Newman Students Have Been Clocking up the Hours

Cardinal Newman students Hussain Alkachkach and Yoovraj Chekori have created a system that could revolutionise subsequent cooling systems.

The pair, who previously studied at Penwortham Priory Academy, started this whole idea whilst they were still at school. After approaching the Head Teacher, with the idea to create a rig, which is a model computer, to demonstrate airflow in order to get the computer to reach speeds of 4.6 gigahertz. After winning the ABCAM plc STEM Innovation Award, which is a national award, a private firm called F2 Chemicals then approached the duo to attempt a trial of their system using a chemical inside the computer as a coolant. This is the first time that such an experiment has been carried out, as subsequent cooling is not the most common type of cooling system for overclocking. Generally, liquid nitrogen is used to cool down overclocked computers, so Hussain and Yoovraj’s experiment is truly innovative.

When they started at Cardinal Newman, Yoovraj and Hussain then decided to bring the experiment to the next level as part of Hussain’s EPQ. The basic premise is to overclock the computer, which is forcing it to work harder and faster than it normally would, reaching speeds of over 5 gigahertz instead of 4 gigahertz, which would be a computer’s normal maximum capacity.

Hussain and Yoovraj’s experiment pushed the computer to run at 5.2 gigahertz, where you would normally expect to see the computer massively overheat with temperatures of up to 120 Degrees. With their subsequent cooling system in place, the temperature remained between 68 – 81 degrees throughout the experiment.

When tested in industry, overclockers often only run their tests for two to three minutes, but Hussain and Raj were able to get their experiment to work successfully for almost five minutes. This is a massive achievement for the pair, as Raj said: “We are only 17, we’re not experts.”

You might expect, given the type of experiment that they are running that they would be studying Computing or Sciences at Cardinal Newman, but Hussain is studying A Levels in Sociology, English Literature and Business Studies and Raj is studying a BTEC Extended Diploma in Business Studies.