How did the original idea for the device come about?

Sam - This final device was a result of many, many prototypes, it wasn’t some epiphany that came to us. We went through maybe 12 different designs before we arrived at this. It was just trial and error, taking the device to Mr. Clark, he’d try it and we’d make changes and gradual adjustments.

Kate - It was a process by which we went around to our community and tried to find someone we wanted to help. We joined the team but we didn’t have a specific client we were working for at that point, we had to find someone. We talked to several different centers and hospitals, and Mr. Clark was the one who seemed the most interested, he was the one who was most responsive and who was willing to come and work with us and let us into his life.

When he came to you, could Mr. Clark write at all with a pen and paper?

Sam - He couldn’t write at all.

Kate - Not legibly. His company knew that the signature that was completely illegible was the one to recognize as his. He said he couldn’t fill out medical documents when he needed to, it was really a problem for him. And he’s a businessman, so in meetings and things it was something that really caused some issues.

Once you had chosen a client and were thinking about how to help him, what did the planning process involve?

Karl - We originally met with Mr. Clark back in September of 2009, and throughout that whole fall, we researched essential tremors and we asked him lots of questions as to what he had tried before, what has worked, what hasn’t worked, what specifically triggers the tremors, those kinds of questions. So we got lots of background on Mr. Clark specifically and his specific issue. And then after that whole research process, we started going to the garage and building. We originally cut out pieces of wood and shimmied some pens on there and we eventually switched to aluminum and got a final device. So there was a whole research and prototype process.

Sam - We spent a lot of time observing Mr. Clark writing, and we noticed that the position of his hand, the motion of his wrist and his use of fine motor skills triggered his tremors. So with that knowledge, we went about creating a device that would hopefully cater to his specific needs.

Kate - As part of our research process, we looked at other writing devices that existed. Even though Mr. Clark hadn’t tried any before, we wanted to see what was out there and so our initial designs were modeled a little bit after those. They were really rough models, but once we saw how he reacted to those and what effect those had, it was really an evolution of, okay, this works, this one’s not good. And we just sort of took the most successful parts of each of the prototypes.

What is the device made of now?

Sam - Right now it’s aluminum, but ideally we’d like it to be plastic. It’s lighter, it’s cheaper, it’s easier to use. But we didn’t have plastic to mold in our garage.

Do you have hopes to patent the design and get it out into the market?

Karl - Ultimately, yes, we have been in contact with a patent attorney who looked into it. It’s a couple thousand dollars to actually patent it, and we still have to sit down with him again and figure out what’s out there, are we infringing on any existing patents, etc. So, our plans, I guess, for this summer are to meet with a patent attorney, see if it’s possible financially or otherwise to get it patented, and possibly do some sort of production with plastic and maybe a larger-scale production in our garage. And maybe talk to some hospitals, doctors and rehabilitation centers and talk with them and see how we can actually get these out to the market.

Kate - We’ve also talked to a man who worked with Greenfit in Australia, he’s interested in possibly having people with disabilities assemble the PAWD and ship it out to people who might use it.

During the building process, were there any frustrating moments or challenges you had to overcome?

Sam - Oh, yeah. We didn’t have the resources available to us as easily as possible, so we had to spend a lot of time looking for the resources, looking for the aluminum, looking for the different pieces that we needed. And that took a lot of time and was very frustrating. If we forgot a piece, we had to drive all the way back to the hardware store to buy it, maybe three or four times in a day.

Karl - Yeah, because it’s one thing to have an idea in your head of what will work, and then to actually build a physical, tangible thing – take your idea into reality, that’s a process in and of itself, and then you have to worry about, well, that doesn’t even work. You have to get your ideas into the prototype and then you have to test that prototype and meet with Mr. Clark, see how it actually works in real life.

Sam - Like we said earlier, this device is the final device in a long evolution of previous ones. So it was a struggle to get here and it was definitely a time-consuming process. Although this device may look simple, it definitely took a long time to build.

How did each of you get interested in engineering and what is your favorite thing about it?

Karl - The thing that I like about the whole engineering process is that you really have to use your critical thinking skills and use a whole smorgasbord of different areas. You have to use science, obviously, but also critical thinking and trial and error, and that whole process is very extensive. Making something tangible actually helps people in real life, it’s not like writing an essay or something.

Sam - What drew me to engineering was engineering’s ability to have a positive impact on people’s lives. It’s tremendous. With our effort, with our time, we can help somebody else, and it seems so much more fulfilling than just writing an essay or getting a grade. This will actually have an effect on someone else’s life, and that’s why I got involved in engineering.

Kate - My teacher really got me involved in physics and I’m really fascinated by that subject, and he was the one who suggested I might be interested in engineering as a major in college. I wanted to take this class to test myself and see if I was capable of doing the job that was required to be an engineer. I knew it was a really time-involved career, it was something that would take a lot of study and a lot of work, and I wanted to just see if I could do it. And, I’ve loved this class, I thought it was amazing, I had a great time and I’m excited about pursuing that as a career.

Do you have any advice for other students who may be interested in taking on a similar project?

Sam - Just don’t be discouraged. Because so many times I felt, working in the garage, that this idea was going nowhere, that we should just give up now and do our homework. But I think if you have hope, if you have optimism, and you have motivational drive, you’re going to get somewhere with your device eventually. So just don’t give up.

Karl - And for me, it helps to have a carrot on the end of the stick. It really helped that we were actually doing this for a competition, it was a motivator for me because we had a chance to go to DC.

Sam - But that wasn’t the reason we built the device.

 Kate - (The competition) was really helpful because it kept us on a timeline. We would have taken much longer if we could have, but there were certain deadlines. For the first stage of the competition, we had to submit an enormous report that detailed our project and detailed our client and everything we’d done for research. Then there was the video we had to make, so we had to really focus on how marketable our product was and how we wanted it to look, and so that was really good, it really kept us on track. And also, it demanded a lot more skills from us, it required us to focus on a lot of different things to get a really awesome product, and now we have a lot to show for it. We have the report, we have the video and we have the PAWD.