Their tiny car accelerates faster than a Formula One car and that speed and precision is taking a group of Phoenix P-12 Community College students to the national titles of the prestigious F1 in Schools program.
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Students William Kynoch, Hayden Gregg, Aston Brownbill, Lachlan Kynoch and Brad Vinall took out second place in the professional senior class of the local F1 in Schools competition and will now take their car Nexus to the national final in Sydney next March.
Phoenix technology teacher Christoff Muller said the boys had been working on their design, marketing and portfolios required for the STEM competition for most of the year.
The miniature cars race at up to 80kmh over a 20m straight track powered by carbon dioxide cartridges.
"The acceleration itself is faster than a Formula One car and not only are they judged on how fast the car travels but on the reaction time, pit display and many other aspects," Mr Muller said.
Not only do the students have to form an F1 team and design a miniature car they have to complete all the functions that would occur in a regular F1 team.
"Students have to form an F1 team, design a miniature F1 car using state-of-the-art CAD 3D drawing programs, code the machine, engineering drawings, do marketing, come up with a logo, team name, team uniforms, get sponsors, do a portfolio, do research, testing, fluid dynamics, collaborate with industry, find mentorship in the industry, a pit display with posters and a big render of their car ... and they get judged on a verbal presentation as well," Mr Muller said.
Not only did they take second place in their division at the state finals at Wyndham Tech School last week, the team also won the best engineering award, best manufacturing award, best innovation award and fastest reaction time.
Phoenix has previously tasted success in the F1 in Schools competition, winning the world championship in 2013 and competing three times at a world level in the 15 years the school has been part of the competition.
A second Phoenix team comprising Thomas Costello, Josh Dridan and Connor Henderson took third place in the professional junior class.
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"It's very competitive so just to go to nationals is pretty amazing when so many students are competing," Mr Muller said.
"F1 in Schools is one of the major STEM programs in the world. They've got 9.5 million students involved in F1 in Schools and about 22,000 students in Australia."
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