MAZE OF ME
PROJECT OVERVIEW
As introduction to my graduate program, each new student must build something that talks about our “Wildest Dream.” My Wildest Dream was to discover myself and figure out who I am and who I’m destined to be. Therefore, I decided to make a maze to show how my journey of self-discovery is an adventure and a huge challenge. The maze will have moving parts to show how in life there are ways to make your life easier and harder and how you can let other people help you through the maze. Eventually, after all the twists and turns in the maze, you will find your center which to me means who I truly am.
Personal Takeaways: I failed so many times learning how to use these machines. Some material ended up getting wasted because of my mistakes; however, this exercise made me look deeply inward in how I should approach product design in my future career.
PROCESS
IDEATION
First, it is important to mention that I want this maze to be fully manual. I wanted the “box” of maze to be made out of wood, the walls of the maze to be made out of clear acrylic, and the base of the maze to be a mirror which means that while you are solving the maze you are looking at yourself the entire time.
DESIGNING
Because I’m making a maze, I need to find a maze and a code to plan which parts will move. For the moving doors, I prototyped how to make these doors move with foam core, and measured out the length of distance that the doors will move in the maze as well as measure and place how long the slits for the doors have to be. After this, I used Solidworks and illustrator to sketch out each individual part of the maze to ensure that each measurement will make clean sharp edges.
MANUFACTURING
I had three layers to my maze: the clear acrylic top to view the maze through the mirror platform that the maze sits on, and the wooden platform under the mirror platform that the moving dowels sit on. Every single thing has to be measured precisely so that the doors could move a specific distance at a specific place. After checking and rechecking my measurements I used the laser cutter to cut all my pieces only to cut my box two more times to finally get the clean corners I wanted.
FINAL DESIGN
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