7.7 Conclusions & Future Work 

In all, the design balanced rapid manufacturing and functionality well, but needs refinement in the movement profile, and some of the mounting. 

All initial objectives were met, the final project included a functioning slip gear that created intermittent motion and a 4 bar linkage to shake and release dice. Some of the shortcomings of the design were its inconsistency in dice throwing, and the torque and speed requirements on the motor complicated the control programming. 

If we were to build this again we would opt for a 3D printed slip and output gear in order to have more teeth engaged and improve the gear meshing characteristics. Printed gears would also allow them to be thicker, which improves mounting and meshing stability. We would also incorporate more 3D printed spacers to decrease our backlash. Finally, we would increase the number of teeth in the slip and output gear to create a more smooth motion profile. 

We could also scale up the links to accommodate a larger box. This could allow many, many dice to be shaken at once, especially if we experiment with different shapes for the 3D printed ramp inside. 

The same shaking achieved by the spring and toothless gear is an effective way to achieve intermittent motion without electrical controls. The sizes of the links and box can easily be scaled up or adjusted for other shaking tasks, like tossing pasta or stir fry.