Fab Corn

What will it do?

The pop-corn machine will pop popcorn with the use of a nichrome wire (heating element) embedded in cement block, attached to a stainless steel pot . The machine will also allow the user to select the amount/quantity ofpopcorn required using a mobile application. Then the machine will automatically dispense the required amount of corn and oil to pop the desires quantity of popcorn. The machine would allow user to select the portion of popcorn they need using a mobile application and in 7 minutes come and collect the ready made pop-corn. I will focus the most on the safety of the machine as it will be working without any monitoring, this is why a thermo-coupler will be used to contorl the cement block temperature to not increase above 250 degree Celsius and to automatically turn off after 15 minutes. This machine is the first step to create an actual self automated fresh pop-corn vending machine.

Who’s done what beforehand?

other than the traditional ways of poping corn, some project did use heating air to pop corn, however non have used the heating element wire to do so. As for the corn self dispenser mechanism, some project do use the Archimedes screw mechanism to dispense pills, pet food, etc. For my project I ll be using a rotational mechanism to do so. However after some research makers on the Internet do usually 3d peristaltic pump to move liquid, some of them are fully 3d printed, and some do use ball bearing. the concept of a peristaltic pump is that a tube is press fit between a rotational part as those part rotate around,the liquid moves from the high pressure to the low pressure side. As for the heating element nichrome wire is used in various applications such as soldering iron, air dryers, heaters, oven etc. the concept behind the heating element is that this wire resistance will introduce heat, for example if a 70 Ohms wire is used at 220 Volts the amount of heat is equivelent to around 750 Watts.

Refrences

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What will you design?

  1. Corn dispense mechanism
  2. Heating element in hydro-stone (and the clay 3d print plate model, if I decided to use clay)
  3. outside packing box
  4. Nema 17 motor driver circuits
  5. Nema 17 holders
  6. Fab corn application
  7. Stickers for the packagae
  8. Pop-corn holder

What materials and components will be used?

  1. Nichrome wire (heating element) (Local market, me and Sibu have found an amazing spot Amman downtown that sells all kind of nichrome wire for very low cost)
  2. 2 stepper motors ( available at the fab lab from the fab inventory)
  3. Stainless steel pot with hydrostone ( if I didnt print using the clay 3d printer), I ll get it from Carefour
  4. ball bearing (Local market)
  5. Solid state relay ( MikroElectron which a local supplier for electronic a bit pricy though)
  6. PLA filament (available at the lab )
  7. plywood 2.5 mm ( local wood market)
  8. hydro-stone (avaialbe at the lab)
  9. silcion tube ( I got it from a pet shop, specifically people who sell fish aquariums they use silicon tube for oxygen )
  10. Bluetooth module hc-05 (MikroElectron a local electronic supplier)
  11. thermocoupler (MikroElectron a local electronic supplier)
  12. MAX6675 (MikroElectron a local electronic supplier)

How much will they cost?

  1. Nichrome wire = 2 $ (or you can find it in any old heaters/ soldering iron/ )
  2. stepper motors = 15 $ per motor link
  3. Stainless steel pot = 30$
  4. ball bearing = 0.25$ per piece link
  5. Solid state relay = 30$
  6. silicon tube = 1$
  7. 5 Volts batteries = 3 $ link
  8. 12 Volts battery link
  9. Bluetooth modules HC-05 = 10 $
  10. Thermocoupler = 12 $
  11. MAX 6675 = 10 $
  12. Hydro-stone =

What parts and systems will be made?

  1. Machine outer box
  2. Heating plate ( nichrome wire embedded in cement composite hydrostone)
  3. Corn dispense mechanism
  4. Motor controller circuit using H-bridge
  5. Solid state relay controller and temperature sensor
  6. Clay 3d print pot
  7. peristaltic mechanism

What processes will be used?

  1. For the machine outer package box I ll use on-shape to design a press fit box then cut it using the laser cutter (Trotec 400)
  2. Corn dispense mechanism will be 3d printed in 3 different parts and I will use super glue to glue them all together, The first part is the rotating fan ( or circke), the jacket and a cover so only corn get released when it rotated for abput 90 degrees.
  3. Motor control H-bridge circuits, I ll design the H-bridge circuits using Eagle and then mill the circuits using SRM-20 milling machine. I will be using aattiny 44 to control 2 motor driver which is needed to run one stepper motor. Although I need 2 motors so I will mill 2 circuits
  4. I ll be using nichrome wire (750 Watts at 220 Volts) which will be embedded in a cement composite (hydrostone) to create heat to pop up the corn and then by the use of the thermocoupler the temperature of the cement wont increase above 250 degree Celsius

In brief I will design 2d and 3d cad, electronics designing and production, laser cutting, 3d printing, vinyl cutting, and casting hyderstone

What questions need to be answered?

  1. will the nichrome wire (heating element) be sufficient to pop corn, as if its connected to 230 volts it will produce 750 Watts ?
  2. Is the peristaltic mechanism sufficient to move oil ?
  3. The ratio of oil to corn ?
  4. will it be better to use clay or hydro-stone ?

How will it be evaluated?

If it perfectly all perform all the essential tasks:

  1. The corn dispense mechanism did work
  2. The oil dispense mechanism was sufficient to move Oil
  3. The embedded nichrome wire did pop corn
  4. It was easily controlled over blue-tooth/ or buttons
  5. Safety of the machine, so the user will relay on it working even though if he is not there watching it

If all those task were meet, I think I have achieved a good learning curve to be capable of making a self automated pop-corn vending machine.