Introduction: Null

About: I am currently a student in Minnesota with an interest in studying engineering. I have been playing around with 3d modeling, 3d printing, and electronics for a few years now. I just started making my own elect…

Have you ever been walking through the grocery store and you suddenly wonder if you already have an item or have enough of it? Have you ever been sitting on the couch wanting to get a snack but don't feel like getting up? Introducing the robotic smart fridge that can solve both of these problems and more. This fridge features a large touchscreen that you can customize to show you many things including the time, weather, shopping list (which you can also see on your phone), and your current food inventory. The screen can also display upcoming expiration dates for the contained items. When you insert something into the refrigerator you can enter it's information on the screen or it will automatically get the information from an RFID tag on the item (it's the future right?). The fridge would also include a small robot. It would be stored under the refrigerator when not in use, but if you call it, it can work with the fridge to select and bring the right tray to you with the item that you asked for. You will be able to connect it too any in-home assistant or, if you don't have one, you can just ask the fridge instead. Just as an example, if you wanted an apple, you could say "alexa ask my fridge to bring me an apple". The robot would then come out from under the refrigerator while the trays in the fridge would rotate for the correct tray to be on the bottom and come out of the hatch (see pictures). After that the robot would just take the tray from the fridge and bring it to you. Also, the "food transport robot" would come with the rest of the refrigerator so it's still considered one appliance. The middle of the refrigerator is just a regular fridge but you would be able to get different configurations. If you want to put items onto one of the trays you can select what tray you want on the screen and they will rotate so you can put the item on the tray through the small door on the left (the trays are still refrigerated). I feel like this is a totally practical addition to any smart home that could exist somewhere between now and 2025. This design was made entirely in Autodesk Fusion 360. Please view my video and animation at https://youtu.be/rzeO-hWhhDI and if you like my design please vote. Thanks!

Design for Robotics Contest 2017

Participated in the
Design for Robotics Contest 2017