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Better Baffles and Load Eccentricity

A project log for Vending Machine for Birds

Simple, inexpensive bird feeder that dispenses peanuts in exchange for dropping stuff in a hole. A vending machine for clever birds.

stephen-chaseyStephen Chasey 04/29/2023 at 21:080 Comments

I changed the baffles so I have just two. Both are cut from 110mm discs of PVC board. The bottom one about 2cm above the dispenser is a ring about 1.5cm from inner to outer edge. The top one about 1.5cm above the ring is a disc with about 40% removed so it looks like a "C" instead of an "O". I tried so many configurations with 1, 2 and 3 baffles of various sizes in different configurations. With the load this volume of peanuts puts on the dispenser, this configuration seems to work best. It's been spitting out peanuts in < 2 sec every time for over a day now.

I also changed the eccentric load on the vibration motor. While trying ot make a dispenser for unshelled peanuts, one of the brass cylinders in the terminal strip i was using fell out. An M2 .5mm pitch bolt fit in there perfectly. The vibrations in the dispenser are much stronger now, but not louder.

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