commission the race car”.
http://dailytimes.com.ng/article/nigerian-engineering-undergraduates-win-global-race-car-design-competition

For the NUTA_BOLTS boys whose design
was judged the 7th Overall Best

billante: Since july and we are hearing of it now! Who paid for their flight ticket to london?

EngrH: This event happened last yr. And NUTA_BOLT Team is a team for the mechanical students in anambra state university. The construction of the nut and bolt was a practical assignment given by one of the lecturers at the university to the then 200 level engineering students(mechanical, civil, electrical and chemical engr. Students) that wz in 2008. This set of team graduated last yr and are serving now. They came back wit a national certificate presented to them at the event and from what i heard from one of them, THEY WERE THE BEST TEAM.