Design and Testing of Custom Brake Caliper of a Formula Student Race Car

A Formula Student race car is a car designed and manufactured for speed, performance, and competition. For a car to have high speed and performance, their parts also need to be lighter with being able to sustain the dynamically occurring stresses. Effective braking is a crucial factor which determines the performance of the car. This paper focuses on designing a brake caliper on the basis of calculations done with respect to a Formula Student race car, selecting a material which is of low density but with higher strength which can be easily manufactured with low cost and analyzing the design. Further, the manufactured part is also tested statically to ensure proper working before being tested on an actual formula student race car. The caliper is again tested dynamically, where the caliper is mounted on rear wheels of the car. To ensure proper working, brake pressure sensors are being mounted which also helps to validate the calculations. The computer-aided design model is created in Solidworks 2017 and is analyzed for the factor of safety, stress, and deformation is ANSYS workbench 16.2.