Two teams, comprising of 4th and 5th year students from The Institute of Education recently submitted entries to the F1 In Schools Competition.
As a school community, we are very proud that both of our teams have made it through to the National Finals of this prestigious competition. We wish them all the very best.
The project involves designing and building a model F1 Racing Car using CFD (Aerodynamic analysis) and CAD (Virtual 3D Design) software. A CO2 cartridge powers the car.
One of the teams is called Team Sirocco Racing and is comprised of 4th and 5th Year students. The team members are: Kelly Burns, Cora Keogh, Leen Idris, Radu McGill (4th Year) and Alex Cheung (4th Year)
We contacted them to find out more about their team and what they are doing in the competition.
Kelly Burns, the Team and Media Manager, told us more about what their team name, Team Sirocco Racing, mean.
Sirocco by definition is a hot wind, often dusty or rain blowing from North Africa and the Mediterranean to southern Europe. To us, Sirocco focuses on the dust we leave behind and how fast our car is, as well as how quick we develop our team and project.
As this is a team based event Kelly is also joined by 3 other students. All of who have specific roles they carry out.
Kelly Burns, as we mentioned, is the Team and Media Manager, ensuring everything goes smoothly during the process of this competition. This requires Kelly to have contact with all members of the team, to organise the meetings, and to be the main contact between the team and school. Media Manager means Kelly created a social media page for the team to put their name out there as a brand and to spark sponsorship.
Cora Keogh is the team’s Marketing Manager. Cora’s job on the team is to help source sponsorship. As part of this, she drafts emails which would be sent to potential sponsors, as well as create a suitable list of companies which would later email or call. This job is to help gain a sponsor to help with the finances of our team running. Cora is the main contact between the sponsors and the team to ensure all clear messages were delivered.
Leen Idris is their Finance Manager . Leen’s job as finance manager consists of working with the graphic designer to pinpoint the materials we need. Leen researches the materials to identify the price of each material and the best place to purchase them. She uses these price estimates to draft the budget that our project would base upon. She works closely with our Marketing Manager to research potential sponsors that would subsidise their budget.
Radu McGill is the team’s Head Graphic Designer and Research Manager. Radu’s job is to research the specifications of the engineering for the car as well as designing it on the computer with the CAD software. The results include measuring the airflow, movement, and functions of each part of the car and testing them on simulators on the computer. Radu researches the materials suitable to achieve the goal of fastest car and discusses with Leen to cover the budget. Also, he communicates with Alex regarding creating and designing the car.
Alex Cheung is the Head Design Engineer. Alex’s responsibility is to identify the most efficient methodologies in designing and engineering the car. This determines the greatest metrics (speed and acceleration) possible. Alex collaborates with Radu to help achieve this. The design of the car is thoroughly examined in order to create what we feel the best design possible. Alex considers the logistics of our design and any possible issues that may arise when we try manufacture the car.
We are very excited to follow the progress of Team Sirocco Racing and Team Omega Racing as they participate in the F1 in Schools National Finals.
He are some behind the scenes images of what Team Sirocco Racing have been up to.
