HoneyPot

Modular e-textile based portion controlled jar. Does not allow people to grab more than one health serving size.

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Inspiration

The inspiration for this project is that the temptation for one more cookie never goes away. This solution to this issue is inspired by that one fact. A healthy serving size will not only help you lose weight but it will make you feel 100 times better. We wanted to make this system modular so that it may be placed in any container so no compromise must be made to maintain the freshness of the produce.

What it does

HoneyPot is a project that utilizes a modular e-textile system in order to measure how much food is currently in the jar. When the user reaches in and grabs more than one serving size, the opening will quickly, but gently cinch close around their hand until they're holding less than or equal to the itemized programmed serving size.

How we built it

Honeypot was built using Arduino and e-textile technology. The bottom is a textile pressure sensor that detects the weight of the produce that is inside of the jar. As more then the allowed amount is taken off of the the sensor the steppers on the side of the jar will begin to pull on the drawstring bag therefore not allowing the persons hand to be released until the amount of food in the persons hand is the correct amount.

Challenges we ran into

The challenges that we came across was we got pre-made pressure sensors that we thought would work for this application it ended up not working as we thought it would. That is when we moved the idea over to a e-textile system. Currently the sensor is using capacitance to detect objects in the bag but with the correct materials a textile pressure sensor could be made. We just did not have a resistive fabric with us to create the sensor. One of the steppers had too much skipping and ended up burning the stepper out.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

Making a physical prototype that worked that involved e-textiles even if it did not work 100% it still conveys the idea we are trying to solve. We are proud of getting the domain bestmlhproject.com. We are honestly surprised that the domain was available as it seems like a perfectly good domain to get.

What we learned

The load cells are really hard to use/do not work very well for this application. How to buy a domain on domain.com Two of our members learned how to use Arduino. How to make an e-textile

What's next for HoneyPot

We want to implement a textile based pressure sensor using velostat and conductive fabric. This will allow a more accurate way of detecting the food in the jar. We also want to improve the mounting mechanism to the jar itself. The code could also a facelift.

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