For the midterm project, Hayden Webb and I decided to make a retro-style television set with a miniature scene with moving pieces visible inside it. While this little scene took some time to come up with, we eventually, through the iterative Check-Ins, decided upon having the Chaus squirrel (dressed as Alvin the Chipmunk) chaseDr. Wettergreen throughout the OEDK. To accomplish this, we would have the character pieces moving up and down on the rotating living hinge, with a rotating background utilizing mechanisms 055 and 138 from the 507 Movements.
Check-in 1:
To start our design process, we first created 2-D drawings of our conceptual design using Adobe Illustrator. In this, we utilized https://en.makercase.com/ to create our box shape for the TV, and found our test characters on https://thenounproject.com/. As shown, we had the basic idea for the TV established in what we wanted the general shape to be, and how we wanted the pieces to move within the space. For a starting position, this check-in established how the idea for our design that could be built upon as we iterated forward.
Check-in 2:
Following this, we had moved towards creating a low fidelity prototype. On the Epilog Laser Cutter, we cut pieces of cardboard using the first check-in’s design to create this iteration of what we actually wanted our creation to be. While smaller than the final scale we created, this prototype served us well in teaching us a number of issues and/or changes that we needed to make within our design. On this, the gears worked with some friction issues (lubrication was needed), and instead of creating the full wave track we would have in further check-ins (making a living hinge out of cardboard was not feasible as this material burnt too easily for precise cuts) we decided to add small cardboard raises onto the outer gear to imitate the function of our wave track. Additionally, we learned that the gears would need to be offset slightly from their original placement as the teeth were not capable of perfectly connecting to rotate freely. Shown here is the constructed low fidelity prototype, and with its construction we moved towards recreating the project in higher fidelity materials.
Check-in 3:
For this check-in, we laser cut our parts from high fidelity materials, as shown, and began the assembly process (With this iteration at a larger scale than the previous). For the body of the TV, wood was lasercut according to our original design. Using an iterative process, the wood was first cut with painters tape across the top to prevent laser-burn and then removed to allow for a clean raster for the design of the piece. Additionally, wood was used for the gearing as its solid material properties allowed for more pressure to be applied without any form of damage occurring. Furthermore, we laser cut acrylic for the sticks holding up the characters as it played into the aesthetic for the piece we were going for (Children’s popsicle stick theater) and hid what allowed the character’s to move up and down. Finally, Vinyl was cut to decorate the TV buttons and dials with aluminum being waterjet cut in the shape of an antenna to act as the lever arm for the top crank (The extruding antenna could be grasped to freely rotate the piece).
Check-in 4:
For this final check-in, we assembled the entirety of the TV. Upon its construction, we finished the detailing of the piece wherein we used scrap fabric to decorate the characters (Squirrel & Dr. Wettergreen), background (composed of the Maker Bar, Large Classroom, and Computer Lab), and curtains of the piece after their attachment to their respective parts. Additionally, we stained the entire box with Linseed oil to match the wood grain of older style TV’s (The goal for the aesthetic of the box) and buffed/clear coated the antenna piece. In this construction unfortunately, when you rotate the living hinge, the characters would become caught on the living hinge, This was due to the bottom rail-guides (i.e. popsicle sticks) becoming caught within the grooves of the living hinge due to a sideways displacement when the piece turned. While it did not work fully, when both characters go “downhill” the TV does turn and rotate as expected. But when going “uphill” the dragging occurs and the piece does not work correctly. Despite this, all utilized gears were 100% fully functional and both the Squirrel & Dr. Wettergreen’s characters were capable of translational movement on piece when rotating the antenna crank as seen in the video. What helped this movement in addition to small modifications was having a number of the pieces sanded down to ease up some of the friction and lubricated to reduce the friction as much as possible.
We put together the following slide deck to show our progress:
Cost Calculation:
Overall, we both put together around 25 hours of work on this project, so assuming Texas minimum wage of $7.25 an hour, the cost of labor is $362.50. The larger wood sheets for laser cutting were found on amazon for $30 for 20 counts, so with reprinting kept in mind we used approximately 2 of those sheets, rounding the price to approximately $3.00. Furthermore, a 24” x 12” piece of acrylic costs $25 and we used roughly 6” x 6” of acrylic (Again accounting for recuts), bringing the cost to $3.13. While the cost of the aluminum was unknown as no reputable source could be utilized, we presumed the cost to be approximately $6.00. So in total, this project cost $368.63 for the entire design and assembly process..
Reflection:
There was a lot learned throughout this process: to be honest our final product is incredibly altered from what we were originally planning from before the starting check-in. There were a number of times where we backed ourselves into a corner and had to reevaluate multiple aspects of our project to determine the best step to move forward. However, we learned how aspects of designs that work on lower fidelity prototypes may not work once you increase the fidelity and material quality. From this though, we gleaned how you can try to find solutions to problems that continue to not work through different design perspectives. Furthermore, we learned how to anticipate future problems through the design process and plan for them further in advance by working proactively, as well as the importance of timing and planning for errors when we need to be reactionary. At times this process was frustrating (Pieces not fitting, aspects not working, etc.), but overall it was fun to create something that at least was somewhat functional and aesthetically pleasing as a result of our hard work during the duration of the process.
