Students start chopper creations

4 high school teams building motorcycles with April deadline

MANITOWOC — Matt Worley, 18, believes designing the frame and gas tank will be a challenge.

However, the senior does have welding skills that will come in handy as his Lincoln High School team builds a mini-chopper motorcycle over the next seven months.

"The clock is ticking" on devising initial conceptual sketches said Tom Bushman, Electric Utility director at Two Rivers Power & Light by day, and adviser in the evening to the Roncalli High School team of seven boys and one girl.

Think Paul Teutul Sr. and Orange County Choppers, the custom motorcycle fabricators, except on a downsized scale — but still creating a possibly street-legal machine.

A second Lincoln team, along with one from Valders High School, and Project Mini-Chopper is a four-way competition, with finished two-wheelers due April 15 in time to be shown off at the Ant Hill Mob's spring motorcycle show.

The Chamber of Manitowoc County and the Economic Development Corporation of Manitowoc County are the principal sponsors.

Their mission is to improve the image of manufacturing, and help students, parents, educators and the public understand that manufacturing provides excellent career opportunities.

"You'll have the opportunity to build something real … and have fun, too," Tom Musial, senior vice president of human resources at the Manitowoc Company, told students at one of four recent kickoff events held at the sponsoring companies.

In addition to the Manitowoc Company, Spancrete, LDI Industries and Wisconsin Aluminum Foundry, each have contributed $5,000 to underwrite the cost of parts associated with the engine, wheel assemblies, brakes, frame, fenders, seat, hand controls, forks, and other components.

"Skilled trades are the backbone of the American economy to come," Steve Braham, vice president of Operations for Manitowoc Crane, told a Lincoln team.

Potential career paths linked to the skills learned on the project include mechanical, electrical and manufacturing engineer, welder, painter, machinist, project manager, quality engineer-control, business management, and safety compliance.

'Putting the talents together'

Derrick Fallon, technical education instructor at Lincoln, said his school has most of the equipment necessary to build a mini-chopper. "Some of the fancier or intricate detail work may be done outside of the school," Fallon said.

"Many of the students have done engineering or (computer-aided) drawing, but not machining or vice-versa … putting the talents together will be a challenge," Fallon said.

He said the 22 students who volunteered to be on the school's two teams tend to be high-energy achievers.

"The teachers are very excited, too," Fallon said. "This should be fun and educational for the students."
David Dahleen, senior manufacturing engineer at Manitowoc Cranes, is an adviser to one of the Lincoln teams.

He explained that at the end of September mini-chopper project teams are scheduled to run their conceptual sketches past the corporate sponsors, with CAD (computer assisted design) work due in October.

"Every one of the persons on the Roncalli team will have to do a piece of everything," Bushman explained of the learning environment expected to be common with all four squads.

"All will learn how to weld, drill, mill, use a lathe, though not every student will have as much involvement in each area as one of the others," Bushman said. "But they'll all have knowledge of the skills necessary to have the whole project come together."

Teamwork essential

Another adviser to the Roncalli team is John Vogel, owner of Vogel Auto Body and father of student-member Joe Vogel.

"The biggest challenge will be learning to work together as a group," Vogel said. "I told them they might want to set up two groups and dual track the work."

"This is a leap of faith for us because we don't have an on-site industrial arts program," said John Stelzer, Roncalli's president.

The Jets team's machine will be built at Lakeshore Technical College, which will be granting three college-level credits to mini-chopper team members from the four high schools.

Roncalli students spent the past two Wednesday evenings at LTC taking safety instruction in grinding and use of other tools, and beginning to read blueprints.

A quality engineer at Roncalli's sponsor, Wisconsin Aluminum Foundry, Kevin Dimmick, said he will be hands-off unless the students ask for help.

A motorcycle builder himself, Dimmick said, "One of the challenges for me will be to not grab a wrench and help."

Staunch booster

John Lukas, vice president of LDI Industries, didn't have too much trouble convincing his brothers, Tom Lukas and Mark Lukas, to sponsor a team.

The hydraulics and lubrications manufacturer has been a strong supporter of Youth Options and other Student-to-Work programs, as well as internships and apprenticeships.

"We live and breathe manufacturing … the draw of the mini-chopper program is it gets the students involved in design and drawing, creative thinking, machining, fabricating and assembly," John Lukas said.

"I hope the Project Mini-Chopper catches on, and in the coming years we have an increase in the number of teams and corporate sponsors," Lukas said.