1) Introduction and Background - Onion Cutter

Anyone who has experienced the wonders of telemarketing commercials knows all too well the long line of gimmicks that allow a user “maximum efficiency” with their meal prep. Often, these products work very poorly or are more trouble than they are worth. They are also the muse for the design of our Onion Cutter/Crank Mechanism. What better way to apply the fundamentals of robot mechanism design than to a first world problem, such as slicing a vegetable without any energy expenditure from the user. The goal with this project was to create a mechanism that coupled a slicing knife with a crank (to move the onion towards the knife).