Powell High School's ambitious art project is nearly finished

Posted 5/31/22

The F-22 Raptor at Powell High School is just about ready to take flight. 

PHS art teacher Jim Gilman decided early this year they would take on the ambitious project. The decision was a …

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Powell High School's ambitious art project is nearly finished

Posted

The F-22 Raptor at Powell High School is just about ready to take flight. 

PHS art teacher Jim Gilman decided early this year they would take on the ambitious project. The decision was a combination of needing to fill a large space and believing that the students were ready for the complex design of the plane.

According to the U.S. Airforce website the F-22 is the newest plane in the Air Force and began development in 1986. After years of rigorous testing it was put into production in 2005. With stronger thrust than any other fighter plane and highly engineered aerodynamics the F-22 is one of the most well-designed and advanced aircrafts ever, which made it the perfect challenge for PHS art.

“I thought it’d be fun to try with all of the different techniques we had kind of perfected over the last few years that we could attempt this now,” Gilman said. “This is a very complicated thing, this is a complicated shape, but we could do it this year.”

After a few bumps in the road the plane is nearly done, with only a few small additions and alterations to be made including the door motors, which were more complicated than expected.

“The doors were very hard for some reason,” said senior Kyler Warren. “Francis and I spent four months working on the doors. Basically, we spent a solid month building a complicated gearbox that would open four doors at the same time. It didn’t work and we ran it, and it kind of tore itself apart.”

Gilman explained the coding required was a bit unfamiliar to the robotics students he recruited for the project. After consulting his son, an engineer with Raytheon Technologies, Gilman learned the code would be complicated for anybody. He jokes that “a Raytheon employee will be working on it this summer.”

Overall, Gilman said students have done a good job of replicating the real plane.

“There’s still some flaws but mostly you’d have to be an aeronautical engineer, and have probably worked on this plane, or possibly a pilot or ground maintenance person to recognize the differences,” Gilman said.

Powell High School

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