WESLEY CHAPEL, Fla. — It all started with Ronnie Pittman’s intro to engineering class.
“In the class I taught them how to weld, how to fabricate, how to bend, how to cut metal, and electrical. All of it," Pittman said. "And we figured this would be great project cause it ties all of that into one thing."
His students at North Tampa Christian Academy turned those skills into a solar powered car that keep getting better every year.
WATCH: Wesley Chapel students set to race solar-powered car they designed and built
“It’s fairly simple. It looks more complicated than it is,” Ian Degressi said.
Gabriel Javier added, “We were pretty impressed when we put it on. It’s like we built this from the ground up."
Pittman said, “The crazy thing is the car is 100% student-built. All the welds were done 99% were done by them, the designing, the welding, the wiring, most of it done by them."
There are still some finishing touches left to do, but this car will be put to the test next month racing against other high schoolers at Texas Motor Speedway.
Ian was a part of last year’s race team that drove more than 650 miles over the four day Solar Car Challenge.
“I got to drive a couple of times. It was a lot of fun. I enjoyed it. I’m going to be the first one to go twice. I’m really excited to go back,” Pittman said.
There is a lot of trial and error for these Solar Titans and for Ian, which included a crash.
“I took the first corner on the back straight of the school. And I woke up I was upside down. I ended up blacking out. And it was no fun,” Pittman said.
The top speed for this car, named Nemo, is 50 miles per hour.
And it cost about $7000 to build.
And with this brain power, nothing will slow it down, except maybe clouds.
For more information, go to Solar Car Challenge.
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