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Does it Work?
Does it Work?
As the team came to a conclusive design at the end of Phase 3. Phase 4 was dedicated to determining the validity of this "dream design". This design implemented several key components that would further provide accuracy and distinct results to further mechanically characterize human skin. So lets begin by breaking these components down!
The Four Part Breakdown
The Four Part Breakdown
The critical pieces leading to the success of our prototype are as follows: the peristaltic pump, the fabricated cups, the ported pressure sensors, and the arduino DAQ. The peristaltic pump provides critical negative pressure within the tubing and cup cavity to deform the skin exactly 1mm within the skin. Attached to the cup is two sets of tubing, one running through the peristaltic pump to create the negative pressure, and one running to an accessory ported pressure sensor to take a measurement once a 1mm seal is created within the cup. As the skin undergoes the 8-10 second deformation to 1mm the main pressure sensor diverted off the pump by a valve is constantly taking pressure readings over time and relaying this information to the arduino (DAQ). These results can be shown below as the DAQ was capable of exporting this data and creating graphs in excel running a specific macro.
The information below proves that our prototype was more than capable of creating the negative pressure cavity we needed; however, our alpha prototype exhibited a rather inexpensive peristaltic pump. This effective yet inexpensive pump proved a great point for the team to move forward, but wasn't capable of displaying a flow rate or rpm on a screen for us to know exactly how hard the pump was working. To best mechanically characterize skin the team needed a pump capable of these features, and that is one of the most important differences for the Beta-prototype within Phase 5! Stay tuned!
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