Our Mission

This semester's final challenge was an entire-class Rube Goldberg machine, where each team built a portion of an RGM. Our group wanted to make a self-assembling Gingerbread house as part of our contribution to the machine. During the Final Expo, we actually managed to get a run without any interventions!

The purpose of this project was for us, on a surface level, to learn and employ basic ideas from physics, code, and electronic circuits, which we learned in class, but it was also to practice our skills with scheduling, planning, and the engineering design process.

Through this project, we learned two fabrication methods:  3D Printing and Lasercutting which we'll discuss later. 

Project Development

Initial Prototype 

Description: Our first prototype used 4 servos to simply lift up the walls. Afterward, a magnet would roll out of the house down a ramp and attract another magnet acting as a counterweight for our pulley, which lowered the roof down afterward. 

Final Prototype 

Electronics (Final)

For our electronics setup we utilized Sparkfun Motor drivers(TB6612FNG), along with 4 DC motors (4.5V DC DAGU DG10D). The motors are controlled by the motor drivers, and the motor drivers are controlled by the raspberry pi microcontroller. As the motors spin, the walls of the gingerbread house are pulled up. All of these actions begin with the limit switch being actuated (see figure 2 for wiring). 

AutoCAD

Development and iterations 

Since we were the last group, we knew we wanted to produce some sort of on theme deliverable since we couldn't end with transitioning into the next group. Initially with the kitchen theme we had thought