Two very excited teams of Quadcopter enthusiasts headed to Levenmouth Academy on Thursday 25th September. The purpose of the visit: receive Quadcopter kits and begin building drones!

A few months ago, Raytheon announced their Quadcopter Challenge has now become so popular that there would need to be qualifier rounds to get to the Build and Fly stage. For months, two teams of S3 students worked hard on presentations to prove why they are the best people for the job. They sent their presentations off to the judges at Raytheon, and just after the summer holidays were given the news that they had both progressed to the next round! Many teams across Fife entered, but only five progressed, so to have both KHS teams be successful was quite an achievement.

On Thursday, at Levenmouth Academy, qualifying teams were given a box of kit and an instruction manual. Team SAS dug straight in, throwing pieces together as they were already familiar with the constructions of drones. Their quadcopter came together very quickly. Team KDAS were slow and methodical and double-checked instructions as they went.

When it came to turning the quadcopters on, both teams encountered issues. Team SAS had misconnected some wires – a consequence of not checking the manual thoroughly! Lessons were learned. Both teams discovered that we had been sent faulty motors from the manufacturer, and the quadcopters would not be ready to fly at this time. What a disappointment!

Levenmouth were able to source some spare motors and got their quadcopter up and running in the designated area. Raytheon helped piece together some bits of working quadcopters to give both KHS teams a chance to fly their drone before heading back to school for the day. Both teams showed signs of great flying skills. One of the Raytheon engineers said she would take both team’s quadcopters home with her to fix and would bring them back to school for us the next day.

Team SAS and Team KDAS are looking forward to the following:

• The regional final, consisting of five teams, being held at the start of November
• Re-editing their presentations for the final. The judges are looking for even more content and even more lessons learned!
• Practising flying the quadcopters in the gym halls, with the cooperation of the KHS PE department
• Modifying the quadcopters for better functionality – already both teams have come up with some great ideas

The quadcopters are now back in the school and ready to continue on this adventure…

Keep your eyes on the KHS socials to see what happens next!