Robert Palin Email & Phone Number

Los Angeles, California, United States

Leveraging heavily on the experiences gained at Tesla, the goal of Spaera is to accelerate the transition to sustainable shipping. Currently, the carbon emissions of the shipping industry are on a par with the entire country of Germany, but there are also many other problematic emissions that need to be eliminated. Shipping poses a formidable challenge for electrification, but the tools already exist to make it happen. Spaera combines fresh thinking with the integration of diverse technical solutions to solve the shipping challenge. Spaera's first step will be to create a truly zero-emission small cargo ship, using wind-assisted propulsion to augment electrical power from fuel cells, using green methanol and e-methanol as a hydrogen carrier.

Los Angeles, Usa

Greater Los Angeles Area

Responsible for all things related to airflow at a start-up aiming to make affordable electric vehicles that suit modern lifestyles, ride-sharing, and commercial distribution models. Starting absolutely from scratch, it was important to establish first what aerodynamic development would mean at the company, and then define how best to accomplish it. This meant working very closely with a broad range of other functions, including Design, Engineering, and Finance, to understand everyone's needs, and to communicate our own. A key aspect of this was ensuring the appreciation of the goal being to develop the best overall product, above & beyond the aspirations of any individual department.

Hawthorne, California

Greater Los Angeles Area

Responsible for all aspects of aerodynamic performance and development across Tesla's range of vehicles. This meant working closely with both Design and Engineering, ensuring that aerodynamic performance principles were integrated into even the earliest design concepts without compromise to the aesthetics, and then following those features through the engineering process and into production. With relatively humble resources, and very limited wind tunnel time, we were able to achieve industry-standard results through close relationships with key groups and individuals around the company, and through the careful use of combinations of CFD simulation and track testing. Tesla's aerodynamic performance was achieved not by intricate airflow manipulation, but rather by simplicity and collaboration.The intense scrutiny of performance, and technical rigour at Tesla meant that we were often pushing the boundaries of fidelity of aerodynamic development techniques. A substantial amount of effort was put into greater accuracy at each stage of development, not just in terms of assessments and measurements, but even the very notion of what metrics really had value to the product. This led to several published research papers, and advances in the field.

Crewe, England, United Kingdom

Working with the Aerodynamics team to improve the efficiency and high speed stability of Bentley automobiles during a very intense time for the company. With up to 8 vehicle programmes running concurrently, it was vital to make sure that all fulfilled their performance potential. In addition to CFD simulations and wind tunnel testing, I supported high speed stability testing at the Ehra test track in northern Germany. This involved mapping the behaviour of the cars up to around 200mph, and manipulating the aerodynamics to maximize performance and handling.

B.Sc (Hons), Physics

Activities and Societies: Member of the Cocks Moors Woods Karate Club. Achieved black belt grade in Shotokan Karate, and competed.

Master Of Science - Ms, Aerodynamics

Activities and Societies: I set up and ran my own small scale Karate school at the university.