February 14th - 17th 2023 : Microchallenge 1¶
Link to repo https://github.com/PaigePerill/gotaplatemold-
Reflection
I allied with Sami and June for Microchallenge 1. We wanted to create an interchangeable biomaterial press, where various mold could be swapped out.
As we drew some prototypes on paper and illustrator, we realised laser cutting technology was not the most appropriate for that idea, so we focused on creating a mold only 1 or 2 layers deep, which could make shallow plates. The interchangeable aspect then was more about positionning holes for screws that would make possible multiple plate configurations.
We laser cut on cardboard on a small scale first to see if the holes were aligned and everything fit togtheer - and then we laser cut a the full scale on acrylic. Our tests were succesful but still the plates felt small. We might try again to make bigger plates.
To incorporate electronics we hoped we could make a humidity sensor that might be able to detect when the interior of the biomaterial was drying, or whether it was stayiong humid for too long (unfortunately I was away for that part so I can’t reflect on it)