Repairable Bluetooth Speaker

Repairable Bluetooth Speaker - 2022 Senior Thesis

For my Senior Thesis Project at Virginia Tech, I decided to design a repairable bluetooth speaker that is designed to last longer while also creating a reparability framework for future electronics products.

Thank you to my Professor Elham Morshedzadeh, Ph. D., and my mentors Cameron Meyer and Jonathan Michel.

Concept Sketches

After conducting some research on reparability and circular design, I began to create concept sketches to start to iterate on the idea of a speaker where all of the components could be separated and repaired.

Component Representations

During my sketching I was also manipulating a set of wood blocks that I had cut out to represent the sizes of all components in the speaker, allowing me to try out different orientations where they all could be accessed. Below you can see some configurations as well as the actual components next to their respective blocks.

CAD Prototypes

Following the block prototypes I created a series of CAD prototypes where I used the different orientations of components while also thinking about hardware and how the speaker would come apart.

The CAD models shown below iterated on the idea of a system where the hardware faced the front of the speaker and integrated with the speaker mounting hardware. This was to try to reduce the amount of hardware used but it only resulted in odd looking bases and a low and wide form.

This next set of CAD iterations were based off of the vertical through-bolt/standoff design and went through multiple changes. The biggest change that was made was the large grill base being introduced. Next, the top plate was spit into 3 different pieces allowing for each individual box to be accessed separately and a bottom access was also added into the base.

Physical Prototyping

As the final form was being created in CAD I began to work with some physical prototypes to get an idea of the size and scale of my design. I also acquired all of the electronic components that would be put into the final prototype for demonstration of how it can come apart.