Our original goal was to create a mechanism that had a defined purpose and could directly affect a person's daily life. We wanted to make something that was practical and interesting at the same time.
When discussing ideas for a mechanism, we decided to combine two of our favorite things to create an innovative solution: automation and cooking. Combining these two worlds led to the idea of an automatic sauté machine that uses a crank-slider mechanism to move food in the pan to avoid burning. With this mechanism, chefs would not need to worry about being present for the sautéing of food which could increase overall efficiency.
The process of creating the functional mechanism did not come without it's difficulties however. Along the way, we ran into a few problems with the construction and optimization of the machine as a whole. Our finished product ended up working as intended, moving the pan with a similar motion to how our kinematic analysis had predicted.
