Sponsored by Fisher Price, this project was about designing a pull-toy for younger children and build a full scale model. We sketched out many options for toys we could build for our final deliverable and presented them to Fisher Price, having them choose which designs with which to move forward.
Fisher Price narrrowed my options down to either the cake toy or the flower toy. I decided to move forward with the latter because with the limited build time it would be more doable to make. I sketched out some different options for the handle shape and the face, as well as how the spinning mechanism would work in the toy. I also explored different color palettes.
This was the final design for my flower toy. I decided to CNC the flower out of a thick sheet of plastic, use a clear plastic Christmas ornament for the spinning ball, cast the stem rope out of silicone, and 3D print the handle. The center ball would just be filled with colorful beads and skewered with a dowel rod to act as an axis on which to spin.
Here are some screen caps from my 3D model in Fusion 360. I CNC'd the top and the bottom of the flower separately so that I could carve out spots for the dowel rod axis and sandwich the clear ball between the halves to assemble the toy.
I also 3D printed a little bee that would act as a weight to change the balance of the flower as it's pulled (If you see I forgot the wings then no you didn't!)
This is the final toy! I'm very happy with how the final product looks! If I were to do this build again, I would use mold release when silicone casting the flower's stem, give the bee some wings (and actually have time to paint him), and find a way to make the ball able to roll in all directions! Overall, this was a huge learning experience for me, and I wish I didn't overthink so much at the start of the project. But I was also UNDERthinking in that I was in a bit of an idea-block at the time. I was able to push through and make a beautiful toy thanks to help from my professor! We were also tasked with creating a poster for our toy.
