At the Canterbury regional finals of the EVolocity nationwide schools electric vehicle competition, year 7 and 8 engineers Pearse Cooper, Josh Ward and Corban Julian fronted up with their electrical creation — Elwin an electric tractor — and cleaned up the opposition which included big city high schools.
They won first place overall in their category, were awarded the show stopper award for best presented in the show, and took home the 'overall performance' award which was the combination of all their points in building, design and the performance of their electric vehicle.
The team said they originally only aimed to win the show-stopper award "because we knew our competition was all senior students at big city high schools working towards marks for their NCEA".
But their name kept on being called out.
"It was an amazing experience for our students," said parent and driving force behind the Sefton School EVolocity project, Katie Cooper.
Katie's son Pearse, 13, said the team of young designers decided to enter the competition in April.
"Mum thought it would be a good idea to enter, so we all went to Wigram for the opening and were surprised to see we were the youngest people there," Pearse said.
"We decided to stick to our roots as a country school and make an EV that reflected who we were."
Katie said the group dived into the competition, but it wasn’t until they gained the services of adviser Samuel Ward, who is also a parent, that their project really took off.
"He taught us so much — how to cut metal, how to weld, how to solder and how to design the parts of our EV tractor," 12-year-old Corban Julian said.
EVolocity’s mission is to inspire young Kiwis into sustainable engineering.
At the start of this school year, high school and intermediate teams were given a standard 350-watt electric motor kit, batteries and wiring loom from sponsor Orion Energy.
They had some guidelines to follow, and design inspiration came from visits to the University of Canterbury and Air New Zealand.
Alongside their teachers and mentors, teams plan, engineer and manufacture electric karts or bikes — all with sustainability in mind.
At the regional finals, the teams and their EVs go head-to-head against each other tackling a gymkhana slalom event, an endurance challenge and a drag race to find who is the fastest.
"Elwin was set for 25km/h but we changed the gearing and he went much faster," said Pearse.
Said the third member of the team, Josh Ward, 13: "It was great to drive him and go fast."
Corban said Elwin also handled much better on the Kartsport Canterbury Race Track than some others which crashed or fell apart in the competition.
Katie said with Samuel’s help and a lot of practical assistance from many others, including tutors at UC and Air New Zealand's engineering base, they built their EV from spare parts, trashed bicycles, go-karts, recycled pieces of scrap metal and covered it in cardboard retrieved from a dumpster.
It was called Elwin after one of the original team who had to return to Sweden when his father's work finished in New Zealand.
Katie said there were so many supporters and sponsors who all helped to keep the costs down.
"We have to thank them all as together they made all this possible."
Sponsors making it possible were Samuel Ward Plumbing, Farm Bike Services, The Freight Escape and Team Parents.
