Tilt-A-Bowl

About this Project

Problem: When my family travels, we often eat meals in the car. During one one trip, the car accelerated, and I spilled my soup... Oops! :) But I had an idea.

Solution: I designed and built a 2-axis gimbal mounted bowl that automatically tilts to keep liquids from spilling when it is moved.

How does it work? The “Tilt-A-Bowl” uses its onboard 3-axis accelerometer to determine the direction of local acceleration. When stationary, this acceleration points down (gravity), but when accelerating sideways, it will have horizontal components. The Tilt-A-Bowl uses its 2-axis gimbal to keep its surface perpendicular to local acceleration, so that anything on its surface "feels” only downward acceleration.

Specs

• 2X digital servos
• On-axis linkage for inner gimbal
• Arduino 101 with 6-axis IMU to detect local acceleration
• Runs on NiMH battery pack

Relevant Skills

• C++/Arduino: Programmed from scratch using Arduino 101 IMU library
• Design for Assembly: All screw holes are accessible without disassembly. Correct tolerances were included for minimal postprocessing.
• Design for Manufacturing: Entire system was designed in FreeCAD to be 3D printed with minimal support material.
• Filtering: Noisy IMU data was filtered with a moving average to smooth response.