So, I am a rising junior Mechanical Engineer at Princeton, and it's about time for me to start thinking about my junior/senior project. I had been tossing a few ideas around in my head, but one that jumped out at me was designing and building an individual slide throttle intake and manifold from scratch.
I would probably megasquirt it and may use another interesting idea for FI. Basically I was wondering if you guys thought this would be a worthwhile project, and whether you had any input or insight on issues I might run into.
I have heard that slide throttles can be hard modulate, so I was thinking of using an eccentric linkage or possibly an electronic throttle so partial throttle would be easier to control.
one other project idea that I was thinking of were building an FI system that based its calculations not only on air pressure or flow, and o2 in the exhaust, but used fast acting, laser-based, oxygen sensors to measure the oxygen concentration on the INTAKE side just before every injector event, hopefully increasing power and effeciency. Because o2 concentration can vary quite a bit, i think there is some room for improvement
The other idea was to build and race a lithium battery powered, 240sx based electric car and compete in popular motorsports events with it to get media coverage and therefore funding.
I look forward to your input.
-will watts