Reddit reviews Engineer to Win by Carroll Smith (2010) Paperback
We found 1 Reddit comments about Engineer to Win by Carroll Smith (2010) Paperback. Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.
I third this. You may find that you learn more in FSAE than you will in class, especially regarding the realities of making designs come to life. It's hard work, but it will pay dividends for the rest of your life. (Just like the rest of college).
No need to restrict yourself to aerodynamics, that's only one of the many areas of study you'll learn in AE. Structures and controls are also core competencies of any respectable AE grad.
To half-answer your latter question, I found myself going down the structures route when my FSAE team needed a guy to do the chassis. I was originally enamored with aerodynamics, but to be honest, I'm quite glad that fate steered me to structures.
Because aerodynamics are so amenable to mathematical description (i.e., Navier-Stokes rules the show), the modern aerodynamicist is chiefly a mathematician. (Or some would say CFD-jockey, but that's perhaps a bit derogatory, haha). Rarely does he get to touch hardware.
Being a person who loves to split time between desk work and getting my hands dirty in the lab, I have found structures to be far more rewarding than other field options. There's still so much we don't understand about how materials fail, how to build stronger or stiffer composites, and how to predict failure, hat the structures engineer will always be kept busy pushing the boundaries of his field both experimentally and analytically. (I'm sure other fields are hard too, but of course I speak unabashedly from the structures perspective.)
As for books, a good place to start is the well-written series by the great Carroll Smith. Engineer to Win is a gem among the FSAE metal-pounders.