WELD awarded a $1,000 prize to Kansas City Art Institute (KCAI) student Noah Geiger for his directional on-spoke wheel design. Geiger participated in the first annual WELD KCAI Performance Design Challenge contest, which was open to students enrolled in the virtual sculpture design program at KCAI. The contest was conducted in conjunction with the WELD-sponsored KCAI Art of the Car Concours event held on June 28 at the school campus in Kansas City, Montana.
Geiger, a native of Rapid City, South Dakota, is studying sculpture at KCAI and will be a junior in the fall. Geiger designed his wheel to be coated in black except for the exterior face, which is polished.
“My design follows the ideas of fractals and an understanding of the rotation around a single point in relation to the drive of forward progression,” said Geiger. “Being that this is a directional wheel, there are two sets of opposing wheels that work together.”
The partnership between WELD and KCAI was in conjunction with the college’s Sponsored Studio program where students are given actual projects to complete on behalf of area businesses. The students who participated in the contest had the opportunity to visit WELD’s Kansas City manufacturing facility to learn about recent developments in computer aided design (CAD) and finite element analysis (FEA) modeling before beginning their designs. Geiger’s wheel was produced by WELD, with slight modifications to accommodate its manufacturing standards. The wheel was unveiled for the first time at this year’s Art of the Car Concours.
The Art of the Car Concours is a benefit for the KCAI scholarship fund. The Concours features more than 200 vintage, classic and special interest vehicles, including cars, trucks, race cars, motorcycles and pedal cars. Additional information can be found here.
“We congratulate Noah on his innovative wheel design,” said Norm Young, president and CEO, WELD. “We are proud to be involved with educational endeavors like this that support the arts and the education of young people who we hope will someday join our industry.”
All WELD wheels are engineered, produced, and tested at WELD’s facilities in Kansas City using only aircraft-grade aluminum alloys and state-of-the-art manufacturing processes.
For more information about WELD or any of the WELD brands, call 800-788-9353 or go to WELDwheels.com.
