Teams race for the trophy in Junior House Engineering Competition 

Second Years put their design skills to the test in the latest Junior House Engineering Competition.

As part of a ‘supercurricular’ programme being jointly run by the Physics and Design Technology Departments, boys are taking on a series of challenges ahead of a grand final later in the academic year.

For the Rocket Car Race, which took place on Monday 3 October, teams of two, representing each House, had spent a couple of weeks designing and building their models, before racing them over a distance of 50m on the School campus (as pictured above and below).

With cars being powered by a mini-rocket, success depended on the aerodynamics of each design, meaning teams had to put great care and a touch of ingenuity into their creations.

The races were filmed and high-speed footage was analysed in order to decide the winning team.

The Parkside team took the top honours – and the Junior House Engineering trophy – after producing a rocket car which clocked up an amazing average speed of 93 mph.

Cowdrey House came second (average speed 86 mph), with Smythe House third (45mph).

Chris Powell, Head of Physics, said: “The main idea of the competition is to bring Physics and Design Technology to life, outside of regular classroom learning, and it allows plenty of scope for creative thinking and teamwork. Boys find some excellent design solutions and have lots of fun along the way.”

The next rounds of Junior House Engineering will set teams new challenges, such as creating ‘mousetrap cars’ (using springs to power wooden models), building mini-bridges and flying wooden glider planes.