Sloth becomes our favorite Sin

Written by Rene Millman

Monday, 05 March 2007

It is a situation that we have been in many times, we are playing on our Wii and we simply cannot be bothered to get up to get a beer. So thank God for North Carolina University student John Cornwell, who has invented a beer throwing refrigerator. Cornwell, 22, recently graduated from college and spent around $3,000 designing the "Beer Launching Fridge" which is activated via remote control. "Have you ever gotten up off the couch to get a beer for the umpteenth time and thought, 'What if instead of ME going to get the BEER, the BEER came to ME?'" said Cornwell. "Well, that was how I first conceived of the beer launching fridge. About three months and several hundred dollars later I have a fully automated, remote controlled, catapulting, man-pit approved, beer launching mini-fridge." He said that the fridge holds ten beers in its magazine with 14 more in reserve to store a full case. It is controlled by a keyless entry system. Pressing unlock will start the catapult rotating and when it is aiming at your target, pressing unlock again will stop it. Then the lock button can be pressed to launch a beer in the selected direction. The mini fridge can throw beers to people ten feet away. Although he did warn that there was a minor design flaw. "There is a slight danger of being hit in the head with a flying can but this danger decreases the more you use it." Cornwell said almost all of the raw materials for the refrigerator were purchased from McMaster-Carr, some motors came from Jameco, and the switches/potentiometer were purchased at RadioShack. "In total the beer launching refrigerator uses 3 limit switches. Two of which are triggered when the elevator reaches the top or bottom of its travel, and one is triggered when the catapult arm is fully cocked. I also have a potentiometer that is connected to the rotating catapult platform." "The voltage across the potentiometer is read by the microcontroller to sense the angle of the catapult platform." There is a video of the fridge in action here.