The automatic garage door closer was inspired by the gut wrenching feeling one gets when they realise their garage door is wide open, has been since they left home, and will be until they return.  The model is designed to illustrate the idea that the Arduino would be connected into the garage door system.  Hypothetically, after a set amount of time that the sensors in the system have not detected movement, the servo will be triggered; thus hitting the button to close the door again.  With this, ideally one will never have to panic about a possible, unmonitored garage sale, again.

Step 1|  Programmed Arduino recieves energy from either a battery pack or a computer.

Step 2|  The Arduino tells the servo to exicute the programmed sequence.

Step 3|  The servo's arm presses down on the garage system's remote.

Automatic Garage Door Closer 

Keeping your home safe, one forgotten door at a time

The studio, NuVu 123, was geared to teach the students in greater detail how the resources at NuVu work, why they do what they do and how to work with them in the best manners possible; rather than a typical studio where a specific goal or product is determined at the beginning and achieved by the end of the two week studio.  In NuVu 123, the first week we focused on, what I like to call, classroom topics.  We had lesson plans, listened to lectures and worked hands-on with the various materials and techniques presented to us.  On the last day of the first week, all of the students brainstormed and selected design engineering based projects.  However the second week of our studio was greatly minimised in time due to the series of horrific events following the bombings at the Boston Marathon (one town over from NuVu).  At the end of the first week, I decided to make an automatic garage door closer.  This was inspired by the few times of pulling into my driveway after a long day at school, and finding that I had forgotten to close my garage door in the morning.  Fortunately I live in a quite neighbourhood.  Going into this project I was aware that I was not making anything new, this is actually a very common feature in many of the newer garage systems.  However, I wanted to challenge myself to make this feature for my older garage system.

The research process for how The Genie Company designed their systems was very accessible, and credit to the previous week of classroom time, I was able to understand the diagrams at a much higher level than I was prior.  Both my greater understanding of the diagram, along with the hours spent on learning the Arduino programming software, Arduinos (of all forms), Bread Boards and servos; it was  relatively simple to do the programming for the whole project.  Ironically, the difficult section of the project was constructing the casing.

It was decided that it was best to 3D print the casing.  This meant I spent all of Thursday creating a 3D design in SketchUp.  However, after spending 4-5 hours on SketchUp going through trial and error, and coming up with a final model, it was found that it would function however it was not possible within the restrictions of the 3D printer.  With the help of my NuVu Coach, a simpler model was quickly constructed in the 3D Printer Programme.  Printing started around 2:30PM on Thursday, and supposedly finished around 1AM on Friday.  However, because of the lockdown, the model ended up sitting in the 3D printer for almost three days before being taken out and placed in a solution for the support material to dissolve. Thus making the construction of final model quite difficult.

This studio and project, as stated earlier, was more about the education than the product.  And though the product of my studio was more of a rough model than anything else, I was still pleased with the outcome.  The studio was incredibly educational and worthwhile.

Thank you breaking down NuVu, David!