Objeti

Good design is innovative
Good design makes a product useful
Good design is aesthetic
Good design helps us to understand a product
Good design is unobtrusive
Good design is honest
Good design is long-lasting
Good design is consequent to the last detail
Good design is concerned with the environment
Good design is as little design as possible

I was just watching this ( http://www.yatzer.com/2042_less_and_more__the_design_ethos_of_dieter_rams ) video and thought I would share it with readers.

Great rules to design by!

In the past post I have been commenting on the process of designing & manufacturing the Aerialist Series, but I want to talk about one of the new pieces we are working on – a lamp which uses LED (strips).

Now – for the past month I have been trying to find the best source for the actual light and I have to admit it is not as easy as I would hope!
My biggest reason to be unhappy is that I cannot find mfg. which produces the lights in the US.

I would really appreciate it if someone could point me in the right direction!!!

Besides this, the light is working out really well.  Maybe I’ll post some close-up teaser shots in the next week.

Thanks

Good song for a Monday

One of the most important tools used on the Aerialist tables was our CNC (computer numerical controlled) mill and lathe machines.

Considering we have so many moving parts (hard to see because most are hidden), we need them all to be extremely precise.  We need all of the pieces to fit with a an extremely tight tolerance to insure we have no play in the rotation of the box and that the lever smoothly locates into the lock.

Part of the design of the bushings (mentioned last post) also included machining the frame of the box.  The images below show the machining in process.

There are a few different ways to program a machine.  As you can see from the image, the code is written in series of lines – each line basically represents a command.

The machine in action, spraying coolant on the tool to keep its heat low.

The machines obviously speed up production.  Though, the initial set-up times are quit labor intesive.  And when you are costing out production the most expenisve part will be the set-up, therefore producing large runs is much more cost effective.

Now that I mention it – large production runs cut the cost for many reasons – one of the most important is purchasing raw materials.

As I mentioned yesterday, the most problematic flaw was the fact that the box would rotate like one of those toss-across games, taking out fingers as it rotated!

My father and I sat down with the intention find a simple strategy to fix this problem.  We decided to incorporate a solution to 2 other small problems while looking at these bushings – locating the box into a horizontal position and to stop the bushings from tearing apart the powder coat finish as they spin.

Now, I feel like I need to keep the final solution a secret…
Though, I can break down the process and share with you our strategy.  The solutions HAD to affect the tables only in a way which would improve the simplicity and minimize the visual impact of our functionality.

Our first break through was to turn 1 bushing into 2 parts which essentially kiss, keeping the friction where the 2 meet, inbetween the 1/4″ gap between the box and frame.  This eliminates the destruction of the powder coating while letting us hide the functional parts which then eliminate the speedy rotation and lets us locate the table in a horizontal position.

In the end, we succeeded in creating a solution which maintains the look we wanted while functionally solving our problems.

Though, we went from 2 solid bushings to what we have now – 16 individual pieces!

The image below shows the final product. (So the secret lies between the kissing bushings)

Before we built the first prototype, I built no less than 20 versions of the Aerialist table.  Each one progressively getting better, solving another problem and simplifying the functionality to represent the design.

I was sure that the first piece I built would be the final design, ready for production – and I was very wrong.

The first problem with this table was the mitered corners (shown in the photo).  This created a welding nightmare, especially since we are interested in having square corners and do not want to show any exposed welds.
The second problem was the handle/lever which would act as a lock for the rotating box.  My biggest concern was the fact that the ‘male’ end would easily wiggle out into the area in which the box was rotating, causing it to smash into the top – damaging it!
The third problem, and most important, was that the bushings which separate the box from the frame would allow the box to rotate like crazy.  This, of course, would lead to eventually smashing someones fingers.

There were other problems, but these were the most important to overcome.

Aerialist V1

Since we have always been intrigued with how things were built, we decided to share our manufacturing experiences with the world – good or bad!

While we get this blog rolling we will backpedal a bit and show a few examples documented during the prototyping stage of our first product line, Aerialist Series.