Students at Killina Secondary School have received sponsorship from Laser Prototypes for their F1 Schools Technology Challenge entry.

The competition now in its 6th year sees students from across Ireland compete for the opportunity to represent Ireland at the International finals. Challenged with designing and manufacturing a 1/20 scale model each team must prepare a business plan and presentation along with racing their design at the Irish Finals.

The Hornet team have been working on the design of their model Formula1 car since September. Speaking on the design, team Marketing and Communications Manager, Ciara Ryan stated “our team has based our car on the U2 stealth bomber..not only is the U2 stealth bomber known for its speed it is also known for its aerodynamic shape”. Upon successfully completing the Qualifying Stage have set about manufacturing their car at the AIT Athlone Make Centre. A balsa wood racer was created from the 3D CAD files.

The team then turned its attention to final finishing and race preparation. In order to source custom made wheels Team Hornet turned to Belfast based Laser Prototypes. The wheels were produced in PA Nylon using the Selective Laser Sintering process. Using proprietary software the 3D CAD data was split into 0.1mm cross sections.

Each cross section was then drawn by laser onto a thin layer of Nylon powder, until layer by layer the model is grown. Full details and a animation of this process can be seen on the Selective Laser Sintering page.

With the wheels fitted and the car fully painted, the Regional finals are only days away. We would like to wish Team Hornet the best of luck in the F1 Schools Technology Challenge.

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