Food Processing—Build, build, build!

Last night after we had dinner, we had a team discussion about our production timeline, specifically for the next two workdays. Our goal is to take two Graters and three Presses on our trip to PKK this weekend where we will meet our stakeholders. In order to achieve our goal, today is a vital workday since we need to produce the machines by Friday in order to have them painted (and dried) during the day on Friday. That means that all assembly needs to happen today!

As soon as we arrived at ITTU, we began work right away. We had decided on tasks for each team member the night before so that when we came in to the shop we would get straight to work. Bench and Luke immediately began working on the Grater and by noon they were able to test a new coupler with cassava. Good news---it works! 

The coupler (the cylindrical silver and black piece) 

Grating cassava while testing the coupler

Bench bending the Grater chute

Meanwhile, Asha, Deborah, Shan, and Maria worked on building Grater heads. Deborah and Shan started by punching teeth in a sheet of metal, and then Asha and Deborah were able to fit the sheet around a plastic head. Once the plastic head was fitted, Asha and Maria spot welded the metal sheet onto the plastic head. By lunch time, we had finished three Grater heads!

Deborah and Shan punching teeth 

Asha and Deborah fitting the sheet onto the plastic head

Asha and Ben spot welding

We worked until the shop closed at 5pm--by that time we were just about finished with the two Graters and three Presses. Tomorrow morning we have to work quickly to get these five machines done before they are sent out to get painted at 10 am. We're going to bed early so that we can be well rested to continue working in the morning!