Today in class, we did a short project where we choose a “How it’s Made” video and look for physical properties in the making of the object. I chose gummies for my video:

In this video they did two different candies: licorice, gummy worms. I will split it into sections:

1. Red licorice:

0.32: “They cook the mixture for two hours 102 degrees Celsius…They cool it down, then put it through extruders. Extruders work like icing nozzles, shaping the paste into a design such as the twirls…” This shows how the paste can easily be molded into the twirl-like shape.

0.55: “A water-lubricated knife slices the continuous strips into eighteen and twenty-one centimeter lengths… The cut licorice goes on aluminum trays. The stacks of trays then go in an oven to dry for 8 hours at sixty degrees Celsius. As the excess moisture evaporates, the licorice shrivels.” This shows how the temperature can change how moldable the paste is.

2. Gummy worms

2:08: “To make gummy worms, for example, they mount the gummy worm board on a stamping machine. The machine then stamps the worm shapes onto trays of corn starch. This creates a series of corn starch molds for the gummy worms.” This means that the corn starch trays are not very resilient, as it created the gummy worm holes just by the machine stamping it. It also means that it can be easly formed (formability) by the stamping.

2:45: “…cooks the mixture at 115 degrees Celcius. A machine called the depositer pours the mixture into the cornstarch worm holes. The molds then go into a refridgerated room. In 12 to 15 hours, the candies cool and solidify.” This means that the gummy worm melted mixture can be put into molds, but would need the tempurature to cool before it can hold.

Through this project, I looked at things mindfully, which really gave a whole other experience. Overall, this was a very fun project for me!