UC Irvine Solar Car 2025-2026
This Year's Mission
Bring UC Irvine’s Solar Car team to this year’s Formula Sun Grand Prix 2026 and help pave the way for future UC Irvine students to succeed through our project. We humbly ask for your support in helping us reach our $20,000 goal to fund essential parts, tools, spaces, and registration fees for this upcoming summer’s competition.
Meet the Team
Let us introduce ourselves. We are UC Irvine Solar Car, a student-run interdisciplinary team of 60 undergraduates from the University of California, Irvine.
Our team is made up of several specialized sub-teams: MGMT/Leads, Chassis, Suspension, Human Interface, Aerobody, High Voltage, Low Voltage, and Operations. Driven by the Sun, Powered by Innovation: These teams combine their expertise to compete while advancing solar transportation and pushing the boundaries of sustainable automotive engineering.
Our Alumni have continued to pursue their careers across automotive, aerospace, defense, tech, and sustainable industries and have joined companies like General Motors, Ford, Tesla, Rivian, Volvo, Boeing, Anduril Industries, RTX, SoCal Edison, TSMC, Western Digital, Sandisk, Maxxeon, and many more!
SolEater drives for the first time!
Our Races
The Formula Sun Grand Prix and American Solar Challenge go hand in hand. The Formula Sun Grand Prix takes place annually and serves as a preliminary qualifier for the American Solar Challenge, a 2,000-mile journey across the United States that occurs every two years.
Each Formula Sun Grand Prix sets a specific lap requirement to qualify for the American Solar Challenge and for different vehicle classes. Our team focuses on single-occupancy vehicles. In addition, awards are given for speed, overall performance, and team conduct throughout the competition.
The first three days of the competition are devoted to scrutineering, during which our car’s electrical and mechanical systems are thoroughly checked. This includes body and sizing inspections, weigh-ins, driver ingress and egress, and dynamic testing. The following three days allow cleared vehicles to begin speed and endurance racing. The faster and more prepared a team is during scrutineering, the more time they have to focus on racing. By the final day, any team that has not passed scrutineering is not allowed to compete on the track.
Formula Sun Grand Prix 2025 all teams photo (We’re 3 down, 4 across!)
Lessons Learned
This past summer, we were proud to be registered as Team #95 in the Formula Sun Grand Prix 2025 with our first-ever car, dubbed the SolEater. As a first-time team attending the competition, we all traveled to Bowling Green, Kentucky, where we faced scrutineering with our car in hopes of making it to the track.
At the end of it all, we were proud to have brought home the Electrical Capacitance Award for UCI as a rookie team. Along with that achievement, we returned with valuable knowledge, lasting memories, and a 90 percent-completed scrutineering sheet that demonstrated the strength and quality of our design and build. With the knowledge we gained from last year’s participation, we are preparing for another week-long experience.
These competitions provide an invaluable opportunity to showcase our students’ potential and capabilities, offering hands-on experience in engineering, teamwork, and problem-solving, all while driving innovation in sustainable transportation.
Our Electrical team won the Capacitance Award for outstanding learning and adaptability
Closing Remarks
Our team continues to learn and grow each quarter and in every competition. That is why we are asking for everyone’s support in the upcoming year. With your donation, you are not only contributing to our car(s) but also investing in our educational growth and our solar car family. We warmly welcome you to join us and become part of the incredible community that has believed in us from the start.
Thank you for taking the time to learn more about us. We truly appreciate your support, and we hope to bring back something meaningful for our school, supporters, family/friends, and ourselves. We look forward to all that this Summer will bring!
Make this car move again… Coming Summer 2026!
Contact Us
Check us out on our social media and website or reach out to us directly via email!
Team Email: ucirvinesolarcar@gmail.com
Instagram: @uci_solarcar
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/uci-solar-car/
Website: https://www.ucisolarcar.org/
$20
Supporter
Thank you so much for your support! Your generosity means the world to us and helps bring this project to life.
$50
Contributor
We appreciate your donation! Your kindness helps us move forward, and we’re so grateful for your contribution.
$100
Friend
Thank you for giving us an extra boost! Your donation makes a significant impact, and we’re thrilled to have your support.
$150
Family
You’re helping us pick up speed! We are so grateful for your commitment to helping us succeed.
$200
Team Member
Wow! Thank you for your amazing donation! Your generosity is making a real difference, and we couldn’t do this without you.
$500
Investor
Your commitment is a game-changer! Your generosity inspires us to push forward and achieve our goals.
$1,000
Founder
From the bottom of our hearts, thank you for your extraordinary donation! Your support is truly transformative, and we are honored to have you as a part of our journey.
