Black Jack
Event Location: Cocoa-FL
Competition: Junior Solar Sprint
Division: 4-6 (JSS Green)
School: Sumter STEM 4H
Team Size: 4
Solar Car Name:
Black Jack
We named our car “Black Jack” because we like the books, “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” by Rick Riordan. There is a character named “Black Jack” in the books. He is a pegasus, or a flying horse, not to be confused with an alicorn, which is a unicorn with wings. We think our car is so fast that it flies like a pegasus. So we named it, “Black Jack.”
Organization Name:
Sumter Stem 4-H Club – Sumter County, FL. Our team is representing our 4-H Club. Our club focuses on STEM based projects, including robotics, engineering, gardening, and computer science. We meet weekly to work together on projects.
Team Members:
- Addie C. – 4th Grade – Homeschool
- Lily T. – 4th Grade – Homeschool
- Jada F. – 4th Grade – Homeschool
- Caroline C. – 4th Grade – Homeschool
Car Pictures:
Car Drawings:
Car Specifications:
| Length | 26.8 cm |
| Width w/wheels | 14.5 cm |
| Width of Solar Panel | 12.75 cm |
| Length of Solar Panel | 26.6 cm |
| Height | 13 cm |
| Weight | 280g |
| Back Wheel Size | 4 cm |
| Front Wheel Size | 3.5 cm |
| Gear Ratio | 4:1 |
| Total Cost: | $49.20 |
Materials:
Cost Breakdown:
- Solar Car Kit: $48
- Battery Pack: $1
- Camp Half Blood Stickers: $0.20
Total Cost: $49.20
Donated/Recycled Materials:
- Legos
- K-Cup (Recycled)
- Rhinestones
- Solo Cup (Recycled)
- Black Spray Paint (Donated)
- Hot Glue (Donated)
- Velcro (Donated)
Project Diary Log
| Date | Time | Duration | Tasks Completed | Team Attendance | Location |
| March 22, 2023 | 9 A.M | 2 Hours | – Planned, designed, and sketched the first car idea – Watched some solar car design videos to get ideas for our car – Tested how to power the motor with batteries to understand how it works. – Built a quick basic chassis with wheels to test gear ratio – Learned that a 1:4 Ratio would not drive the car | Addie, Caroline, and Jada | Addie’s House |
| March 27, 2023 | 3:30 P.M | 1.5 Hours | – Watched Pitsco Building video – Measured Balsa Wood – Cut Chassis using Pitsco Specs | Addie, Caroline, and Jada | ABC Church |
| April 3, 2023 | 3:30 P.M | 1.5 Hours | – Assembled the Chassis with Battery Pack – Put motor on backwards, and car drove in reverse – Attached spacers too far from the wheels, so the car wobbled, we moved them to the outside of the chassis – Battery power Trials in Hallway – Car went crooked – Sanded car parts – Named and Spray Painted Chassis | Addie, Caroline, and Jada | ABC Church |
| April 5, 2023 | 10 A.M | 2 Hour | – First Car design with solar panel – Cloudy Day, Battery Power Trials down Hallway. – Design Flaw: Table Tennis Ball and Battery pack wouldn’t fit under solar panel – Redesigned chassis structure to increase space between solar panel and chassis | Addie, Caroline, and Jada | Caroline’s House |
| April 10, 2023 | 10 AM | 2.5 Hours | – Build redesigned car – Added height to solar panel support using legos and a solo cup – Respray painted car – Solar power trials, but it was too cloudy again – Switched to battery power and did 5 meter trials to practice hooking up power and releasing car – Hard to change batteries, decided to velcro battery pack in so it was easy to remove. | Addie, Caroline, Jada, and Lily | ABC Church |
| April 13, 2023 | 9:30 A.M | 3 Hours | – SOLAR POWER TRIALS FINALLY!!! **See Time Trial Data below** – Website Design – Took and Edited Videos – Practiced speech and determined team captain. | Addie, Caroline, Jada, and Lily | Caroline’s House |
| April 14, 2023 | 9 A.M | 2 Hours | – Worked on website – Recorded video for website – Reattached headlight rhinestone | Addie, Caroline, and Jada | ABC Church |
| April 16, 2023 | 4 P.M | 1 Hours | – Finished Website design – Packed up our solar car box | Addie, Caroline, Jada, and Lily | Addie’s House |
| TOTAL Hours: | 15.5 Hours |
Solar Panel Time Trials
| Trial | Time | Distance | Speed | Conditions | Comments |
| 1 | DNF | 8 meters | None | Sunny | Car jumped off the track. |
| 2 | 9.3 sec | 20 meters | 2.15 m/s | Sunny | This was our best time. It is a partly cloudy day, but the sun was out. |
| 3 | DNF | 0 meters | NONE | Cloudy | The sun went behind a cloud. The car did not move. |
| 4 | 19.18 sec | 20 meters | 1.04 m/s | Sunny then Cloudy | The sun was out when we started then it went behind a cloud and the car slowed down. |
| 5 | 11.48 sec | 20 meters | 1.74 m/s | Cloudy then Sunny | The sun was hidden at the start, it took a second to start moving, then the sun came out and the car went fast. |
| 6 | DNF | 10 meters | None | Sunny | Alligator Clip fell off motor, so car stopped moving |
| 7 | 11.21 sec | 20 meters | 1.78 m/s | Partly Sunny | Partly sunny |
| 8 | 12.6 sec | 20 meters | 1.58 m/s | Partly Sunny | Partly sunny |
Battery Pack Trials
| Trial | Time | Distance | Speed | Conditions | Comments |
| 1 | 9.94 | 20 Meters | 2.01 m/s | – | Tried our battery pack incase we need it for race day |
| 2 | 10.25 | 20 Meters | 1.95 m/s | – | Tried our battery pack incase we need it for race day |
Project Reflection and Bloopers
We really enjoyed working on this project together. We learned a lot about building our car and having to work together. We liked our car’s design and we wanted to add wings to the design but couldn’t figure out where to attach them.
We had a lot of partly cloudy days so it was hard to test our car on solar power.
Special Thanks
Thank you to our parents for helping us with our project. They helped us with website design, photos, video editing, some math, hot glueing, and soldering.
I really like how they brought a card game into a race
Great job girls!