ME103: Design and Making is a mechanical engineering course at Stanford where students design and manufacture a product of their choice. It involves sketches, rapid prototypes, CAD designs, manufactured test models, and ultimately, a customer-ready prototype. In this course, I created Wave, a pan-tipping assistant designed to make tilting a pan effortless, much like riding a wave.

Growing up, I always loved watching my mom cook because I got to witness firsthand the pure joy that it brought her. She would always find new recipes online to try out and then proudly show off her creations to my brother and me. However, with age, she experiences increased wrist strain that makes it challenging to hold her favorite wok, especially in one hand while the other hand is serving the food.

My solution was to design and manufacture a stand that she could rest her pan of food on, relieving the stress placed on the wrist and thus making cooking more accessible to those with limited hand strength or wrist mobility.

I envisioned having two hooked stands that would support the pan, assuming the pan had two handles.

Hooked design allows both main and helper handles to rest on stand while preserving rotational motion.

Experimented with different bases. This base has an opening for a plate to sit in.

Played around with varying thicknesses and depths, resulting in this intricate pattern design.

#1 PRINTING THE PATTERN

• 3D printed half of critical part twice with polylactic acid (PLA), resulting in two mirrored parts
• 3D printing double-sided pattern would ensure consistency among the two parts, especially since the shape was so organic
• Included two holes for easy alignment when attaching to the patternboard

#2 MAKING THE PATTERNBOARD

• Used drill and table cutter to create board out of 1” “no void” plywood
• Positioned pattern on one side and marked where to drill alignment holes
• Inserted 3/16” dowel through holes to secure other half of pattern onto other side of the board
• Cut out general shape of gate & runner with bandsaw from 1” thick scrap wood
• Drafted gate & runner with disc sander, spindle sander, and sandpaper at 10° angle

Each ramming session to sandcast my critical part required 100lb of sifted and mulled sand.

It took several tries to get a successful pull. The sand would often break at the grooves, the edges where the pattern caved inwards, and near the gate and runner. To avoid the latter challenge, I could have used one runner instead of two to remove the enclosed space between the pattern and gate, which was susceptible to breaking.

In the initial pours, the metal was very porous, suggesting that a higher temperature was necessary. It was also apparent that sand broke and entered cavities that should have been filled exclusively with metal. As a result, the grooves of the pattern were lost, resulting in highly textured casted parts.

Increased pattern draft by heating wax and making fillets around the entire pattern/grooves to pull the pattern from the sand

• Added more parting compound to board before ramming up to help remove pattern from the sand. Worked but some parts of sand still broke off, especially in the grooves
• Brushed on graphite in the grooves and edges of the pattern to help remove it
• Used less force when ramming up the lower layers of sand so each layer could still latch on to each other without being so packed that the board is difficult to remove

To smooth the casted parts’ surfaces, I used a strap clamp setup with angle blocks to secure the casted part to the mill. I then used a shell mill tool to face off the front and back faces of the part and repositioned the clamps in between to face off the areas initially covered by the clamps.

Since the casted parts would be fastened to a base, I needed to smooth out the bottom of the stands as well. To do this, I used a level tool and the right angle block clamp setup to ensure the part was straight and then used the shell mill tool to face the bottom.

The stands would be secured to the base with fasteners, so I drilled two holes into the bottom of each part and tapped threads for 10-24 machine screws.

This was the first opportunity I had to design and manufacture a product of my own. Having come into the class with no prior experience in manufacturing, I was intimidated by the amount of knowledge and skill I would have to pick up, but as I spent more time in the lab, I was able to learn how to weld, machine, cast, and woodwork, becoming more comfortable with the various tools, machines, and manufacturing processes.

I also learned the importance of iteration and troubleshooting. Failure was inevitable during this process, but working through these challenges provided me constant opportunities to discover, problem solve, and brainstorm various solutions. This project has left me with a valuable set of personal skills and an impressive knowledge of new manufacturing and design techniques.