FoldEase

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Inspiration

Laundry is a universal chore, but for many, it’s a physical barrier. I realized that folding clothes isn’t just a tedious chore, but physically demanding and painful for the elderly, individuals with motor-impairments, and people with disabilities. Furthermore, retail workers and laundromat staff face repetitive strain injuries (RSI), tendon strain, and lower back pain from folding hundreds of shirts a day. I wanted to build an accessible, smart-home appliance that makes this chore available to everyone, saves time, and prevents injuries. Enter FoldEase.

What it does

FoldEase is an automated, motorized shirt-folding assistant. You simply lay a shirt flat on the board and press a button. In seconds, the servos actuate in a precise sequence to perfectly fold the shirt. It features an on and off button and an infinite loop for seamless shirt folding.

How we built it

I used an Arduino UNO microcontroller board to send signals from my laptop to servos in order to start the clothes folding function. I also used a breadboard with a usb-c cable connected to my laptop to power the whole contraption. The breadboard also have the buttons that control the on/off state of the machine.

Challenges we ran into

I initially wanted to fold full-sized shirts with cardboard instead of paper, however the provided servos were too weak to carry all the weight so I had to scale down and just cut fabric to represent a t-shirt instead. Another challenge I ran into was that I had to carefully configure the angle and speed of the servos to make the most efficient folding motion. Also, the servo arms were too short to properly fold the shirt, so I had to tape paperclips to the end of the arms to make it longer.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

I'm proud that I was actually able to build a working product out of accessible materials. I had to pivot ideas and come up with new plans multiple times but in the end my design came to fruition.

What we learned

I learned the basics of Arduino code and how ideas that initially seem pretty easy to create can have many unexpected variables in production process. I also learned about friction dynamics in fabrics and low voltage limits with servos.

What's next for FoldEase

I plan to up-size the design to accompany real shirts, then have a 3D printed sliding mechanism so that it can fold from XXS to XXL. Once that's all put in place, I'll make it be able to fold pants, shorts, and underwear as well so that it isn't just a single use case machine.

Built With

• arduino
• breadboard
• servos