I never noticed this thread until now. Oh well, better late than never. A lot has changed in Formula SAE in the past few years, and some of the statements from years ago are now inaccurate.
So, I'm looking for any sort of information on FSAE teams, for instance, has anyone been on one?
Yes, did it for 4 years.
Huge time commitment, lots of work, very stressful, many sleepless nights, had nightmares about it, got injured, got burnt out, GPA suffered.
All in all, some of my greatest learning experiences so far, and some of the best times in college. Since college is suppose to be the best time of my life, by extension, these were some of the best times of my life.
That's how it was.
For example, do they like having transfer students around? Do I have to do like an audition?
Every team is different, and every team has their own admission policies. Some teams are more competitive than others to join. To join, some teams may be as informal as showing up to meetings, while some teams may have a full admissions or audition process. We had plenty of transfer students. Our explicit policy was that as long as you're a student at the University and you submit the application along with the requisite documents, we will interview and consider you.
At least for our team, we consider a large variety of factors in admissions; we look at year in school, degree track, academic record, previous and current coursework, any previous work experience, any previous FSAE experience, any previous car or racing experience, any previous experience with certain needed skills (e.g. engineering, fundraising, accounting, etc.), performance at interview, time commitment available, passion, excitement, among other factors. We treated it as if we were hiring for a job. We try to build a dynamic and talented team where all the members have complementary skills, making the team as a whole stronger.
What sorts of things would I typically be doing?
This again depends on the team. Then also depends on the year in school and whether you've been on the team previously. Then also depends on how the team receives its funding. You can expect to do anything from machining to full engineering design of a part. You may also have to do non-engineering work like fundraising or public relations.
In the fall I'll be getting the hell out of this "Community College" and on to a real university. Of course, the universities I'm looking at have FSAE teams, and since this is sort of where I want my career to go, I'd like to be a part of one.
If your university has a Formula SAE team, I highly recommend that you join it and be active. You'll learn a ton about how to actually engineer, how to manage projects and a lot of other stuff that you won't learn in the classroom. Even if you don't do Formula SAE, I still recommend that you find some other engineering project/team or research and really really be involved with it. It will really help you in the future.
