Abyss.

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  The table opening up

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  Planning out the design

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  Making a preliminary electronics design

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  Sawing the table to size

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  Placing an object on the table

Inspiration

We were inspired by Michael Reeves, a YouTuber who is known for his "useless inventions." We all enjoy his videos and creations, so we thought it would be cool if we tried it out too.

What it does

Abyss. is a table that caves in on itself and drops any item that is placed onto it into the abyss.

How we built it

Abyss. was built with an Arduino UNO, breadboard, a table and Arduino parts to control the table. It uses a RADAR sensor to detect when something is placed on the table and then controls the servo motors to drop the table open.

Challenges we ran into

Due to the scale of our available parts and materials, we had to downsize from a full-sized table/nightstand to a smaller one to accommodate the weak, smaller servo motors. Larger ones need more than the 5V that the UNO provides to work. We also ran into trouble with the Arduino code since we were all new to Arduinos. We also had a supply chain issue with Amazon simply not shipping the motors we ordered. Also, the "servo motors", or as they were labelled, turned out to be regular step-down motors.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We're happy that the project is working and the results are quite fun to watch.

What we learned

We learned a lot about Arduinos and construction. We did a lot of manual work with hand-powered tools to create our table and had to learn Arduinos from scratch to get the electronics portion working.

What's next for Abyss.

We hope to expand this project to a full-sized table and integrate everything on a larger scale. This could include a more sensitive sensor, larger motors and power tools to make the process easier.

Built With

• arduino