Name: Rahul Konidena Course: Master of Automotive Systems University: HAN University of Applied Sciences, Netherlands Placement: Mando Corporation Europe GmbH
FISITA offers students the opportunity to apply for a travel bursary, of up to EUR 2000, to help with the costs of taking part in placements (internships, exchange programmes, work placements etc.) in companies and research institutions overseas.
These types of work experience can be life-changing and can lead to permanent jobs after graduation. They also allow students to make new friendships, develop professional contacts and gain invaluable experience in an ever-evolving and exciting industry. We caught up with Rahul Konidena who recently received a Travel Bursary:
1. What did you do on your placement?
As I am doing my master thesis as Mando Corporation Europe GmbH, my work mainly focuses on creating the matlab/Simulink model for the Electro Mechanical Brake (EMB) system, and validating the model with the real data. This project involves in creating an advanced electro mechanical brake system, which not only is quick but also cost effective.
My work focuses mainly on reducing the cost issues with the EMB, since the sensors used in the system are expensive any ways to replace a sensor surely helps in the overall cost reduction. My work in this project is to create a force estimation algorithm which can replace a force sensor.
To achieve this force estimation, I have used the other available signals from the motor, such as motor current, motor position and derived a mathematical relation which accurately describes the relation between the clamping force and the motor position. To ensure that the system works accurately in a dynamic situation I have devolved a control logic. Followed by verifying the estimation against the real data.
2. How did you spend your free time?
I have passion towards photography and videography, during my free time I go out in Frankfurt for some photoshoot. Recently I and my colleague have started a YouTube channel to upload over videos, since we just started now most of the free time I try to learn how to use the camera equipment, get familiar with the video editing process.
3. How has the FISITA Travel Bursary helped you?
FISITA Travel Bursary has helped me a lot financially, since Frankfurt is one of the most expensive city to live, the living expenses are high. Just to cover the living costs I initially planned to work part-time during weekends, but that would have been stressful to do while doing my Master thesis simultaneously.
But fortunately with the help of FISITA, now I have sufficient funds to support myself. Therefore, I was able to focus on my Master thesis more and also I am able to use my free time on my hobbies.
4. What are you going to do next in your career?
Since the COVID-19 crisis has hit every sector, it’s the same with the automotive industry as well, my initial plan was to continue working at Mando or to work in any similar automotive industry but due to this crisis I see that the chances of hiring are slim. Therefore I am thinking to continue my education.
As this project right now focuses on electro mechanical brakes, which operate on signals as compared to the conventional hydraulic brakes. The advancement of this project can be linked with autonomous braking, also now the automotive industry is advancing into electrical vehicles, hybrids, autonomous driving vehicle. Therefore if possible I would like to focus my education in the stream of software coding that could assist for autonomous driving.
Once again thank you FISITA for all the help.
5. In three words, how would you describe the automotive and mobility engineering industry?
Scalable, Innovative, and Adaptive.
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