Self locking backpack

With 6 weeks and very limited resources our group was tasked to come up with a solution to a problem in today's society. The problem our team chose was preventing people from stealing items out of backpacks. The solution was to create a backpack that would autonomously lock and unlock based on the user through an app on their phone. Our team worked cohesively and diligently through those 6 weeks to create a prototype that would function similar to our final solution.

The prototype we created was a secure backpack using an electromagnetic solenoid, Arduino, Matlab, CAD, button, relay, 9v battery, and other items. The button would send a signal to the Arduino (mimic a user sending a signal from their phone) which was powered by the 9v battery. The Arduino would then send a 5 second signal to the relay. The activated relay would complete the circuit with the battery and solenoid, unlocking the backpack for 5 seconds. Once the backpack was opened it would stay opened until the user closed it. When closing, the solenoid would slide back into the locked position.

With this prototype our team become a finalist amongst our peers but ultimately fall short of first place.