TOP: Quaker State staffer inputs data from test car onto screen for students
to review. BOTTOM: Excited about competing in the “Best i n Class
Challenge,” from l., are Jonathan Rodrigues, auto shop teacher Victor
Ribiero, Justin Montanino and Shaun Rutzler.
KEARNY –
It’s off to the races for 34 Kearny High School juniors and seniors.
Students in Victor Ribiero’s automotive classes are competing for a “Best in Class Challenge,” pitting auto shop classes from five high schools in the Eastern U.S. against each other in “restoring, tuning and customizing a pre-owned vehicle into a showroom-ready” product.
And they’ve got the next six weeks to fight it out.
To become part of the Kearny “crew,” the community at large is invited to go to the web at kearnyschools.com and vote for the KHS Auto Shop by clicking on “Vote” and selecting Kearny High School. People may vote as often as they wish. Deadline for voting is Nov. 29.
Each high school’s work will be reviewed via remote access by two judges – NASCAR Sprint Cup Series racer Paul Menard and Tommy Pike, owner of Tommy Pike Customs – who will review engine presentation, cabin detailing and exterior finish.
Sponsor of the completion is Quaker State, in partnership with AutoZone.
The five teams will share in a total of $7,000 worth of Auto- Zone gift certificates, plus each team will get an AutoZone professional mechanics tool kit. The top three teams will auction off their upgraded cars, with proceeds going to their schools, while the other two get to keep their vehicles.
The winning team’s achievement will be chronicled in an advertorial in Popular Mechanics magazine.
Kearny High’s rivals are: Maxwell High School of Technology in Lawrenceville, Ga.; Iredell Statesville School Automotive Tech Center in Troutman, N.C.; New Trier High School in Winnetka, Ill; and Satellite High School in Satellite, Fla.
Last Tuesday, Oct. 13, the KHS team got into gear as its “test” vehicle, a 2002 Chevrolet Impala delivered by Quaker State from an East Brunswick car dealer, arrived at the high school’s auto shop class where it was driven up a ramped platform, secured and linked to a Dyno diagnostic tool to assess its deficiencies.
As students watched, Quaker State personnel, working in tandem with Ribiero, revved up the motor to check the engine’s performance rating and offloaded a bunch of statistical data on to a computer screen.
Over the next several weeks, students will evaluate the vehicle’s torque, engine, brakes, oil, wipers, etc., and figure out what is needed to get the vehicle to run optimally, said Kevin Pryblick, KHS supervisor of business technology.
But, as mentioned by Quaker State representative Bruce Firkins, it’s not just a simple matter of looking at the numbers to assess what’s wrong with the car: “You’ve got to know math, how to read graphs, to interpret the data so you can make the necessary corrections – that’s all part of the student’s education package.”
By the second day of their “trial heats,” Ribiero said, students were expected to come up with a list of parts to order along with a budget that matches AutoZone’s funding allocation for those purchases. Those parts were to be delivered by this week, he said.
“We have a list of modifications to the vehicle that we are required to do in the competition,” Ribiero said. “Beyond those, we can do whatever we want.”
For the final week, Quaker State will bring back the Dyno machine “to see how well we did,” Ribiero said.
The instructor said students’ labor on the test car is being incorporated as part of the auto shop curriculum and they’ll probably be putting in time on the vehicle at least twice a week, supplementing similar work being done on teachers’ and students’ personal vehicles the rest of the week.
Students appear excited about the prospects of delving into the guts of the Impala.
For example, 11th grader Justin Montanino said he’s been a car aficionado since around age 6 when he used to hang around “a little repair shop that my aunt and her husband opened in Pennsylvania.” And, since moving to Kearny, Justin has benefited from tips from some of his dad’s car buddies and has started building hot rods and muscle cars. “We bring them to competitions, see who has the loudest cars – I love it.”
Two other car junkies, juniors Jonathan Rodrigues and Shaun Rutzler, are also ready to roll with the project. “It’s something I love, something I was brought up around – I find loving,” said Jonathan, who lusts for a Subaru WRX STI, while Shaun, who enrolled in auto shop as a freshman as a lark “and I’ve loved it ever since. It’s definitely a career I’m going to pursue.”
