Entry 14: Meeting With Mentor (9)

14 June 2012

Today, our meeting was about the new prototype design.

Previously, we had formulated the basis for our idea of the prototype, which had a C-Shaped design. For today's meeting, the first draft for the new prototype design had been completed and we were discussing about the feasibility of it. 

Here is a picture of the new prototype:

Basically, the base of the stand is where the fish tank is to be placed. It is supposed to be expandable sideways to allow fish tanks of different sizes (up to a limit) to be placed onto it. Currently, the expanding technique that is being investigated is sliding with a "lock" mechanism, which locks the base when at the desired length. The reason why we would place the fish tank at the bottom of the tank is because we hope that its weight can be used to support the stand.

The support part (longest height) of the stand is intentionally curved to provide a more aesthetically pleasing and hopefully, stronger base design. However, we are still unsure if this can be made and it is not as important as the previous part (base) of the fish tank, thus we left it aside in the meeting.

Finally, the uppermost part of the fish tank, the tray base, is where the tray containing plants will be put on. We hope that the support is strong enough to support both the plants and the tray base itself. A section has been added under the base, which can be pulled out, for the battery charger to be placed if we would decide to add in the dynamo concept to our invention.

Some measurements have been taken into account for the current sketch.

Hence, our mentor and us ourselves felt that it was a better design than the previous few designs, thus we had confirmed to go along with this design for the stand. All we need to do now is consult Frankie on the possibility of this design!