Beyond Concepts

These are the last two paragraphs from the epilogue of my new book,"Engineering for Industrial Designers and Inventors: Fundamentals for Designers of Wonderful Things"  (http://oreil.ly/thomasask)

The Process

Concept development is just part of the design process. The process may start with a crafted marketing goal or an individual’s great idea. The design brief is then pursued in concept development, which typically involves a cycle of developing empathy for the user, making sketches, and testing models. Concept development is followed by traditional engineering, where a design is analyzed and detailed, performance standards achieved, and quality assurance procedures developed. The design is then prototyped and tested before releasing to manufacturing. While this is a simple string of words, the reality is very complex. Not only is the process complex but it becomes increasingly difficult to make changes to a design the further it progresses in the process. Engineers churn a concept to develop a polished jewel. Manufacturing often makes expensive capital investments, so changing something like a multi-cavity injection mold can be a costly mistake. So too can be reworking advertisements or modifying performance standards. All of these processes and expenses are based on a concept, which comes from a time when all ideas are options and the “great idea” is waiting around the corner. The paper is cheap and the time gladly spent.

This book looked at a variety of nontechnical issues, but focused on material mechanics, fluid mechanics, heat transfer, and thermodynamics. These disciplines are the cornerstone of the mechanical sciences. Mechanical science works in the company of the other cornerstones of mechanistic design: the biological, electrical, and information sciences. Design, in the broad sense of both mechanistic and nonmechanistic pursuits, relies on many disciplines. The physical sciences, life sciences, math, anthropology, sociology, psychology, and economics can all be tapped for methods that improve design. Knowledge derived from these disciplines improve design and therefore we must borrow from them with alacrity and continually explore.

The Next Page

We are all looking for the elegant, simple design. One that has never been thought of. One that reflects the power of our mind infused with lightning strikes of imagination. The other side of this pursuit is to embrace complicated problems that require complicated solutions. Complex problems are solved one step at a time in a weird, circular path that keeps out the amateurs.

Please take your great ideas—the ones that rise above the noise of the culture and whisper restlessly looking for a home—and draw them. Now build them, even as an ugly, contorted mass of cardboard, clay, and wood. Make them come to life. The process is beautiful. This study of engineering and design was not about how to design—it was about your mind. It was giving your mind some foundational concepts. Concepts that do not surf on trends, but ride on immutable laws of physics that offer a foundation for the mechanical side of wonder-making. Driving knowledge into the tacit realm, involves harmonizing “book learning” with experience and forcing your mind to stitch everything together. You want to walk away with more than facts; you want to walk away with a feel for how mechanical designs behave.

Now go. Design and build. Have fun and keep exploring.