Tracking electric vehicles with GPS

There are several cross-country solar and electric vehicle racing events conducted around the world which demonstrate the capabilities of the cars. The vehicles travel on rural and urban highways, blending in with conventional cars. The vehicles in the event are judged on speed, range, efficiency and performance. The organizers of the events have developed several different methods to track and time the vehicles in order to determine the winner. Usage of an automated process enhances the quality of the scores, reduces the amount of vehicle management work and increases the safety of the event. The use of a Global Positioning Satellite (GPS) system with amateur radio communications is one approach in automating the scoring process. Organizers of the SunDay Challenge-an alternative energy vehicle event in Florida-have developed just such a system for their 70 mile cross-country route. Each vehicle will carry a GPS unit, a computer, a packet converter and a ham radio. Using local amateur radio repeaters, packet radio data messages will be transmitted from the start of the race to the finish, containing GPS location data and other information about each vehicle in the event.