When we were first assigned the bottle opener project, the first things that Keer and I decided to focus on was creating a design that was relatively simplistic and sturdy. We decided on creating a design that would maximize the amount of force our bottle opener would be able to handle, so we settled on a design that would extend upwards, using the side of the delrin as the hook. Our first design that we made out of foam core, and later laser cut delrin, was designed to look minimalistic and clean cut. However, when we were testing out this design, we noticed that the bottom point was not properly hooking under the bottle cap and was starting to chip because of the skirt of the bottle cap and because it was too short and tapered to a sharp point.
We then decided to drop the minimalistic boxy approach and create a more curved look, as the edges of the first iteration made is uncomfortable and slightly painful to hold and use. We added more spacing to fit the bottle cap, and created a longer hook that rather than being tapered off to a sharp point, had slightly more support. This design did work after being tested multiple times to ensure that the stress would not break it, however, we did notice some slight bending on the hook and decided to curve it, rather than having an angle. If given more time, I would have liked to find a way in order for it to be more sturdy, as we found slight difficulty when opening the Fanta bottle. Overall, the final design worked great! In the end the bottle opener we created met all of our criteria: it was simple, functional, easy to use, sturdy, and looked like a hungry Muppet.
