The base and top plate, along with the plunger, were 3D printed using a carbon fiber reinforced ABS filament. Several iterations of the top and base plate had to be printed, mainly due to tolerancing issues with rod holes, watertight container indent, and load cell indent. Other materials were purchased from McMaster-Carr like the rods, nuts, and acrylic tubing.

The load cell was connected to a load cell amplifier and low cost DAQ board, feeding the measurements directly into the DAQExpress computer software. A recording of the voltage change from the transducer was taken on DAQExpress. 

For the lifting force testing, we expected a linear increase in force followed by a plateau, but the readings were much closer to zero due to two main factors. First, the excitation voltage on the load cell amplifier was low (5V) and couldn't be increased due to the load cell's voltage limit. Second, using a sponge instead of a hydrogel replacement material resulted in negligible force exertion when it swelled. These issues, along with noise from the load cell, led to the lack of observed voltage change in the lifting force test.

Our data showed that our test fixture successfully conducted the swelling test with our chosen stand-in nucleus. We observed a significant linear increase in weight from the dry to fully swollen state, with consistent swelling rates across time intervals and minimal weight deviation. The stand-ins reached a maximum swelling capacity, indicated by a constant weight over time.