CAKEBOT: Sprint Review I

At the end of every two weeks, there is a "sprint review" where professors circulate between groups to hear about and give feedback on the progress of each team project. The CAKEBOT team met for a long session the night before to finalize the physical, first iteration of the CakeBot design. We also sketched out the integration of the components for future sprints to demonstrate that we at least thought about the mechanical, electronic and software pieces.

The actual prototype itself focused on the cake rotating platform -- which we knew we would absolutely need for decorations on the side/walls of a cake -- and initial ideas on the icing dispensing system for the face. For the rotating platform, I used a cut-out circle of 9-inch diameter (for standard cake size) and we connected it to a servo motor. I then programmed the Arduino to "sweep" the servo to and fro; the motor itself was pushed into a hole cut out in the foam base. The foam base most likely will be a wooden, hollow cube where we will store the electronics and scoop out a circular groove or track for ball bearings to pass through. The ball bearings will aid the rotation of the platform (cake) by lifting it above the lower height of the wooden base, diminishing friction and torque -- or power required by the motor to spin the cake.

Furthermore, Cassie and Emily looked heavily into the mechanical aspects of the icing dispenser. We found old project videos of a CNC Cake Decorator Robot and noted issues with its decorating abilities, notably the dripping of excess or over-pressured icing. One way to resolve the squiggly lines resulting from drips and over-pressure is to cut off the flow of icing when need be. To do so, we designed a cylinder within a cylinder: the inner cylinder holds and pushed out the icing from storage while the outer cylinder directs the flow into an icing tip and onto the cake itself. When the system reads breaks in the icing, it stops the pressure and rotates the inner cylinder away -- that way, since the two holes are not aligned, no icing can "drip" or hang. Our ideas were well-received by the professors though they also directed us to focus our energy on more pressing, troublesome issues at the beginning and not the end. So, when we meet this weekend, we'll go through our list and hopefully ice a cake, noting the many items to consider in creating a mechanized decorator.