Final Project

Summary

My asset files are here.

Pill Dispenser Introduction

I would like to make a pill dispenser that would help my nephew take his medication for the day. Then send him a reminder before letting my sister in law know if my nephew has taken his medication for the day.

Breaking it down into sections: - pill dispenser body - pill cartridge - sensor or camera in dispensor area - app to notify - electronics to make it work

I worked with my daughter, Sage Kanofsky, to make sketchs of a pill dispenser. She is in Industial Design school at Georgia Institute of Technology. She is currently studying abroad the Polytechnic University of Valencia.

Past Pill Dispensers at Fab

[Griffin van Horne - Fab Academy 2021] (https://fabacademy.org/2021/labs/dassault/students/griffin-vanhorne/projects/final-project/) made a small handheld version with bluetooth.

Corey M. Rice : Fab Academy 2017 made one that distributes the right amount of a whole bottle of pills.

Arsheena.E.P Feb 2016

Lily Yeazell at MIT made the cutest pill box!!

Loes Fab 2021 made a box with alarms.

Miriam Choi showed this instructables project in her presentation. It is very similar in many ways to what I was thinking.

3D models

Then later I worked in Fusion 360 to make a 3D model

We've been discussing this dispenser and a few other items in what we call the "remember me" line. This would be helpful not only to Mika, but also to me and my family as I age. My father had alzhiemers and as he aged, the more things that he had to help with memory, the more independent he could remain. I would like to create things that make the burden on family less, and increase the feeling of independence for all who struggle with memory for one reason or another.

I have seen that other pill dispensers have been done as fab projects. I hope that mine will be different in a couple of ways:

• Cartidges that can be preloaded

• Messages sent first to the pill taker, and second to the car giver

Timeline

Then I also met with DR. Taylor who helped me related each part of my project even better to the weeks we will have in Fab.

3D Printing

During the modeling week, I worked on my body parts and cannister. The body I printed was too small for the motors that we are using at the lab. I could ordeer a smaller motor, but I want to stick with what we know for now and get everything working, so I will change the model a bit to fit the NEMA 17.

I made many notches and other additions to the CAD model to make the mechanics of the dispenser easier. Example: the stop for the acrylic piece at the top so that it doesn't spin past the edges when its closed.

notch from teh body to the bottom body.

Notch for the catridge to seat on the top body

During the modeling week, I worked on my body parts and cannister. The body I printed was too small for the motors that I had. I asked for a NEMA 8 which is smaller and still has enough torque for my application.

My first print of the cartride outer body, i had a few errors. I had combined the outer rim and the bottom to one stl to print, but didn't notice that i had made the bottom a slight be smaller in case i wanted it to spin in the original desdign. I also needed to cut the center in a cirlce so the key can spin freely inside the cartdidge and only turns the pill divider to push the pills.

When printing the divider, the edges were coming up on my prusa MK3s. classmate Angela Horstman suggested that I add more of a brim to help it adhere better.

Computer Controlled Cutting

I plan to use the laser cutter to make the top pf the cartridge lid that will swing open.

I cut my lid on the laser at the lab. Our laser with the picture line up was being repaired, so I used the older laser that you manually align. I brought my lid file in corel draw on the laser computer from an SVG off the fusion file. I used the epilog settings for Acrylic.

When it ran on the laser, Collin Kanofsky pointed out that the laser was running twice in certain areas but not others. So I needed to modify the corel file to remove the overlapping lines.

It wasn't cutting through so we needed to run it multiple times. When trying to adjust our cut path, I moved the part in the file and then it cut through the wrong part.

I separated the two and then deleted the extra and then ran it again over 3 inches to a clean spot. I had to run the cut multiple times to cut through. Possible dirty lense?

Embeded Programming

I started working on the stepper motor and the electronics design there. I used first the RP 2040 and then did it again with the ESP32C6. In the end I went with the XIAO ESP32C6 to move forward with my project.

I used a breadboard to start laying it out to see if it would work.

Motor Programming

I have started working on programming a motor to move in steps. I need 8 steps per revolution to match my design. I found some documentation to help me with the arduino stepper library. For the example motor I have from my ELEGOO kit.. its 2048/8. I have another motor that i want to try that I got from the lab. More research is needed.

Electronics Design

During our electronics design week. I designed a board that I could use in the final project. I may need to make it smaller or change the shape if I want it to fit into my project. or it can be on the side since it fits the theme.

Computer Controlled Machining

I'd like to make my base for my pill dispenser from wood for aesthetics.

Electronics Production

During our electronics design week.