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Production run of GpSpeed controllers !
Rotary Racer 2012
Wins the Greenpower UK National F24 Competition
The Greenpower Challenge is to inspire more young people to become engineers.
The mission is:
- To change current views about engineering, presenting it as a fascinating, relevant and dynamic career choice for any young person.
- To demonstrate the importance of engineering, and associated STEM subjects, to solve the problems faced by societies today particularly in the areas of sustainability.
- To link education, industry and community through inspirational engineering projects.
More information is at: http://www.greenpower.co.uk/about/
The concept is for teams of secondary school pupils, their teachers, parents and helpers to design, build, develop and race highly efficient "green" electric racing cars. Races take part accross the country on major race circuits such as Silverstone, Goodwood, Castle Combe, Rockingham etc. The pupils are exposed to many facets of engineering and other disciplines in doing this.
Greenpower cars race in 4 hour endurance races on full size racing circuits and generally average a speed of around 30 MPH achieving equivalent MPG values of greater
Rotary Racer
The Rotary Racer team is based at Chipping Sodbury School in South Gloucestershire. It runs as an extra circicular activity within the school. The team of 10 pupils and 6 parents/helpers work on Modays evenings in the schools Design Technogy rooms with assistance from Brendan one of the schools DT teachers.
The team has been running, with different pupil/parent members, since around 2005. Its work is funded by sponsership from local groups and companies. One of the major sponsors is the Rotary Club of Chipping Sodbury, hence the teams name.
Over the years the team has worked hard and challenged the students (and adults!) to work at engineering while having fun doing so. The team has designed, built and raced 8 different cars over this period. The team with their lastest car, Rotary Racer 8, Renovatio, has done exceptionaly well. It has won the UK National champianship 3 times in the last 4 years.
There is more information on the team at: http://www.greenpower.beamweb.co.uk/files/RotaryRacer/
Within the challenge students are exposed to:
- Team work. They have to operate as a team both during the research, design and development stages as well as during the races. This includes team meetings, planning, strategy etc.
- Engineering: Science. Maths, Research, Materials, Tools etc. The students need to research and understand the basic requirements in order to design an efficient car. They work in the fields of mechanics, electronics, software, CAD etc.
- Technical work: The Students build the car using the tools and machines in the schools DT department.
- Fund raising: The students need to contact local organisations and companies in order to raise funds to support the work. This is the only source of finance.
- Competition: They compete against around 200 schools in the UK in local and national races.
The National Final 2012
The team came into the national final at position 3 in the qualification table. It was going to be a hard race. There were quite a few cars from various teams that had a chance of winning this race. The race went very well for us, we had no major problems and were running in about 3rd at the halfway point. Slowly during the last half of the race we slowly made up gound on the leading cars and were second going into the lap of 51 laps. The leading car however had spent a little to much energy in the early stages of the race and was slowing due to fading battery power. It was a anxious time for the team as the cars disappeared around the far reaches of the track and jubilation when RR appeared first around the last corner to take the chequered flag and win the race.
Race report by one of the students: FinalWriteUp.pdf
Report on the year by one of the students: 2012-1.pdf
Some High Resolution Pictures (Some by Matt Beee):
