Chasing the sun
This weekend, the Adelaide University Solar Racing Team will chase its first ever top-10 finish in the world’s toughest engineering challenge. And it wouldn’t be possible without one team member’s passion to recreate her father’s success at the inaugural World Solar Challenge in 1987.
Thirty-eight years ago, entrepreneur Dick Smith was behind the wheel of one of the world’s first-ever solar cars when its “space age” batteries began boiling over in the scorching heat, just outside of Darwin. Mounted centimetres from the driver’s seat, the batteries were “like a nuclear reactor melting down” according to the team’s mission director.
The malfunction came during vehicle testing just hours before 1987’s inaugural 3000-kilometre World Solar Challenge from Darwin to Adelaide. The Australian Geographic team was suddenly struck with the catastrophic thought of the car going up in flames with their famous sponsor behind the wheel. That night, in a Darwin caravan park, the team worked through the night, fixed the battery and successfully made it to Adelaide in nine days, driving through heat, rain and even hail.
Fast forward to 2023, when mechanical engineering student Ruby Allen signed up as a member of the University of Adelaide’s solar racing team, she stepped into a family legacy: her father Jason Allen, uncle Graham Allen and her aunty and uncle Michele and John Storey were all technical members on Dick’s history-making 1987 team. They had even built the vehicle in Graham’s garage.
Ruby’s university team had no carryover of team members after Covid quashed the 2021 event, so Ruby quickly became heavily involved. “We had a very small core team of five people and the final push to the event was crazy; we were doing 14-hour days in the workshop, pretty much sleeping on the floor, trying to get things ready,” Ruby says. “We got the battery running at 6pm the night before we left for Darwin. It was cutting it super fine.”
Ruby was nominated to be one of the team’s drivers, given she was light, but also had some motor racing experience. The extreme heat made for gruelling work with a vehicle designed for efficiency, not comfort. “The experience is very raw – it’s noisy, it’s hot, and you’re sitting there for three hours at a time with minimal airflow. It gets up to 55 degrees in the car. Then you’re crawling around on the dirt under the car, stressfully fixing things in a hurry. About 50 per cent of teams don’t finish, so it’s very much a challenge, not a race,” she says.
The under-resourced 2023 team had to pull out before the half-way mark, leaving the university still without a finisher since first entering in 2015.
In the months after the event, Ruby became the team manager and ramped up recruitment for more students to join the team. She also pushed for funding both from the university and sponsors. Today, the student team numbers 50, thanks in large part to Ruby. The funding she helped secure has enabled the university to build its most advanced vehicle yet – Lumen III – from scratch.
“After I revived the social media page for the team, one of our solar car alumni offered me a job in the defence industry, where I work now. It goes to show that the solar challenge is a huge networking tool,” says Ruby.
As she is now working full-time, Ruby is part of this year’s AUSRT team in a mentorship capacity. “It would be a huge achievement if we get the vehicle to Adelaide; everyone in the team would be stoked,” she says.
There are more women members of the team this time around, but there could always be more. Ruby traces her interest in science and technology back to her upbringing on her family’s farm in the Adelaide Hills, with her technically-minded dad gently encouraging her interest in technology.
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“I’ve always been around farm equipment and tractors. My dad’s a mechanic; we were regularly preparing and repairing farm equipment in the workshop and field,” she says. “I enjoyed maths in high school and I enjoy problem solving; taking things apart and putting them back together. I enjoy having guidelines and boundaries to create something.
“I was the only girl in my maths class and my physics class – it starts there, and if you don’t do maths and physics, you can’t do engineering at uni. I think it’s slowly improving and there are a lot of initiatives to help grow the numbers (of women).”
Ruby hopes more young women will be encouraged to pursue STEM subjects in high school, as it can open doorways to experiences such as the World Solar Challenge. She says women bring valuable insights and skills to STEM-based workplaces.
Many participants of the solar challenge have gone on to work in exciting fields such as renewable technology. It’s not uncommon for scouts from international companies to walk the pits at BWSC recruiting students. The event itself has also generated the development of technologies that have become part of everyday life.
“It can be a super career with so many jobs in South Australia, and especially for women, as the industry is trying to push a more equal workplace,” says Ruby. “There’s a huge defence industry in SA. The skills and knowledge I learned from the solar challenge are directly applicable to my work. To do assignments is one thing, but with solar challenge you have to deliver something that works by a very clear deadline and there is no flexibility.
“It’s not just engineering experience that you come away with, but business experience, social skills and networking. It’s the whole picture, which is invaluable.”
This year, SA will also be represented by a second vehicle from the South Australian Solar Vehicle Association involving TAFE, St Patrick’s Technical College and Findon Technical College.
And when Lumen III rolls over the start line in Darwin, it will embody the combined efforts of students from South Australia’s two largest universities, ahead of their merger next year.
After completing the journey in 1987, Ruby’s uncle Graham told Australian Geographic: “We have learned about the limitations of this generation of solar cells. Who knows what the next generation will be capable of?” The world is about to find out.
This article first appeared in the August 2025 issue of SALIFE magazine.
