King Abdullah unveils King Saud University’s Gazal-1, the first Saudi car
Tue, 15 Jun, 2010
Engineering, GSSR, Main, Patents and Inventions, Royal Family, Students
King Abdullah hosted a large contingent from King Saud University (KSU) and the Ministry of Higher Education (MOHE) yesterday in his Jeddah palace for the unveiling Gazal 1, the first car to be engineered and manufactured by Saudis.
The creation of Gazal 1 is one of King Saud University’s most ambitious projects to date, and developed by a team of KSU student-engineers, who designed the car with the unique and diverse terrain of the Arab Peninsula in mind.
Ghazal-1, which is 4.8 meters (16 feet) long and 1.9 (6 feet) meters wide, has been patented by KSU and all intellectual property rights are in the University’s name. It is estimated that 20,000 cars will be produced per year.
The unveiling was attended by Saudi Minister of Higher Education, Khalid Al-Angari and King Saud University Rector Abdullah Al-Othman, Vice Rector for Graduate Studies and Scientific Research Prof. Ali Al-Ghamdi and various University deputies.
Indeed, ambitious projects such as this at King Saud University would not possible without the personal commitment and financial support of His Royal Highness King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud, and he naturally received ample words of gratitude from Ministry and University officials.
Rector Al-Othman expressed his deep gratitude to the King for his support, saying that the unveiling of this automobile illustrates the great progress that Saudi Arabia has seen during his reign. The Rector cited the arrival of Gazal-1 as a pivotal point in the Kingdom’s history, as it shows that Saudi Arabia has “capable people who can transform ideas into products of high economic value.”
Dr. Al-Angari, in his speech, identified Gazal-1 as proof that when provided with adequate facilities and given opportunities, young Saudi engineers can excel in innovation and invention.
The King was shown presentations explaining the various stages of the project and the car’s production; in addition, he viewed pictures and detailed paintings describing the project and was given a detailed account of the impressive features of Gazal-1.
Tags: Ghazal 1, Graduate Studies & Scientific Research, launchings, patents
Yes Yes Yes Yes.
This is my great university, those are the people that my university is proud of, and here are seeds had started to grow and yield very attractive products.
All the best my beloved people.
Congratulations to all: This is one of the most important steps toward achieving vision of the King Saud University. Because this act has linked the University in building Saudi Arabia`s Knowledge economy. If other institutions follow this phenomenon, then the day will do come soon when the Kingdom will turn into an Industrial economy. So there is a need to fill the gap between the industry and the research groups working in different universities where fresh minds may be assigned the tasks to resolve issues of the local industry.
As far King Saud University is concerned, I have no hesitation to say that the university is on right track posing as a leader university of the Kingdom. I wish best of luck for the administration and the researchers of the KSU who have earned good name for the university through contributing in the Kingdom’s economy.
Congratulations to all,
but we must get our automotive industries and our indipendence.
Not only for auto.
it’s very possible, inchaa Allah.
We need to product million unit / year, in all segments A. B. C. D
How to do it ?
But it’s the moment.
For our people.
Je remercie vivement tous ceux qui ont travaillé sur ce projet et je leur souhaite bonne continuation.
Toute fois il y a vraiment possibilité d’obtenir l’industrie de l’automobile et d’une façon indépendante et pour toujours.
Inchaa Allah, nous aurons besoin de moins de 5 ans pour en réussir mais ensemble, car nous totalisons un important marché, de ma part j’ai des idées.
Allah maaakoum
DrMourad
Congratulations on production your own Saudi car, may I take this opportunity to applaud the Saudi engineers’ effort and dedication.
I am very delighted about the production of Gazal-1 and this demonstrate that the university is on right track. Indeed KSU is posing as a leader university of the Kingdom. Many congratuation for all of us and with time and efforts the best will come.
MashaAllah , this a great achievement by the academia and Researchers of King Saud Univeristy. We should aprreciate this kind of innovations and struggle more towards such kind of activities to uphigh the moral of researchers. Bravo !!! We are thankful to kind for his keen interest in our university and its innovative products. Jazakumullah khair !
Congratulations!
I would like to thank you for your great achievement. I just need a few answers for my questions:
1- Where do you plan to manufacture this car in Saudi Arabia?
2- How much is it?
3- When you will start the production in Saudi Arabia?
4- How many job you will be created from this project?
5- When will you release this car in the market?
I hope someone can answer my questions because I am really curious and I want to present this car at my University in U.S.A.
Best regards,
Abdulmhsen
Congratulations for the achievement and inshallah we will see more benefitial outcomes.
So we have achieved what some countries have achieved more than 200 years back…. surely it’s not just a time for celebration, but also to think where we are standing in the automobile field on the world graph.
We cannot undermine the efforts made by the King Saud University scientists, staff and students in achieving this milestone. We should be developing 100 new cars for the world to gain the respect we have lost in the field of science and technology in the last few centuries.
I wish the students all the best for such a wonderful acheivement….Well this is a begining sky should be the limit….Keep working and chase your dreams
Am proud to be a small part of such a huge educational institution called KSU
Gazala Hassan.
Dept of IT
PY,KSU Riyadh
Great work guys.. this a first step towards major projects in Saudi Arabia. I don’t want to be a pessimist when I say this .. but I don’t like how this thing is blown out of proportion.
Concept cars going into production and complex engineering projects of the like need Precision Engineering which is not an easy feat in any sense especially for some students at a university.
Before a car goes into production, every component and subsystem needs to be precisely designed analyzed and manufactured to meet minimal tolerances. The materials/ composites used to design each component and the manufacturing processes involved need to also be studied. Factories need to be built to most efficiently manufacture each component. Each major component of the car is a multidisciplinary engineering problem and a difficult engineering feat by its self. For a car, many disciplines come to my mind, some of which are : mechanical, materials, chemical, ergonomics, aerodynamics, control, electrical, computer, safety and risk, systems engineering, in addition to the management and financial disciplines involved.
Of course all major components need to be tested, as well as crash testing the whole car to meet safety requirements and regulations. Camel crash “simulations” are not enough
!
Do we have crash testing facilities? Do we have testing facilities for the major component for that matter? Do we have purpose built factories to manufacture the major components?
Designing, analyzing, manufacturing and testing the engine its self is a complex feat of engineering, unless you’ll be using an engine from another company which still needs to be tested of course, and of course the whole car ( chassis, gearbox ….etc) needs to be designed and tested around this engine.
What your students have achieved is nice to “look at” and good in pictures, but is Gazal-1 really a Saudi car built from scratch? I don’t think so. I also read that it is a modified “Mercedes-Benz G-class” which has an extremely rigid outer body design to begin with, which I might guess makes it cheaper to manufacture but gives it an aerodynamic penalty which increases fuel consumption. But for the targeted market and required functional goals of the car, maybe these design decisions where more than valid for the Mercedes company.
What you’ve done here with this project is take an extremely rigid ugly looking car and modify the outer body and interior and ergonomics for what goal ? Is it only looks, or does the aerodynamic gain in your modifications and in turn the overall fuel efficiency give it an overall competing edge in the car market in Saudi Arabia? Was there a market survey for such a car ? Where does the car fit in the global automotive market?
If the goal of the modified car is to motivate the students then great job ! But to blow things out of proportion and say that this is the first Saudi car and go on about production lines is clear nonsense and an unrealistic statement just used as another publicity stunt by KSU to shadow the real goals and motivations of such projects.
I just wanted to shed some realistic light on the topic, because I hate how such big statements are made about such projects that make us believe that we have taken a leap forward in our countries technological development. Because we promote and believe such unrealistic statements, we are actually taking many leaps back. We need to know exactly what amount of progress we have achieved so far in order to be able to create a “real” plan to go forward.
I ask from the KSU press and all Saudi organizations to start to accurately inform the public and the people in charge about our countries progress in any discipline. It is sad to see such a highly respected university such as KSU state these wrong and over-hyped joke facts instead of informing the public about the real intentions of such projects. A hypothetical example of accurate information for the Gazal-1 project might be :”In this project, Saudi engineers from different disciplines studied how to specifically increase fuel efficiency of the Mercedes-Benz G-class by redesigning, analyzing and manufacturing the outer body of the car”
Another example : ” Saudi Engineers have been given the task to modify the looks of the Mercedes-Benz G-class by redesigning the outer body and interior with the goal that it would have a higher appeal to the Saudi market. This project has drawn the students attention to the automotive engineering field and the project is considered to be one of the first steps of many towards the ultimate goal of an Automotive industry in the region.”
Of course these are just my thoughts and may not depict the real goals of the project. Even after reading many articles about this car I still don’t have a clear understanding of the goal of the whole project because of the over-hyped ill-informed garbage that plagues each article I read.
The huge problem occurs when our public and the people in charge of our country believe this garbage without a shadow of a doubt because of the reputation of KSU and organizations like it and how highly respected they are in our country.
Again, the car look nice and it looks like a lot of work went into it. Good job Students… Bad job KSU PRESS!!
Great Achievements. Heartiest congratulations to all students one who contribute the best efforts to achieve this goal.
Mohammed Ehtesham Alam
Al-Khobar,KSA
Allhamdulillah, what an achievement for the WORLD OF ISLAM!
Congratulation for this achievement, still we have to achieve more to reach the target. I am appreciating the student, teacher of the university and government of Saudi Arab for supporting their people in every field of as well muslim Umma.I am praying for long life of King Abdullah who is the the sign of unity of Umma.
Mansoor,
Pakistan
Congratulations. It makes me more jealous. We once had the same project but it has been disappearing now.
How much funding was alloted to make this concept?
السلام علیکم ورحمه الله و برکاته
Congratulations to you all, this good effort and good news for all muslims in the world. Muslims need such outstanding efforts in order to prove that islam doesn’t mean to ignore improvement of our lives and use latest technology to cope new era challenges.
Regards.
Salam..
And greetings from Pakistan….
Congratulations to the entire team who worked so hard on such a wonderful project …..
Great Work Guys!!! Excellent…
Its not only an achievement for you guys but for the entire muslim people…
Again… Many Congrats!!
I represented Saudi Telephones since 1982
and was the frequent visitor to the J.V.Site
Riyadh 123 OR KSU and her sister Site
Illaisha commissioning & maintaining various
Telecommunication services, special service
circuits, PCM, PSTN, FOT, Payphones, Video
Conferencing, MDF etc.
But my young mind at that time was telling
that this massive friendly building structures
built for Campuses, faculties, university will
be blessed by GOD through able rulers and
administrators will give a future Saudi young
minds to bring many first greater heights
in their chosen fields.
So this Gazal-1 first car from Kingdom of
Saudi Arabia is now yet another proud
testimony to readers like me when I was doing
my jobs in that empty land firstly,
secondly in the empty buildings and lately
in the occupied buildings comprise of
staff and students when time pass-by.
So today I read this accidently,
Congratulations and congratulations
to the second country I served,
May Almighty God bless you all.
Eng.Roshan Goonewardene
roshan@trc.gov.lk
26.01.2011G
My heartiest congratulation to all involved ln the project. But my concern is to request all Saudis from top to botom to be a Saudi and buy Saudi. I will feel happier if Gazal 1 is used by Saudi and all other Muslims as a symbol of unity.