Aspiring Mechanical Engineer · Problem Solver · Builder
Designing automotive components with CAD, building robots with FRC Team 949, swimming competitively, and solving Rubik’s cubes — looking for the engineering in everything.
Rubik’s cube personal best
FRC Team 949 local event win
Varsity swimming
Years violin — self taught
I’ve been taking things apart since I was a kid — and I’ve gotten reasonably good at putting them back together. Growing up watching my dad work on his Mitsubishi Evo in our garage, I learned early that engineering isn’t just a textbook subject — it’s the habit of asking why something works, and what you could do to make it work better.
My interest in mechanical engineering lives at the intersection of several things I love: the physics of how machines move, the math that describes them, and the satisfaction of building something real you can hold, test, and improve. Formula 1 crystallizes all of that for me — every race is a live experiment in vehicle dynamics, aerodynamics, materials science, and decision-making under pressure.
Joining FRC Team 949 — the Bellevue Wolverines — as a junior was one of the best decisions I’ve made. Working on the mechanical/build side of the robot, I’ve learned what it feels like to design something fast, make it physical, and watch it either work or fail on the field. Both outcomes teach you something.
I’ve played violin since fifth grade at Medina Elementary — entirely self-taught, no private teacher, just a deep love of the instrument and the discipline to practice. That same self-directed approach carries into engineering: if something interests me, I’ll find a way to learn it, whether that’s CAD, automotive diagnostics, or how a suspension damper’s compression curve affects vehicle balance.
Speedcubing is my other unusual passion. A 9.41-second solve looks like magic, but it’s pure pattern recognition, muscle memory, and algorithmic thinking — skills that map surprisingly well onto engineering problem-solving. And swimming four years of varsity has taught me the value of showing up, even when the progress is invisible.
Robotics, 3D printing, CAD, working on the Evo — I learn fastest when I’m making something physical.
Engineering mindset, speedcubing, and math — I’m drawn to puzzles with real-world consequences.
Four years of varsity swimming, a decade of self-taught violin, thousands of cube solves — I don’t quit things.
Every project here started with a real problem and ended with something physical I could test, measure, and improve. No hypotheticals.
Our Evo needed a clean way to mount an aftermarket boost gauge and oil temperature sender without drilling into the dash or buying an ugly universal bracket. I decided to design and print my own. What looked like a simple fabrication task turned into a real engineering project — measurement, modeling, iteration, failure, and refinement.
No factory-fit solution existed. Off-the-shelf pods were expensive, poorly toleranced, and blocked the driver’s view of the HVAC controls.
Measured the dash with digital calipers, photographed the mounting surfaces from multiple angles, then built the geometry in Fusion 360 before designing around it.
Three prototype iterations led to a final part that mounts flush, holds both gauges at the right viewing angle, and requires zero permanent modification to the car.
Spent two sessions with calipers mapping the A-pillar cross-section and dash clearances. Discovered the factory dash has a small flex tolerance I could exploit for a snap-fit retention feature — something I wouldn’t have found without careful measurement.
Built the base geometry starting with the mounting interface, not the aesthetic. Made the gauge cutouts parametric so the design could adapt to different gauge diameters without rebuilding from scratch.
First print was 1.2mm undersized — I hadn’t accounted for FDM shrinkage. The retention tabs also cracked during installation because the wall thickness was too uniform. Adjusted both before reprinting.
Dimensional fit improved significantly. But sitting in the driver seat with a cardboard mockup, I realized the gauge viewing angle was about 8° off. Back to the model to adjust the cradle angle.
Corrected angle, added an M3 heat-set insert pocket for secure secondary retention, switched to 40% gyroid infill for vibration resistance. The part has been installed and working without issues.
My dad’s Mitsubishi Evo has been my most hands-on engineering classroom. From suspension work to brake system service to reading OBD-II data, every session in the garage connects abstract physics concepts to physical reality. This isn’t just car enthusiasm — it’s applied mechanical engineering.
Suspension, brakes, performance diagnostics, data logging — multiple sessions over two summers
Lead on suspension and brake work alongside my dad. Parts research, measurement, installation, and data interpretation.
Diagnosis is engineering. Measurement is engineering. Every data point from the OBD-II scanner is the car telling you something.
Used corner-weight scales to measure static weight distribution. Studied the relationship between ride height, spring perch position, and weight transfer during cornering.
Full coilover swap — learned about spring rate selection, motion ratio, and how a stiffer spring affects both handling response and ride compliance. The trade-offs are real.
Researched camber curves and why negative front camber increases contact patch during high-speed cornering. Dialed in alignment values using reference string method.
Rotor and pad replacement — went deep on brake bias, why rear-heavy braking causes oversteer, and how caliper piston area affects hydraulic force distribution.
Connected EvoScan and logged boost pressure, air-fuel ratio, knock counts, intake temps, and coolant temps simultaneously. Learning to read time-series data and correlate events.
Deep reading on turbo compressor maps, wastegate dynamics, and boost control solenoid operation — theory I could suddenly visualize on our actual hardware.
Worked on a three-person team to design, build, and compete a combat robot at the University of Washington’s engineering summer program. We won the final competition. The compressed timeline and real stakes — your robot either moves, fights, and survives, or it doesn’t — made this one of the most intense engineering experiences I’ve had.
Three themes run through everything I do: building things, solving problems, and showing up consistently over the long term.
Joined FRC Team 949 as a junior and immediately dove into the mechanical/build side of the robot — fabrication, tools, sub-system assembly, and on-field troubleshooting. I’m responsible for key mechanical components and plan to continue through senior year, likely in a leadership role.
Four years on varsity — swimming since early childhood through club programs. It’s the activity that has taught me the most about the relationship between consistent effort and long-term improvement. The gains are rarely visible day-to-day, but they accumulate. Interested in a team captain role senior year.
I started playing violin in 5th grade at Medina Elementary, continued through Odle Middle School, and play in orchestra at Bellevue High School — entirely self-taught, no private teacher. Learning a demanding instrument through self-directed practice has shaped how I approach learning anything new: patient, systematic, and honest about where the gaps are.
I’ve been solving Rubik’s cubes daily for years — millions of solves at this point. My personal best is 9.41 seconds. To most people it looks like a party trick; to me it’s pure algorithm engineering: pattern recognition, decision trees, and optimizing a sequence under time pressure. The same thinking style I bring to mechanical problems.
Paid summer employment — monitoring pools, enforcing safety, and responding to emergencies. The job demands sustained attention, fast risk assessment, and decisive action. Red Cross certified in CPR/AED and First Aid. The engineering lesson: redundant safety systems exist for a reason, and protocol matters most when things go wrong.
Completed Johns Hopkins’ Engineering Innovation program — a rigorous, university-level engineering summer course for high school students. Exposed to formal engineering design methodology, problem framing, and the kind of academic expectations I’ll encounter in college. One of the more directly relevant academic experiences I’ve had outside of school.
Three-person team design-build-compete format at UW’s summer engineering camp. Our team won the final competition. Working within a tight timeline with real competitive stakes — your robot either survives or it doesn’t — accelerated my understanding of design tradeoffs faster than any classroom exercise.
Active in my church community through a discipleship small group, audio/video technical support for services, and volunteering for Vacation Bible School. Community service that keeps me grounded outside of academics and athletics — and the A/V tech role is a genuine engineering application in a different context.
Writing forces me to figure out what I actually understand versus what I only think I understand.
Every F1 decision is an optimization problem with competing constraints. Downforce vs. drag. Tire compound vs. lap time. Pit window vs. track position. When I started understanding there’s no “right answer” — only the best answer given a specific set of conditions — engineering clicked in a new way for me.
Read full entry →Three failed prototypes and months of iteration later, I have a gauge mount that fits. What I didn’t expect: the most valuable lessons came from the failures. Each broken print or mis-fit part was a data point. The project became less about the mount and more about learning to iterate without getting demoralized.
Read full entry →A 9.41-second solve looks like memorization. It’s actually algorithm optimization, spatial reasoning, and decision-making under sub-second time pressure. The same mental framework I use to approach a robot mechanism problem or a CAD constraint — decompose, recognize patterns, execute in sequence.
Read full entry →I expected technical problems. I didn’t expect the team dynamics to be as hard as the engineering. Getting five people to agree on a mechanism design under a six-week deadline — with real competition stakes — taught me more about collaborative engineering than any project I’d done alone.
Read full entry →After working on the Evo all summer, I realized the most important thing I did wasn’t the coilover install or the brake service. It was learning to ask the right question before reaching for a wrench. Diagnosis is engineering. Measurement is engineering. Reading data is engineering.
Read full entry →No teacher, just the instrument and a willingness to be bad at something for a long time. Ten years later, I’m in orchestra. The lesson isn’t about violin — it’s about what’s possible when you stop waiting for someone to explain something and just start trying things and paying attention to what happens.
Read full entry →Whether you’re an admissions counselor reviewing my application, an engineer willing to chat about the field, or a fellow student into robotics, F1, or speedcubing — I’m glad you’re here.