Locker Opening Handle

We made a handle with suction cups that allows students who struggle with motor skills to open things, in particular lockers, with ease. This product gives students a handle with significantly more grip, size, and strength, which makes opening lockers quick and easy for almost anyone.

We bought press-ins off Amazon that can be melted into our 3D printed handle when heated up with a heat gun. These press-ins allow us to screw in clear suction cups we also got off of Amazon that allow the handle to stick onto and open the locker. We designed our handle on Onshape, and used a 3D printer to create product.

Brass Press-ins: https://www.mcmaster.com/97171A370/

Suction Cups: https://a.co/d/01Jdpu0w

Using the design we made on Onshape, we 3D printed out handles using a Prusa 3D printer. We started at a 5% infill, but after experiencing durability issues with the print material, we switched to a 30% infill and haven't had any problems since.

We heated up our brass press-ins using a heat gun. We held the press-ins in the air using pliers, and after heating them on the highest setting for around 30 seconds, they were hot enough to melt into PLA plastic handle with ease. Since the press-ins have so many grooves, it's basically impossible to remove them from the handle once the PLA cools, so they are perfect for this product.

We intentionally ordered suction cups that we knew would be able to be screwed into the press-ins, so this step was very easy. We used 2 cups per handle to allow for more stability and balance, and made sure we bought suction cups that were strong enough to open lockers and would stick on if pulled with a lot of force.

After screwing in the suction cups, we were basically done, but had to put on some finishing touches. To clean up the design, we used both sandpaper to smooth out any small flaws during the 3D print and an X-Acto knife to cut off any dangling pieces of PLA. Once that was done and our product was ready, we tested our product on lockers around the school, ensuring that it would be easy for both us and the cluster program students to open the lockers, and that there was no problems with the suction cups. After that, we delivered our product to the classroom for them to use!