The 2026 MU Mini Baja Team
JOSEPH MOOG / COURTESY
Maizy Swift & Joshua Reichard, Senior Writer & Asst. A&E Editor
Manhattan University’s (MU) Mini Baja team will take part in the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) intercollegiate Baja competition in Rochester, N.Y., this June.
During the four day competition, students compete in a series of static and dynamic events that test the vehicle as well as the marketing behind it. The team consists of 12 students who handle the vehicle’s design, analysis and manufacturing.
At MU, this competition serves as a senior capstone project for mechanical engineering students who choose to take part. The competition gives students real world experience, and the opportunity to apply the skills they learned in the classroom in a hands-on setting.
Christian Danial, a senior mechanical engineering major involved with the project spoke with The Quadrangle about the competition.
“The task is to design and build a car, in our case, we’re doing an all wheel drive car,” Danial said. “It’s a mechanical engineering competition and a worldwide event where schools from all around the world bring a car, not only to compete [with] it, but also to sell it to a theoretical company, so not only do you have to build a better car, you have to build a cheaper car.”
The competition helps competitors develop engineering skills and requires extensive teamwork and collaboration.
Raymond Mitchell, a senior mechanical engineering major, shared how the team works together to complete this project as their senior capstone.
“It’s our senior design project, so all majors in engineering split up into groups,” Mitchell said. “This is one of the bigger projects so it’s a 12-person team. We have one advisor, and we separate into three subdivisions, so there’s a frame subdivision, a drive train subdivision and a suspension subdivision, and that’s how we delegate the work.”
Mitchell also gave further insight into the design process.
“Our whole first semester was all designing it, so it’s not only designing it on CAD [computer-aided design software], it’s also 3D simulations and calculations, with the brakes making sure the car stops.” Mitchell said. “A big thing was calculations for the suspension, and making sure none of the parts fail, because this [competition] is off road, so we’re hitting a lot of bumps.”
Danial explained how the competition is organized.
“There are a few different events, both ones that have to do with the car and ones that have to do with the group,” Danial said. “The group does a business presentation to a group of judges at the event, we bring the posters that you see on the wall [about the car], and we talk about all the different components on the car… You also have events with the actual car, so obviously you have to pass inspection… The rule book is hundreds of pages, so if you don’t pass inspection, you don’t get to do anything.”
Mitchell further elaborated on the events that the team will compete in.
“There’s static events, and there’s dynamic events,” Mitchell said. “Static events are all the reports that we have to fill out… Then there’s dynamic events that actually involve the car. There’s a braking test, acceleration test, there’s a hill climb, maneuverability and a couple-hour endurance race.”
Mitchell also explained that this competition gives the team members real world experience and is the pinnacle of their engineering experience at MU.
“I’ll be honest, I’ve learned more here than I have in almost all of school,” Mitchell said. “Especially for engineering in school, you might learn the theory side of things. But with this, you’re applying the theory to something, and then you’re building it.”
Associate professor of mechanical engineering and Mini Baja’s faculty advisor, Peyman Honarmandi Ph.D., shared how Mini Baja is a staple at MU for engineering students.
“Whenever students come to visit the engineering school, they ask about us,” Honarmandi said. “They want to see the Baja shop, they want to meet me and my students. Because they know [it] is the most expensive project and the most hands-on project in any department, let me go even beyond, in the School of Engineering.”
Honarmandi shared how the team is split into different roles, and each position is voted on by the members.
“The company has [a] president, VP, treasurer, secretary, they vote for it” Honarmandi said. “We have a shop manager, we have [a] secretary, we have someone who monitors the budget. I tell them, imagine this is a real-world business, you have to run your company, and I felt giving them that power [and] self-confidence to grow, gets a good result.”
Honarmandi is proud of the team’s continued success and sees the competition as a valuable experience for students.
“Every year I am witnessing [the team] doing better and better, the students learn a lot through this competition,” Honarmandi said.
Danial explained that the project requires significant funding, much of which comes from donors and sponsors.
“Although the school gives us a budget, I’d say it accounts for a fourth of what the car actually costs,” Danial said. “Almost all of our huge purchases, and a good chunk of our materials come from sponsors, so we’re actually kind of running a business here… We have a solid 15 to 20 sponsors.”
Danial went on to share that the team’s work is mainly supported by their GoFundMe.
“The GoFundMe provides another way for people to show their support, because, to put it like this, the amount of money the school gave us would not even cover the material we need,” Danial said. “A lot of sponsors give us materials, some sponsors give us parts. Some sponsors just give us money, but we’re open to any support we can get.” The team is pulling together their final preparations for the competition, and those who are interested can learn more through the team’s Instagram page, @mu_baja.