As the countdown to the final week before FDR begins, the team has been diligently putting the finishing touches on the prototype to ensure it’s fully prepared for the ultimate presentation and demonstration! This involves several tasks, such as extending the wires of the new motor, adjusting the housing dimensions for accommodating larger motors, and completing the multimaterial DOE.

Regarding the multimaterial print, the team intends to craft a base using a no-bake cookie dough infused with fruit jelly, topped off with buttercream frosting. This novel cookie dough base underwent testing this week and proved to be resilient while remaining relatively easy to extrude. Additionally, experiments were conducted using larger nozzle tips (2mm) to mitigate clogging issues observed with smaller nozzles.

The team was also able to take some measurements of the dough prints to measure the shape fidelity of the printer.

In previous weeks, the 3-3 printhead occasionally generated ghost prints due to material leakage even in the absence of active extrusion. To address this, the team has been evaluating stop valves to enable users to deactivate inactive tubes and thus eliminate these residual prints. After thorough valve testing, a stop valve was selected that maintains optimal pressure levels without causing extrusion delays or interruptions.

The team has also been busy wrapping up our final deliverables: FDR presentation, FDR poster, FDR video, volumes 1-5 of the written design report, lab notebooks, & of course polishing our design & completing lots of test prints. Take a look at our FDR poster below: