Disc-located Locating – Jenie J

In Disc-located, so far our group has done a lot of progress to improve our prototype product, design of prototype, marketing ideas, and extending our research as well to fit the needs of improving and innovating the design/prototype.  We began with our original design idea of creating a sports bra that would’ve had 2 shoulder pads attached on the side, and the sports bra serving as an extra support for the clavicle and scapula, as well being used to keep the shoulder pads together in a more efficient and comfortable way. As we extended our research and continued to edit our design we realized that we began to put our entire focus on the chest and the creation of the sports bra instead of the shoulder and improving the shoulder pad design. We then decided to create the slide on shoulder pads and completely eliminated the sports bra idea. Now with the slide on shoulder pads we were able to narrow down and organize our research better, allowing us to extend our research and go into more depth about the anatomy of the shoulder, such as the articulating bones, Tendons, ligaments and their joint movements. We also learned about the Minimum force to break bone, Minimum rotation before muscle/ligament/tendon tear , Max/Minimum Range of motion for joint rotation/ flexion/extension, this research is necessary to move to our next step which is the testing of our prototype. With the change of our design, creating our prototype became less challenging and more challenging at once. It became less challenging since we did not have to focus on the building of the sports bra and placing that together with the shoulder pad, because it was hard trying to find materials or ways to place them together while still meeting our customer needs such as movability, and comfortability. It became a little more challenging to build since we needed to find a way to get the shoulder pad  to stay on the shoulder without falling off or breaking. Another challenge we have encountered in the process of building was trying to find what material or padding to place underneath the prototype while yet allowing the prototype to serve its purpose in allowing the player to move freely.

Capri modeling what the 3D design looks like.

This is an image of our prototype so far, our prototype is a 3D printed model with three different slides with different sizes, attached together at one end to allow the slides to move backwards and forwards. We then attached elastic on the inside from slide to slide, since at first the slides would open too wide and would not stay in place, so with the elastic it allows the slides to stay in place together but with just enough space and allowing the shoulder pad to move along with the player and the motions of the player.