Drybrella

Inspiration

During recent storms, we've had to use umbrellas but as we brought them indoors, they would drip everywhere. There's no convenient place to hold them as they dry.

What it does

The Drybrella holds your wet umbrella while drying, so it doesn't leave trails of water and it is ready for next time.

How I built it

We used an aluminum frame for the apparatus and used six fans as the drying mechanism.

Challenges I ran into

Some troubles we ran into were where to collect runoff water, how to stabilize and hold the umbrella, and how to sense whether there is an umbrella in the apparatus or not.

Accomplishments that I'm proud of

We successfully came up with an idea and executed it in just one day.

What I learned

We learned during the product design process how to brainstorm ideas and how to solve all the problems we ran into effectively.

What's next for FanBrella

FanBrella can be improved by hosting multiple umbrellas or having an automatic timer that detects moisture or how wet the umbrella is, so that it will also automatically turn off when the FanBrella knows it's dry.