Pellissippi State-Jefferson Middle School effort nets national honors

Nine months and hundreds of hours of hard work paid off for the Jefferson Middle School Formula One Racing Technology Team, when the group recently won second place honors in a national competition.

The achievement took place in Dallas at the Technology Student Association National Conference, where the Oak Ridge team competed against 29 other top-ranked teams.

To prepare, the team—with support from the Mechanical Engineering Technology program at Pellissippi State and CG Tech, a software technology company—designed, analyzed, manufactured and raced a small-scale Formula One race car the members dubbed “Betsy Flo.”

Pellissippi State allowed the students to use a Haas VF3 computer numerically controlled milling machine in the MET lab to manufacture six cars, and they selected the best performing one. Previously, students had had to find a local manufacturing facility willing to let them use the expensive and highly specialized equipment to do the work.

The Engineering and Media Technologies Department not only provided the specialized equipment and guided the team through the computerized milling process, says Mary Kocak, MET professor at Pellissippi State, but faculty and staff also helped the students create the video and PowerPoint presentations used in the competition.

The team developed the car—scaled down to 1/20 of the original—based on exacting specifications for material and size. The middle schoolers simulated the manufacturing process using CG Tech’s VERICUT Software.

Ultimately, they created a display, a portfolio and a movie and gave an oral presentation at the competition. The group placed first in the presentation category. They also tested their car against others on a 25-meter-long track when they launched it using a CO2 cartridge.

Many teams who went to the competition worked on their project during class time throughout the year. But the Jefferson Middle School team of Andrew Cousins, Jonathon Henry, Kendall Hughey, Rebecca Kocak, Marybeth Snodgrass and Aimee Readel worked exclusively after school.

“The students were very impressive,” said Kocak, “and we were glad to be able to give them an opportunity to work with state-of-the-art technology. Someday, we’d like to see these high achievers come back to Pellissippi State and get a degree in Mechanical Engineering Technology.”

The winning team from the national conference now goes to Melbourne, Australia, for the international competition.