A designer of electric motorcycles used in the world’s oldest and most dangerous motorcycle races will talk about his work at Morrison Institute of Technology, 701 Portland Avenue, Morrison, IL, in Parkinson Auditorium on Monday, October 24, 2016, at 1:00 p.m. The public is invited.
Lennon Rodgers, a native of Sterling, IL, will describe the process of designing, building, and testing electric motorcycles for the Isle of Man Tourist Trophy (TT) Zero race and, more recently, the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb (PPIHC.) The TT is the oldest existing motorcycle race, established in 1907. It is known for high speeds, more than 200 sharp turns, and danger to the rider. PPIHC is of similar age, with a shorter distance, but with more extreme mountain conditions.
“These demands created a challenge, to engineer machines capable of finishing the entire course on a single battery charge, in the fastest time possible,” Lennon said. “The design process consisted of systems engineering, subsystem design, final-system design, testing, and model validation. Real-time sensing provided a rich data set that was used to validate the models. It was found for the TT, that the models were able to predict the acceleration, maximum speed, and energy consumption to within 10% of the actual values.”
A designer of electric motorcycles used in the world’s oldest and most dangerous motorcycle races will talk about his work at Morrison Institute of Technology, 701 Portland Avenue, Morrison, IL, in Parkinson Auditorium on Monday, October 24, 2016, at 1:00 p.m. The public is invited.
Lennon Rodgers, a native of Sterling, IL, will describe the process of designing, building, and testing electric motorcycles for the Isle of Man Tourist Trophy (TT) Zero race and, more recently, the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb (PPIHC.) The TT is the oldest existing motorcycle race, established in 1907. It is known for high speeds, more than 200 sharp turns, and danger to the rider. PPIHC is of similar age, with a shorter distance, but with more extreme mountain conditions.
“These demands created a challenge, to engineer machines capable of finishing the entire course on a single battery charge, in the fastest time possible,” Lennon said. “The design process consisted of systems engineering, subsystem design, final-system design, testing, and model validation. Real-time sensing provided a rich data set that was used to validate the models. It was found for the TT, that the models were able to predict the acceleration, maximum speed, and energy consumption to within 10% of the actual values.”
Lennon earned his Ph.D. and M.S. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and a B.S. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. All the degrees are in Mechanical Engineering.
He is currently a Research Scientist at the MIT International Design Center in Cambridge, MA, where he leads the Electric Vehicle Lab. Previously he worked for three years at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. All of his research is related to engineering education and modeling; designing, building, instrumenting, and testing complex systems–ranging from spacecraft to electric vehicles.
About Morrison Institute of Technology: Whether you are a recent high school graduate or looking to enhance your current professional position, Morrison Institute of Technology, located in Morrison, IL, is the place to start. Morrison Institute of Technology will help you prepare for the life you want. We offer a cutting edge education in Engineering Technology and Network Administration. You will find Morrison Institute of Technology offers condensed coursework in a small classroom environment. We provide a personal touch to your education process. Since its founding in 1973, we have not lost sight of our founding mission: to provide an academic foundation on which the student may continue a lifelong learning process, on a formal or informal basis. For additional information, contact Larry Libberton, Director of Admissions, 815-772-7218, extension 227, or visit www.morrisontech.edu.