May I first take this opportunity to congratulate you all on your recent performances in all your respective solar car events…well done to you all!  You have all been an inspiration to ourselves and the solar car teams here in South Africa over the years.

We are in the process of selling off all components/parts, etc intended for our cancelled solar car Gen.II project to recoup costs on these items, and as a fundraising drive for other projects that have arisen recently.

A few of the more high-end components/hardware (listed below) may be of interest to you in your preparations for various solar car events – we are making these available across the board as possible purchase options; this has also already been hung out to the South African-based teams as well. Most of these items are brand new while the rest are in excellent condition – they were purchased specifically for our Gen.II vehicle project before it was pulled due to insufficient funding.

There are also many custom designed and manufactured components that were specific to the design of the Gen.II car (not asymmetric) & should anyone be interested, we can forward you a detailed listing as well as baseline prices – these are not shown in the list below.

Details & specs (where possible) can be made available too, as well as detailed photos and/or videos on the components if requested. We will upload date-stamped photos and videos onto our FaceBook and YouTube sites over the next day or so of some of the items below should you need verification that these items are indeed in full working order & in decent condition.

Bear in mind that the batteries will only be sold as either a full batch of 1006 cells or two batches of 503 cells in order that we are not left with bits and pieces.

If you are interested, please contact me on this email ( Clive.Hands@nmmu.ac.za ) and I will send you individually a list of the base price we are asking (this will be to cover our initial expense only with no mark-up) and will be an ex-VAT situation – VAT in South Africa is 14% and is unavoidable. Shipping will be for your own arrangement & costing – we will pack for shipment, but that will be as far as our involvement on that side goes.

The way we will do this is that we will accept bids relative to our baseline amount from all interested parties on parts/components up til January 5^th 2015, and then will sell the parts/components off on either a best-bid or first-come-first-served basis as soon as our Financial System opens up on the January 8th 2015. On that day we will issue a formal invoice & upon receipt of a PO (or equivalent) from your institution, the deal will be considered done.

Can I also take this opportunity to wish you and your loved ones a wonderful, happy, restful & safe festive season, and also to wish you all the very best in your endeavours in 2015…

Clive Hands

NMMU Solar Car Project

Be safe, be merry, be wise, and most of all, be kind…

Armed with a variety of liquid refreshers (some of which can only be described as full-body PK’s) as per Cubata’s BYOB policy, the team ensconced themselves front and centre (smokers insisting on immediate door access), waiting on Jose’s finest. It had to be the first time in Cubata’s cosmopolitan history that around the same table sat a mix of Parisian-Angolans, Namibians, Ethiopians, Germans, Dutch-Ivorians, Phillipinians & a motley crew of disparate South Africans – alongside us were 5 Japanese businessmen, feasting on massive platters of world-class prawns, while the rest of the place was pumping as well…

After a hearty Cubata meal, the team’s insatiable hunger turned a little Twilighty…

Food was shortly served, and a feast it was too – Hummer distinguishing/disgracing himself once more by gorging on at least 3kgs of ribs, his finished plate a killing field; despite his rather pathetic bleatings of “I haven’t eaten any more than you guys“, photographic evidence suggested otherwise, and two angry waitresses were needed to clear the carnage up.

The elephant-in-the-room (“put it away Hummer!“) though, was the imminent departure of two of our beloved team members. Jo has been with us for….well…forever, but time has come for him to continue his quest to follow the World Cup across the globe, this time to Brazil. This means not only do we lose the team dreadlocks but also one of our most significant members iro the contribution he has made. Indi has been with the team for a year, but seems like he’s also been around forever, and not even he knows what he’s doing next except “not studying…” – it means we also lose our premier surfing talent.

Hummer’s vegan diet was not going well…

Of course, we will miss them both terribly, and the team shamed themselves once more by a public display of crying and wailing and hugging, as well as some disturbing groping too (“wtf?!“), as the rest of the diners tactfully ignored the spectacle.

Altogether now – “Farewell and adieu to you fair Spanish ladies, farewell & adieu to you ladies of Spain, for tomorrow we shut down for Xmas & New Year, only to open in the first week of 2014 again“.

Baby looking svelte back out in the sunshine – Nicko, Nats, Stepho & Hummer do their best to spoil an iconic shot….

Setting up the day before in pouring rain & wind didn’t bode well for an open-air event with virtually no cover at all…but the day of the event itself was a spectacular sunny African day, and we were breaking out the SPF100 early in the day; some of our paler members shrieking in fright at their first exposure to sunlight probably ever? Either way, with the beer tent a bottle’s-throw away & rainbow snowcones in endless supply just down the way, as well as SA motorsport doyen & MC for the day, Roger McCleary‘s dulcet tones booming from the overhead speakers with a wealth of information, we were set for the day.

The team posing with SA motorsport doyen, Roger McCleary, MC for the day & still wildly enthusiastic about every vehicle present at the show.

A popular event it turned out to be too with excellent public support throughout the day – we had a endless stream of interested visitors from the very young (always keen to get in the car!) to the very old & then some, as well as many enthusiasts from the many different fields associated with this type of event, so it was an excellent learning environment for all. Thanks once more to all involved in an excellent event, and also to our team members, still determinedly hanging in there on a Saturday way after the University had officially closed for the year – soldiers all!

The plan was to take an old car, clean it up, modify it where necessary, and get something on the road with no-mess-no-fuss; and Stevo was just the man for that job. Ultimately, the team woke up one morning, arrived at the eLab bleary-eyed & hungover as usual, and…’presto, we had a running Baja…Stevo then delighted in terrifying local Summerstrand pensioners & students with several highly illegal runs through the suburbs & surrounding bush in the weeks leading up to the event, while the rest of the team pretended not to take any interest whatsoever.

Scuba-Steve brings her home in 4th place in driving rain while the rest of the team goes apeshit!

Either way, the Baja event at Gerotek, Pretoria neatly overlapped with the Solar Car’s commitment to the VWSA stand at the JHB Int Motor Show. This created a bit of a logistics nightmare iro splitting the team’s duties while up there between Gerotek and NASREC (right on the other side of Jo’burg)…but we managed it nonetheless without too much drama….despite the crazy Jhb traffic and the daily 200km commute for those on duty at the Motor Show.

The Baja event itself, a vast improvement on previous years (kudos to the organizers), saw a day of static & dynamic scrutineering followed by a race-day with the main event, a 4-hour Enduro around a seriously challenging track at the outstanding Gerotek facility. This year, there were 15 entered-teams, including an international team from India, but some were sadly not even going to make the starting grid. Long story short, despite two minor breakages (stripped bolt & sheared rod-end, both from impacts on rocks), the team performed heroically, fixing both to complete the race in a fantastic 4th place; Stevo crossing the line to general hysteria, mayhem & girlish screaming from the rest of the team…

Muddied but unbowed – the victorious team at the end of the 4-hour Enduro race having achieved an amazing 4th overall

The track was one of the most challenging ever created, with even the most fancied teams coping with multiple impact breakages, and this resulted in a very exciting event as the positions changed constantly in equally changing conditions – no sooner had the event completed in pouring rain, down came the hail! Overall, hugely enjoyable all-round & definitely worthwhile…now…to get that mud & red-dust out of our Levi’s & Jimmy Choo’s…