Students Benefit from Hands-On Experience
Launch the media gallery 1 player - media #1Overall IVVC for the last two years has taught us a ton, and we have benefited from the hands-on experience. I have gained the ability to work on my own vehicles and save myself some money. The instructors in the automotive classes are very knowledgeable and they have always guided me down the right path.
In the first-year class I learned the basics, from safety, to the uses of the different types of tools. We then moved on to lift safety and how to properly place a vehicle up on a lift. Next, we moved on to mounting, dismounting, and balancing tires. From there we moved on to a unit for brake components. We practiced taking apart and putting back together drum brakes and replacing their shoes to the systems for disc brakes.
During the year me and a few of my friends took on the project of building a lift kit for a customer's vehicle and although it took us some time to do it, we accomplished it and learned a ton in the process. This gave us the opportunity to put all the things we had been learning to the test. As we moved through the year we moved along to things like alignments and how to drill and tap holes. Finally at the end of the year we got to work on an old gold wing from 1994. We pulled it all apart and looked at how everything works.
That moves us into this year (my second year) where we took the engine from that gold wing and split it open to look at how it functioned. We have also taken apart an old 6.0L engine and examined what went wrong for the engine to lose compression. Along with doing all the different projects, we had all of the regular jobs like oil changes, tires, and brakes. In the second-year class we still spent some time in the classroom, but most of our time was spent working like a real shop taking on outside projects.
This year we have learned a lot more about the meat and potatoes of automotive work, learning about engines and transmissions. With our teachers' insight we have been able to get through many challenges and learn new ways to approach these situations. Overall, I would recommend IVVC to any student willing to put in the effort to learn these skills. It has been a great time and the best part of my day.