Brainstorming

• Each team member came up with 3 educational toy concepts. 
• Above are the 18 original drawings from the team.
• After a team vote, we narrowed our choices down to the 3D Maze, the Probability Game, and the Coding Foosball Game.

Initial Prototyping

The team divided into three groups of two. Each team created a rough prototype of the 3 final toy choices.

From left to right, the prototypes for the Probability Game, the Coding Foosball Game, and the 3D Maze.

The team voted to construct a 3D Maze, and then created a more thorough prototype.

 Prototype #1:
​

•  gave a better idea of what size the team wanted from a toy

​

• mocked up the interlocking component in a workable way

​​

• gave the team an idea of the engineering complexity they were undertaking

Preliminary Designs

After deciding on creating a 3D Maze, the team set out researching materials for the toy and designing educational mazes.

Materials:
​

• Polycarbonate (outer cube walls, windows, lids)
  • incredibly durable clear plastic
  • can be machined easily
  • can be thermoformed or cold formed well
  • often used in bullet proof glass due to material strength

 

• Aluminum (interlocking component)
  • standardized extrusion easily accessible
  • lightweight and incredibly strong
  • standardized fasteners easily accessible
  • t-slot profile cheap and versatile

​

• Delrin (mazes)
  • easily accessible plastic
  • comes in several colors
  • easy to machine

​

• Steel fasteners (fasteners)
  • standardized sizes
  • incredibly strong
  • easily found in all shapes and sizes

​

• 3D Formlabs Resin (3D prints of mazes)
  • used in fancier 3D printing techniques
  • stronger material than lower quality prints
  • can print abstract shapes with accuracy and high quality

​

Maze Ideas:
​

• Space
  • walls include mazes and center is a 3D spiral which includes all the planets
  • educates user about our solar system in tactile way

​

• Mountain Climb
  • demonstrates motion in mountainous terrain
    
  • allows sense of accomplishment when reaching the summit
    
    
• Ocean
  • shows ocean animals in a fun way
  • allows users to explore a shipwreck on the ocean floor

​​

• Zig-Zag Gravity
  • helps develop hand-eye coordination
  • educates the user about gravity and physics

First design for the Space Maze.

First draft of Mountain Climb Maze.

First draft of Ocean Maze.

First draft of Zig-Zag Gravity Maze.

Manufacturing Plans

In order to create our educational toy, we used many different manufacturing processes.

The cube will be made of 1/4" thick polycarbonate that will be bent at a plastic manufacturing company. The top and bottom will be CNC milled in house using 1/8" thick polycarbonate. The cube will attach to the interlocking component with a standard 80/20 T-slot made from alloy steel.

The interlocking component will have an extruded 8020 Aluminum base with CNC milled Delrin caps on both ends. The assembly will be held together with two stainless steel threaded bolt.

For all four mazes, the wall mazes will be CNC milled out of Delrin. The central spirals will be made with a 3D Formlabs printer out of Formlabs Resin. They will all be fastened to the polycarbonate walls using stainless steel fasteners.

Maze Iterations

The final toy assembly will look like this!

​Final Assembly:

• four separate cubes

​

• four separate mazes in each cube

​

• one interlocking component

​

• hole in all walls for the ball to roll from maze to maze and be like jumping from world to world

​​

• all walls, windows, and lids will be clear so there will be no wrong way to play

The Zig-Zag Gravity Maze was changed into a Skatepark Maze. It will show physics and gravity concepts still but be more visually stimulating.

The Mountain Climb Maze was too complex to be manufactured in house, so we redesigned a maze that focused on photosynthesis. The left side shows sunshine and the right side is a tree.