BIVAR LEDs Help Indy 500 Winner Tony Kanaan and KV Racing Technology

BIVAR and Mouser Electronics have teamed up to support leading IZOD IndyCar® Series driver Tony Kanaan and his 2013 KV Racing Technology team. The partnership is helping supply the racing team with a competitive edge in the pit and on the track.

KV Racing Technology Technical Director Eric Cowdin, the head Race Engineer for Kanaan's #11 IndyCar, and his engineers chose BIVAR LEDs to perform a critical role for the pit crew. According to data engineer Josh Fults and engineering assistant Matt Cummings, the BIVAR LEDs are key components in a re-fueling status system integrated into a crew member's helmet. Re-fueling an Indycar with 18.5 gallons of ethanol in 7 to 8 seconds is not only critical to winning a race, it's also a potentially dangerous activity that requires extreme focus.

“We have a fuel status system. In our fueler's helmet is a little circuit board with BIVAR LEDs on it, and then there's a control box that runs those LEDs,” Fults explains. “We can use those LEDs to tell the fueler when to pull the fuel nozzle out of the car.”

BIVAR LEDs also factor into the engineers' proposed future designs. “We're experimenting with some different steering wheel projects and we would utilize LEDS to alert the driver when caution lights are coming on,” Cummings says.

For the second consecutive year, BIVAR has partnered with Mouser Electronics in co-sponsoring the KV Racing Technology team. Mouser distributes BIVAR's product lines globally. The Mouser racing program provides a high-tech platform to showcase the newest technologies and connect with industry's leading automotive electronic design engineers and buyers. Mouser and BIVAR's support of the KV Racing Technology team has proved to be a winning partnership. Kanaan captured his first-ever Indianapolis 500 victory in May and continued his run of success with a third-place finish at the Firestone 550 at Texas Motor Speedway in June. The upcoming schedule for the KV Racing Technology team is highlighted by the GoPro Grand Prix of Sonoma on Aug. 25.

To watch video clips of Tony Kanaan for BIVAR, click here and here. Learn more about BIVAR's support by clicking here.

To read about Kanaan's epic Indy 500 victory and Mouser and BIVAR's participation in the 2013 KV Racing Technology team, click here.

With its broad product line and unsurpassed customer service, Mouser caters to design engineers and buyers by delivering What's Next in advanced technologies. Mouser offers customers 19 global support locations and stocks the world's widest selection of the latest semiconductors and electronic components for the newest design projects. Mouser Electronics' website is updated daily and searches more than 10 million products to locate over 3 million orderable part numbers available for easy online purchase. Mouser.com also houses an industry-first interactive catalog, data sheets, supplier-specific reference designs, application notes, technical design information, and engineering tools.