Give Out Candy to Trick-or-Treaters with This Automated Dispenser
Automatic candy dispenser facilitates trick-or-treating without depriving neighborhood kids while you're away.
The Barkers of the “Barkers’ Random Projects” YouTube channel, wanted to go trick-or-treating this year, but depriving visitors to their house of candy seemed a little wrong. One could of course just put out a bowl of candy for visitors, but after a few greedy kids decide to take their fill, it’s entirely possible that most visitors would be met with a strangely empty bowl.
The solution then was to create their own candy distribution machine, the build process for which is nicely outlined in the video below. The video includes explaining some basic engineering concepts like force, coefficient of friction, and even defining criteria at the start of a project. This, along with the fact that they use fairly basic tools to craft everything, and show some of the trial and error involved in getting their build to work correctly, could make for an excellent introduction to these concepts for young makers.
The final contraption uses a conveyor belt tightened down with a tensioner on one end, and driven with a stepper motor. The motor is powered by a CNC driver unit, and overall control is split between two Arduino Uno-style boards in order to minimize delay.
More info on the automated dispenser is available in the video description, and Arduino code is up on GitHub.
