Dallas College EFx Team Turns Setback Into a Starting Point

April 21, 2026

When Dallas College hosted the ASME EFx competition at Richland Campus on April 10-11, one team learned more than just how to build a vehicle.

Dallas College STEM students Ari Hernandez, Charan Venkatesh, Erick Flores-Ortega and Aveen Alfatal participated in the e-Human Powered Vehicle Challenge (e-HPVC), and while they didn’t cross the finish line, they left with something arguably more valuable: real-world engineering experience, collegewide support, and a foundation for future students to build upon.

From Inspiration to Initiative

Last year, marked the first time Dallas College hosted the ASME EFx competition, which brings together mostly four-year universities from across the United States and Mexico. 

Volunteering at the event gave Dallas College students, including Hernandez, a chance to view the vehicles from other schools up close.

“I saw all these incredible vehicles going around and knowing that these students were making them. And I just really wanted to take part in that.”

While Dallas College had competed in the student design portion of the event, they hadn’t previously participated in the e-HPVC event, where teams design, build, and race innovative, sustainable, and highly engineered vehicles that combine human muscle power with electrical assistance.

With fellow STEM League students Venkatesh, Flores-Ortega and Alfatal on board, the team came together last December to begin designing their vehicle. 

Each brought their own strengths and areas of study: engineering, mechatronics and computer-aided design (CAD). 

“None of us had actually built a vehicle from scratch,” said Venkatesh. “We’ve worked on motorcycles and our cars, but there's nothing like building a vehicle from scratch.” 

“We had no background experience in welding, so we were trying to be lofty with our design process but also take into account our own actual limitations in terms of what we know,” said Hernandez. 

The students reached out to the welding department at Dallas College Mountain View Campus for guidance and hands-on support. That partnership influenced a key design choice. The team selected steel for the vehicle frame because it’s easier to weld and more forgiving for first-time fabricators.

Flores-Ortega had a heavy hand in the design process by creating 3D renderings while Alfatal took on most of the welding. Additional support from across the college proved essential. 

Faculty and staff from welding, robotics and CAD contributed time, equipment and expertise. The STEM Institute director, Dr. Jason Treadway, and the STEM League coordinator, Fabiola Resendiz, acted as advisors and helped bring the team together. Even Student Life at Mountain View provided space for the team to store materials.

“Those connections did end up helping get the vehicle farther along than we probably could have done ourselves,” said Flores-Ortega.

A Race Against Time

With manufacturing beginning just two months prior to the event, the team pushed to assemble the vehicle in a matter of weeks. 

“It was a huge undertaking, but we all got together and we got it done. And that's one thing that I'm really proud of. We got a whole vehicle together in 20 days,” said Venkatesh. 

That rapid build demonstrated not only technical skill but also leadership and project management under pressure.
Working through disagreements and making quick decisions mirrored real-world engineering environments. 

“It was a lot of leadership and teamwork, because sometimes we also didn't agree. And with the time constraints we had to be like, okay, as a team, let's vote on it. What's our best approach?” explained Flores-Ortega.

Lessons From the Track

The vehicle was completed on time, but the day of the event proved additional challenges for the team. The seat failed the event’s safety checks and so they were unable to race. 

The outcome was disappointing, but the team framed the experience as a valuable learning opportunity. 

“This momentary failure was an incredible growing experience. I know we were all a bit disheartened at the moment, but at the end of the day, it was very much a contributor toward our growth as students,” said Hernandez.

Even without racing, the group came away from the event with a positive experience. ASME EFx offers more than just competition; it also focuses on networking and community building. 

Meeting students from four-year universities gave the Dallas College team new perspectives. 

“Getting to meet students from other universities, learning what their techniques were, how they worked as a team, and how we could borrow some of that experience and utilize that for our next competition … that was a great experience,” said Venkatesh.

“Even seeing some of the other teams struggle made it seem more realistic for us to actually be able to recruit for next year now that we have a base,” said Flores-Ortega.

Passing the Torch

The students hope the vehicle they built can be used as a recruiting tool and a learning platform for incoming students to take over, build upon and compete with next year.   

Overall, the experience of participating in ASME EFx strengthened technical skills, fostered teamwork and created a blueprint for future students. For a two-year college competing against four-year institutions, the lessons learned and relationships formed may be the most important victories of all.
  

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