The Sucky Trash Can

The Sucky Trash Can is a silly name for a really useful product. The basic premise is this: What if putting a bag into a trash can wasn't so frustrating? When the bag goes in normally, it traps a lot of air underneath it and makes it unable to be used efficiently until it is flattened out. Most people will try to remove the air themselves using their arm to bat out the air and flatten the bag to the sides of the can. The Sucky Trash Can makes this process easier by employing a vacuum in the bottom of the can to automatically remove the air. This was tested and we can confirm that it is faster to use The Sucky Trash Can than the normal method.

The design uses an AC vacuum blower fan from an old handheld vacuum to achieve a negative pressure in the lower portion of the trash can. This causes the bag to be sucked down into the can. We used another trash can as an inner wall, which we drilled holes into to evenly distribute the airflow over the sides and bottom. This means that the bag goes out towards the sides and not straight down.

The fan is powered by a normal 120V outlet, and is controlled by a relay wired to a Raspberry Pi Pico W, which takes input from the buttons on the side of the can and outputs a signal to the relay. The Pico W also has code which sets the amount of time the fan will run for and implementing a cooldown to be more user friendly.

The process we used to design this was to start with a cardboard prototype, which we used to test out a couple different fans including a PC cooling fan, the AC vacuum fan, and a 3D-printed impeller fan we designed. The PC did not work very well and the 3D-printed design still needed a lot of work with the design to become effective. To save time and material, we decided to use the AC fan. This introduced different challenges, as none of us had worked with AC power before. Ultimately, we were able to put together a prototype that worked well and that we were happy with.

There are many potential uses for this product. Obviously, using it as a trash can in a household kitchen would be a time-saving product for a busy homeowner. Additionally, slight modifications to the product can make it useful for maintenance staff in large buildings. Something we considered is keeping the vacuum module separate and including a port on the side of the can that could accept a vacuum. This would keep the cost of the trash can lower while still being efficient to use by maintenance, who likely already have a vacuum with them.

Overall, I'm very happy with the way the project turned out.