Toy Product Design
My freshman year at MIT, I took an introductory product design class, 2.00b "Toy Product Design". Our goal throughout the semester was to ideate, design, prototype and build a toy product that would appeal to young children.
​
My team started pursuing two prototypes. The first was a dynamic color changing T-shirt for team sports. The idea is that while playing a team sport, the color of the shirt of specific people could randomly change to signify that they are changing teams and/or have to be removed from the game until the shirt color changes back. That would add an extra dimension to regular team sports and reduce some of the competition. The second prototype was a random direction train toy. The idea behind this toy is that there would be two opposing teams (of one or two people) and each team would have their own set of tracks (either blue or red). Given a starting point, and two end points (one red one blue), the goal of each team is to reach their corresponding end "station". There is a significant amount of Y-junction tracks at which point the train is configured to randomly choose a direction. Then each team must decide how to use their remaining pieces in order to get as close as possible to their station.
​
The train itself is made from a DC motor powered by a 9V battery, which leads to the two wheels at the back and a front-wheel that is designed to wiggle about and choose one of the grooves when it reaches a junction. The housing is made from foam which is cut out and painted to resemble an actual train.
​
Pictures follow:
