The donation lid will sit on the top of the donation box and rotate to open and close the donation slot. I'm now testing stepper motors instead of servos. Steppers allow for controlled movement but they can't store position data like a servo motor. If someone disrupts the movement of the lid the motor will stall and there is no easy way to "reset" the position of the motor.
This is a test for future implementation of EL (electroluminescent) wire lighting effects to be added to the donation box. EL wire is programmable and it has a very low profile which allows for easy installation.
Donation box / servo test from iamnotarobot on Vimeo.
Another test of the donation box tilt mechanism. I'm trying to lock in the correct axis of rotation so the floor will tilt properly to deposit the donations inside the acrylic canister.
Here are some prototypes I built to test the donation box mechanism that will sit next to the multitouch table. I'm trying to find the correct servo settings to tilt the floor and open/close the lid.
The servo code is a little jittery at the moment but this prototype is helping me work out some final design and engineering issues. I wired a rotary knob and a reset button so I can control the movements during testing. The final version will be controlled by the users score on the multitouch table and a signal will be sent to the donation box to tilt the floor according to the outcome of the game. The final components will be laser cut so everything should move as smooth as silk when finished.
The donation box will be divided down the middle – if you win, the floor of the donation box will tilt to drop your money into the “matched donations” side of the canister and if you lose, the floor will drop your money into the “unmatched donations” side.
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