To be completely honest there is not much to write about this project. I did a poor job of documenting it because it all happened so quickly. In less than 24 hours my team and I went from nothing—not even an idea for a project— to a fully completed and functional braille punch machine.

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Going into this competition, I wanted to contribute the way I knew best, and that meant mechanically. One of our team members primarily handled the electrical and software side of the project, which was hugely beneficial and played a crucial part in our win.

 

The theme of the competition was recovery. My team and I wanted to solve a problem, and ultimately decided on making a braille machine. After doing some research, we discovered that a large percentage of the blind population in the world is illiterate. We wanted to play to the theme of recovery and recover the number of visually impaired people who could read and have easier access to reading materials.

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Per the National Federation of the Blind, “Fewer than 10 percent of the 1.3 million people who are legally blind in the United States are Braille readers” (Source).

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Furthermore, the cost of braille embossing machine at the entry level floats somewhere around $1000, whereas our machine, which we built in less than a day, only costed about $300.

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Even with a sub-optimal design, we were still able to create a reliable, cost-efficient braille machine. I am super proud of my team and I and will showcase some images below.

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I contributed mainly to the mechanical design of this project. Assembling the outer frame, cutting the base plate, and designing the gantry system. I acted quickly at the beginning stage of the competition to obtain 2 of the 5 lead screw mechanisms from the materials table. I cut aluminum both with a miter saw and with a handheld hacksaw. With a drill press I made custom brackets for the gantry system, ensuring my design allowed for us to adjust the tension on the gantry belt. Below are some images highlighting the project.