Okay, so today I decided to mess around with building a hot beverage vending machine. You know, the kind you see in office buildings or train stations that spit out coffee, tea, or hot chocolate at the push of a button. I’ve always been curious about how these things work, so I thought, why not try making a super simplified version myself?
Getting Started
First, I needed a basic structure. I grabbed some cardboard boxes from the garage – gotta love recycling! – and started cutting and taping them together. I envisioned a tall, rectangular box with separate compartments for the ingredients and a dispensing area at the bottom.
The “Brains”
Now, I’m no engineer, but I figured I could use some simple mechanics. For the “brains” of the operation, I used a few small plastic containers for the ingredients – instant coffee, tea bags, and hot chocolate powder. Above each container, I made a little hole, just big enough for the right amount of powder or a single tea bag to fall through.
Making it “Pour”
This part was tricky. I needed a way to control the release of the ingredients. I ended up using some cardboard flaps, kind of like little trapdoors, that I could open and close with strings. Each string was attached to a button on the front of the machine. Push a button, the corresponding flap opens, and the ingredient drops down into a waiting cup below.
Hot Water, Please!
Of course, you need hot water. Now, I wasn’t about to mess with heating elements and electricity. Safety first! So, I cheated a bit. I just used a regular old thermos filled with hot water. I positioned it so that when you place a cup under the dispenser, you could manually pour in the hot water after the ingredients have dropped.
Testing, Testing… 1, 2, 3
- First try: Total mess. The coffee powder got stuck, the tea bag ripped, and the hot chocolate clumped together.
- Second try: Slightly better. I adjusted the size of the holes and the angle of the flaps. The coffee and hot chocolate worked okay, but the tea bag still got stuck sometimes.
- Third try: Success! (Mostly). I figured out that if I pre-packaged the tea bag with a tiny bit of extra cardboard, it would fall through more smoothly.
The Final Product
It’s not pretty, and it’s definitely not something you’d see in a public place, but it kinda works! You push a button, the chosen ingredient falls into your cup, you pour in the hot water from the thermos, and voila! A (very) homemade hot beverage. It was a fun little project that taught me a bit about basic mechanics and problem-solving. Plus, I got to drink a lot of coffee and hot chocolate during the “testing” phase. Win-win!
