Cookie Press

Our Design Process

By: Julia Prien, Alexandra DeGroot,
Natalie Nickerson, and Arianna Druecke

Before the press...

The first thing we
had to do was pick a
project, so we
started making an
ideas list.

We narrowed down all

our ideas to a
favorite top three,
with which we would
do a decision matrix.

Each group member

found ideas for the
projects separately,
and then we combined
all these ideas into
a master ideas list.

Our top three were a

gumball machine, a
thermos water bottle,
and, of course, the
cookie press.

Based on
a variety of
factors, all
of the group members
judged the top three
products. The result
was unanimous, and
the cookie press won.

Decision
Matrices

Starting the project

Since we
decided on the
cookie press
for our
project, we
had to start
familiarizing
ourselves with
the product.

To do this, we did a
visual analysis of the
product.
Isometric
sketches of
the cookie
press

Drawings by Alexandra DeGroot

Visual Analysis
For visual analysis, we
looked for how the
elements and principles
of design were used on
the product.
Heres an overview.

Emphasis is
put on the
trigger
area, both
by the
balance of
extra
material
toward that
end and the
darker color
of the
Rhythm is shown in multiple
trigger.
places, including the circular

forms used throughout. This helps

make the product look very
uniform.

The press is
relatively
symmetrical
along this
line, which
is visually
appealing.

The visual design seems overall to

try and direct the attention toward
the function of the product.

The cookie
press overall
shows a lot
of economy,
and it isnt
very flashy.
This helps
make sure the
focus when
making
cookies is
not on the
press, but
rather the
cookies you
re making

Since we had done all we could visually, we

dove deeper into Functional Analysis
In this stage we tried to figure
out how the cookie press worked.

The function of the cookie press is

to extrude dough through shaped discs
to make different shapes of cookies.
Also in this stage, we did research
on the product. We found patents for
some of the discs, and many customer
reviews.
We used these reviews to help
diagnose a problem with the product.

The Great Cookie Experiment

When looking at the reviews, we noticed that
many of them seemed to stem from user error,
and we wondered if they we real problems with
the press.
We decided to try it for ourselves, and chose
a day on which to make cookies.
Many of the problems users were complaining
about did seem to be user error, though we did
find a few that would be targets for fixing.

When trying to
figure out
exactly how the
mechanism of the
cookie press
worked, we
realized we
needed to take
some of the back
apart further
than was possible
conventionally
for washing. We
ended up with
these main parts.

Part#

Part Name

Qty.

Die

Barrel

Bottom Ring

Pluger

Ratchet

Top Knob

Body Casing

Inside Cover
Plate

Release Pin

10

Spring

11

Trigger
Assembly

In some areas, taking

apart the press helped
show parts that we
would not have otherwise
been able to see.

We understood the workings of the cookie

press much better after taking it apart,
and with this new knowledge, proceeded to
diagnose a problem with the product.

Design Brief
Problem: dough doesnt stick to sheet when
extruded through the cookie press
Criteria:
-must make dough more able to stick to the
cookie sheet
-must maintain the simple look
Constraints:
-cannot add too many more parts, because
that raises the manufacturing cost
-cannot be hard to operate

The Problem (in detail)

During the experiment, one of the main
problems we found was that the cookie press
didnt press out enough cookie dough for the
dough to stick to the cookie sheet, or it
needed some kind of attachment to cut off
the dough.
With this information, we decided to focus
on fixing the problem of the dough not
efficiently sticking to the tray.
Note: some factors (like the stickiness of
the dough) are going to negatively affect
how well the dough sticks regardless

Solution
There were many possible ways to solve this
problem. We had a group discussion to decide the
best way to solve this problem
An idea that came up was to add some sort of
sweeper arm to the bottom ring area of the press
to cut the dough so it would have no choice but to
stick to the sheet. This was a great idea, but we
could ultimately not come up with a mechanism and
way of triggering the sweeper arm, so the idea was
discarded in favor of something simpler.
The way we decide to fix the problem was that on
the rachet, we made the notches longer. That way
the cookie press would press out more dough.

Here they are...

We made dimensioned drawings

of each part so with the new
changes. (we also simplified
a few geometric forms so the
press looked more sleek)

We used these dimensioned drawings to put our

parts into Autodesk inventor.

(spring not modeled)

Now that we were putting parts into

Inventor, we could make the
discussed changes in a visible way.
The notches
on the
ratchet were
lengthened
to 1.5 times
their
original
size.

We also made some visual improvements by

simplifying the forms of some parts and
removing unnecessary embellishments.

Heres the full assembly with our changes.

Press Moving

Any Questions?
Thank you for
your time.