The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Students develop lightweight three-wheeler

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Saturday, Mar 12, 2005

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Students develop lightweight three-wheeler

By Our Special Correspondent

From left S. Karthikeyan,A.G. Nanda Kumar and B. Kranti Pandey with their new vehicle.

CHENNAI, MARCH 11. Three final year mechanical engineering students of St. Peter's Engineering College, Avadi, have developed a three-wheeler, which, they say, is a lightweight automobile, convenient for cross-country commuting.

The students have displayed their innovation, Trionta (short for tri-wheeled one-man non-traditional automobile), and won the adulation of peers and judges at a science and technology exhibition near Chennai and the third place at a national-level expo at Amrutavahini College of Engineering at Sangamner, Maharashtra last year.

Globally, 900 million vehicles are on the road and 50 million vehicles are added each year, say B. Kranti Pandey, S. Karthikeyan and A.G. Nanda Kumar. The dependency on travelling machines has been posing several problems — traffic congestion, parking problems and plying on narrow roads.

Motorcycles and scooters are manoeuvrable and compact, but they lack storage space and offer little protection against bad weather. Cars are comparatively energy-inefficient. "That's why we thought of this new vehicle," says Pandey.

It has the manoeuvrability and compactness of a motorcycle and the stability and load-bearing capacity of a four-wheeler car.

It is a single or double-seater, driven by belt and uses a simple transmission system. The clutch is required only for starting the vehicle.

The chassis and rear axel, both of mild steel, have been specially designed. Their objective is to reduce congestion and parking problems even while addressing the needs of the physically challenged, say the students.

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