Choo-Choo Gumball Machine

For our engineering project, we were assigned the task to create a functioning and themed gumball machine by the ACME company. It must be life sized, have a functioning dispenser system for 1" gumballs, and also must be durable. We initially were thinking about making a "Cuckoo Clock" themed gumball machine, but our group ultimately decided to go with the "Choo-Choo Train" gumball machine theme. During our design process, we made sure to follow the specifications provided, and the product of our work was very pleasing.

2 4x4 Sheets of 1/8ths Sanded Pine

3 5 1/2" x 4' Barnwood Planks

4' x 4' Cardboard

3D Printer

4 2" Corner Braces

Hot Glue Gun (5 Sticks)

2" Scews (Box)

Tik Round Clock Mechanism

Mahogany Wood Stain

Mitre cut 4 pieces of 1' long wood, which will be formed into a square shape for the base. With using screws and wood glue, you will attach the pieces together, to create the base. Cut out a 5 7/8" x 5 7/8" piece of plywood, and make sure the space in the center of the base is able to comfortably fit the piece of plywood. Attach the piece of plywood to the base, by using a nailgun to fix it into place. Place the 3' wood post into the middle of the base, and attach the post to the piece of plywood with screws. Cut out a 1' 1/8" x 1' 1/8" square made from sanded pine, and attach it to the very bottom of the base with the nailgun, so the whole machine lays flat on a surface.

Cut out another piece of plywood that is a 5 7/8" x 5 7/8" size, and screw that to the top of the post. Cut 4 decoration boards to a 3' x 5 1/2" size, and fit each board to each side of the post. Cut 1-inch squares of wood, and square them to each side of the post, so you may attach the decoration boards, and any height is fine for these 1-inch squares, just make sure that the screws do not run into each other. Use a nailgun to attach the decoration boards to the top piece of plywood, as well as where the 1-inch squares of wood are located. After attaching this, use 1" inch thick, 3' tall corner trim, and attach it to each corner.

Please used the attached Onshape files to 3D print the separate mechanics, and assemble as required. You may tweak the size of the gears and other pieces to fit your needs.

For the actual part of the machine that houses all the components and gumball dispensing mechanism, there are various steps. As the post is 3' tall, we will need the top part to be 2' tall to fit the specifications. Cut out two 19" x 17 1/2" pieces of wood for the sides of the house, and cut out another two pieces that have a 2' x 2' size, and use a triangle to mark the parts you will cut off, to assure that it makes an even house shape. Use a nailgun and wood glue to attach the walls together after cutting them out, and add corner trim on each of the corners.

The clock was fairly simple to implement into our gumball machine. Take an 11" x 11" piece quarter-inch sheet wood, and cut it out into a circle. After you do this, you will need to use the attached .dxf, which can be tweaked in Lightburn and Autocad to your needs, to laser engrave the roman numerals into the clock face. All the dimensions and measurements can be found in the file. Use the front face dxf for reference to cut a 2.1875" x 2.1875" square.

The coin and gumball mechanisms were the core aspects of our machine, and also were very difficult to sort out and properly install. The first part of the gumball mechanism we worked on was the train. We wanted the train tracks to lay fixed onto a turn table, along with a stepper motor to rotate the train out with the gumball after the coin was deposited. To do this, use the attached file to laser cut out the stepper gear, and the turn table. The stepper gear will then be attached to the motor, and then attached to the turn table, to properly turn the turn table. For the motor to actually work, you will need to upload our code into an arduino breadboard, and wire it as necessary. Then, according to the attached file that was used for laser cutting the clock face, you will cut holes out in the front panel, so you may install the coin mechanism that was previously assembled. Cut pieces of wood as necessary size to fit the sizing of your gumball and coin storage, so it may rest sturdily.