“Steel flies” competition: The winning team is from Darmstadt

The international competition “Steel flies” has a winning team: David Kemper, Christian Lipp and Alexander Kubsch from TU Darmstadt not only won first place with their flying object, they also nabbed the Innovation Award for the particularly snazzy shape of their “aircraft”. The third place also went to TU Darmstadt and was scored by Team 1. The second place went to Team 3 from TU Dortmund University.

The “Steel Flies” competition has a long tradition. The “Steel Research Association” from Düsseldorf launched it 19 years ago in order to emphasise in a special way that steel is the ideal material for lightweight applications. Ever since then, mechanical engineering students have accepted the challenge year in, year out, developing any number of creative steel planes. This year, students from the universities of Aachen, Darmstadt, Dortmund, Kassel and the University of Saarland took part in the competition. The particular challenge was to design and build structures that fly without being driven by an engine of their own.