Tonight at Tinkering Night I didn't work on my project, instead Cody led a really fun class where we took apart electronics and learned whats inside of them and how they work. Every group started with a hard drive (which is labeled to the right). Part of the fun of it was figuring out where the engineers hid the screws when designing it. The inside of the hard drive was amazing and really made me value the hard work and creativity it takes to be an engineer. Cody and some of the other engineers helped me understand what each component of the hard drive does, which was the part I was most interested in. Below is a link if you want to learn about how a hard disk works: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4iaxOUYalJU After everyone had helped to take apart a hard drive we got to pick an electronic we wanted to take apart. There were so many cool choices but I thought it would be cool to take apart the laser printer really stood out to me because I use printers everyday practically. With a team of 6 people it took a while to take it apart but when we were done we found that there were two electronic boards. This was very surprising to me because usually engineers what to minimize space. I learned that the reason there are two hard drives is one is for the electrical components like transferring the information from the computer to the printer and the other is for the mechanical components. It makes sense in this case to have two separate hard drives because the mechanical components happen in a certain area of the printer primarily and the electrical components happen in another. So technically the engineers that designed the printer did save space. Another cool mechanism that the printer had was this rotating gear that counter how long the page was. It was such a simple technic, yet super efficient. Tonights activity reminded me the creativity and innovation behind simple objects, such as a printer, that we take advantage of everyday. Jami, Joci's mom, suggested for me to meet a high schooler named Meghana, who is the founder of a nonprofit organization called Limbs With Love. The organization prints and builds prosthetic hands for kids and adults all around the world and they are currently working on sensor technology in their hands. I met with her and her mentor at UTC Mall and of course brought the prosthetic hand I had been working on for Joci. I was curious about her organization and if they had any suggestions for the hand I had been working on. She said I was on the right track and her mentor also suggested that I might want to have a molded casing that Joci can slip her hand into so she can push her wrist against something harder then just a strap. At the end of the meeting Meghana invited me to be apart of her organization, which I might take her up on.
Today, Cody and I talked a lot about what we wanted to improve on. The original idea was to design are own prosthetic hand on CAD but we wanted to make sure Joci had a fully functional prosthetic hand first. We realized that the material Qualcomm uses in their machine shop caused to much friction so we decided to stick with PLA and ABS when printing. We also played around with stringing the prosthetic hand with a very thin flexible wire instead of the rope that Cody brought from his lab. Another idea that we put into action tonight was having the fingers move independently of each other. Before all the fingers moved at once with equal pressure as Joci bended her wrist. We intended on distributing the pressure on each finger and it worked. Below is the working hand with the pull system that allows for the fingers to move independently of each other and there are more photos on the photo gallery tab.
I was very nervous about meeting Joci, because I really wanted her to like me. I didn't only want to build this prosthetic hand I also think it is important to be a friend/mentor towards her. Saura had done this for me which was a big inspiration for my love of engineering. When I got to Thinkabit Joci wasn't there yet, but she came soon after I had arrived with her mom and brother. She was a spunky little girl with a lot of energy and was equally as excited to meet me. I had her try on the prosthetic hand and it fit her snuggly. The materials used made it a bit hard for her to bend her wrist and have the fingers curl. Her mom wanted to take it home for the weekend to see what other problems Joci faced and give me better feedback. Before they left I talked to Joci about what she wanted from the hand and if she had any questions for me. We ran around the lab for a bit and she even allowed me to do a secret game of hers that she only does with Saura, so I felt very special. We snuck into the elevator and rode up and down it pretending that we were spies. Although this may sound like all fun and games I was happy that I got the chance to play with her and act like a kid (which I am very good at). I really want her to get to know me so she could feel comfortable telling me problems she has on a daily basis so I can hopefully fix them.
After doing a little research on other prosthetic hands this week, I was eager to finish the prosthetic hand at Thinkabit and figure out the problems it encountered. When I got their I finished the hand, which didn't take that long. Not much longer after I had finished the hand a man named Cody, who works as an electrical engineer at Qualcomm, started talking to me. Funny enough he went to my dream college, Olin College of Engineering. He wanted to help me in the process of making the hand and of course I didn't object. It's always helpful to have someone to bounce ideas off of especially if that person has experience in what you are working on. He told me that in high school he experimented around with building a moving hand out of wood, wire, and string. Although the hand was not for actual human use it helped him understand how our joints work. I explaining Joci and my hopes for the prosthetic hand: for her to play softball with it. After talking to him for a while and showing him the prosthetic hand that I had just put together we brainstormed on a big piece of paper all the ideas we had and problems we thought we might encounter, so we could avoid them. Some of the points we made were:
Today when I got to Thinkabit the Cyborg Beast wrist had already been printed, thanks to Saura. The palm, fingers, and knuckle joints, had already been printed to 1.4 scale so the wrist was the last piece. I took it off of the 3D printer and got all the tools in preparation to put the pieces together. I used the cyborg beast website tutorial page and followed their directions. A lot of people at Tinkering night were curious about what I was working on and it was really fun representing Qualcomm and explaining how the hand worked. I made a lot of mistakes on putting it together. Saura wasn't at Thinkabit tonight and the instructions on the website weren't that clear so when I ran into problems I really had to think on my feet. For example the string wasn't stringing through very will so I used the plastic cord to push it through. I didn't finish by the end of the night but I was close.
Tonight was amazing! It was empowering to be amongst engineers of all age (young and old). Tinkering night is primarily for Qualcomm Employees and their families. Since Qualcomm is an engineering company a lot of engineers come but you might be surprised at how many people aren't engineers in the company, since there is more to the company then just making the chips for electronics, they also have to sell, market, ect. A lot of non-engineers like to learn what Qualcomm does on the engineering side, so they come to Tinkering Night.
I first looked at the prototypes Saura had previously worked on with the prosthetic hand. They were either too small or not functionable for Joci. After that I discussed the next plans with Saura: study up on the cyborg beast model, print a bigger size for the wrist, wire it up, then see what problems we encounter, and why they occur, and go from their. After that pizza and salad had arrived so Saura and I went into the lunch room. Since she was the only person I knew I sat down next to her at a table of Qualcomm engineers. Nicely, they didn't talk down to me but instead answered any questions I had. It was inspiring to talk amongst them and listen to what they were working on. After talking with them for a while I headed back into the lab to try and get the cyborg beast wrist model printing. The 3d printer was also broken so Saura and I attempted to fix it. We didn't really succeed before it was time to leave at 8:00. Saura waited for me until my mom got to Thinkabit, which was really nice of her. We talked a bit and I got an update about her secret project she has been working on. It was nice to talk with Saura because she is such an inspirational spark, that cares and shows girls the creativity and fun that engineering is. When I got in the car with my mom I couldn't stop talking about all that I had done. Can't wait till next week! Although I have already been doing this project for about two weeks, I was thinking I could also get school credit for all the hard work I have been putting into it. Below is my rubric/plan for my teacher: |
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