Diana Thomson

During my senior year of college, we had to find a problem and solve it. What came to mind for me was hunting dogs and how they are really mistreated even though they can cost thousands of dollars.

My inspiration for the project came from being on a hunting ranch and seeing these dogs in action and also being in Savannah, Georgia and a lot of my classmatess knowing about hunting and actually having these dogs and knowing the pain of these dogs.

If they develop gun shyness, sometimes they are abandoned, brought to dog shelters, or euthanized. Gun shyness is when the dog (usually as a puppy) becomes scared of the loud noise of guns. Once they are thought to be gun shy, they are considered worthless.
I wanted to make something that would help dogs get over loud noises.

I developed “Orion,” a toy, fun for both hunter and puppy, to prevent gun shyness. It’s a gun that throws a toy, or even a dead bird, while making a gunshot noise, the volume of which can be adjusted.

RESEARCH

I talked to hunting-dog owners, hunters, trainers, hunting-dog rescue leagues, gunsmiths and hunting-bow makers. I learned about current training techniques, which all tried to replicate the hunting experience, with varying degrees of easiness and success.

SKETCHES

I started to think about how I wanted a dog toy that would prepare these dogs for what they would doing. To make it realistic, prepare them for the loud noise, or help protect them from the loud noise. One thing I started to think about was launching mechanism for the toy and how to make it.

PROTOTYPE

My solution was slingshot technology, launched via a trigger mechanism, was easy to load and fire. Which would be good for putting a dog toy in and more realistic for a hunting rifle when releasing it and making the noise.

TESTING

I went to a lot of dog parks with my prototype to test it out and my friends with dogs also let me test this out on their dogs. It did great. At first, the loud noise did seem to bother the dogs a little bit. But after a while the dogs did not seem to care and were focused on the toy.

SKETCHES

Then I was focused on to make it look better I was inspired by slingshots and antique gun engravings. But I also wanted to make it more practical and more realistic when the person and the dog were using it. Make it easy to hold and natural like an actual hunting rifle.

MODEL

After figuring out how I wanted my new version to look I started working on the foam model to make sure I had everything down before I started working on the final one. I took the foam model everywhere when making the wood/final one. I even made a computer model as well which I can't find but I had blueprints that were also big help.

WOOD BUILDING

When I was making the final one this took a lot pre planning but it looked great and worked!

HAVE A NICE DAY!

STORY

In my senior class presentation, they wanted my presentation to be illustrated. I also illustrated a story of what happens to hunting dog puppies and what I hoped my project (Orion) could change.