Here I am, posting another blog about my other design project…Oh! Sorry. Hi guys, this is Kankan again! These pictures are featuring my hand-built prototype of our second design project: the smell detector. Now, such a thing doesn’t exist in the world at the present, but if it does, I don’t know about it, so Mr. Layman, naturally, gave us a challenge: build a prototype of a hand-held smell detector that can detect smells. Because this doesn’t exist, the prototype doesn’t have to work (If it did, we would be famous!). This project tested our imagination, crafting skills, and ability to use limited materials. As you can see in these pictures, I used a mix of cardboard, hot glue, and mesh. My design is not very “workable”, but I made it like I drew it on paper. My detector is kind of a compass, but instead of leaning towards north, it leads us to wherever the smell is coming from. Before you say it, I will address several problems. One, it only leads us towards the smell, but it doesn’t tell us what the smell is. Also, there may be other smells in the air. Plus, you might think, Kankan, you didn’t tell us how it works! If you are thinking that, wait, I’m getting to that! I got a great idea when I was planning my project. Cardboard, if you cut it into halves and look closely, cardboard is actually full of holes, like cubbies. So I thought if we could somehow put tiny sensors into the holes, then it could lead us to the smell! So I cut two identical circles, one the face of the compass, the one with the bubble letters with N, S, W, and E on them, and the other circle the back, sandwiching a smaller circle in between them, with black mesh holding it together and a popsicle stick punching straight through the center. And here’s the part where I tell you how this compass works. The small circle inside the bigger ones is the vacuum and inside the holes in the cardboard are tiny sensors. The circle sucks in air through the mesh and the smells in the air go to the sensors. The sensors identify where the smell is coming from and turns the popsicle stick, making its shadow point to the direction where the smell is coming from. The mesh helps keep debris and dirt out from the sensors, only letting the smell in. Cool, right? I mean, it’ll be even cooler if it worked… But that’s okay! This was kind of a rush job, but I think I made it pretty good. I learned how to accurately cut cardboard with a scalpel and also how to make the proportions of the circle’s match. This project was also really fun, and another thank you to Mr. Layman for being so helpful!