If he were king of the forest…

…everything would run on solar energy and fly really, really fast.

BedHead: Adem Rudin, 20

Location: Minneapolis, MN USA

Occupation:Aerospace Engineering Student, University of Minnesota

Meet Adem, the lion-hearted junior at University of Minnesota, and member of U of M’s Solar Vehicle Project. You might have heard of these guys. Every two years, the team builds a car powered completely by solar energy and races it in the Formula Sun Grand Prix and the North American Solar Challenge. Adem is part of the aerodynamics team which is so appropriate given the state of his BedHead in this photo. Truthfully though, Adem tells me that this BedHead was caused by wearing a bandanna for four days but can’t you imagine his head poking out of the top of a solar car at 75 mph? I like that story much better but for the real story, check out Adem’s exclusive BedHead interview after the jump…

MB: So, was this photo just a spontaneous bedhead or were you testing drag coefficients against varying cotton thread-counts?

AR: This was pretty much a spontaneous “Whoa. That’s wild. I should grab a picture of that.” As amused as I am at the thought of testing the drag coefficient of my hair in various configurations, modeling my hair in Pro|E would be hellish, and I don’t even want to think about setting up the proper boundary conditions in Ansys CFX.

MB: Uh…yeah. Sure..whatever…As an engineering student, do you ever consider the science of bedhead?

AR: Unfortunately, classes keep me far too busy to consider the scientific implications of my hair, or think about my hair at all, really. That’s kinda how it got to look the way it does.

MB: This Solar Vehicle Project is really interesting, do you foresee a day when we’ll all drive solar cars?

AR: Unfortunately, no. The math just doesn’t work out; you can’t get enough power. The solar vehicle project is primary an engineering exercise, with no thought towards commercial viability. Solar-augmented plug-in electric vehicles, however, are going to become increasingly viable over the next decade or so.

MB: Well that’s kind of a let down, Adem. When is your next race? What’s it going to take to win this one?

AR: Our next race is this summer, 2300 miles from Dallas, Texas to Calgary, Alberta. Practice, pure and simple, it’s what’s going to win the race. The team that is most familiar with themselves and their car has a major advantage.

MB: Do you guys ram each other into the wall like they do in NASCAR?

AR: Haha, no. We race on public roads with public traffic, and obey all traffic laws. Also, I would very likely cry if the car that I’ve spent three years of my life on got smashed.

MB: What happens if the sky clouds up in the middle of a race? Do you have a “cloud flag” that comes out or do you just putter to a stop?

AR: *shrugs* the race is a race, pure and simple. If weather gets bad, well, tough luck, the race goes on. If I recall, it rained almost constantly for the ‘99 race from Washington, DC to Orlando, Florida, and hail was seen in Kansas in ‘05. The cars can drive ~200-300 miles on a charge, and if the battery is entirely drained, teams pull over to the side of the road to charge.

MB: Have you ever driven the solar car? How fast does it go?

AR: Yep, I was one of the drivers for Borealis III when Minnesota went to Taiwan in September ‘06; it was a blast. During the races in the USA, we’re limited to 65mph, but we’ve hit 79mph during testing.

MB: Wow, that’s fast. So, what do aerospace engineers do on their time off? Do you guys party in wind tunnels or anything like that?

AR: The usual stuff, I guess? We hang around in each other’s apartments and watch movies or play games.

MB: Exciting…What do you want to do with all this stuff you’re learning? How will you make your mark on the world of aeronautics?

AR: Honestly, I have no idea yet, other than “build cool stuff that goes fast and flies”. When I came to the U, I was thinking I might want to do hypersonics research, but now I’m leaning towards rocketry.

MB: Rock it on, dude…

Want to share your world with ours?

You can become a featured BedHead by clicking here…