Take a look through some recent Case Studies to see our work in action.
Many of these projects involved a combination of CAD design, project management or manufacturing support services. Each project is unique, providing fresh challenges and the type of creative problem solving opportunities that we thrive on!
‘Digipipe’
Formally “Limpet”
A small start-up company Klarian (Dashboard) Intelligent Industry contacted us for some advice on mechanical engineering design. After a couple of online meetings, we were happy to help them and understood their brief, technical specifications & requirements.
The product specifications were simple: it needed to be lightweight, easy to retrofit onto a pipeline and easy to assemble and setup – even in extreme environments.
We helped Klarian do just that while maintaining a design for manufacture. We also supported with the supplier search, Request for Quotations and Design Failure Mode Analysis (DFMEA). We came up with an innovative design that was able to be produced by 3D printing a set of components, ready to be assembled and tested in the field.
With a concept designed and tested, we were ready to refine and design a final product working with the chosen suppliers. We updated the assembly design to make it lightweight, robust and easy to use – but more importantly, manufacturable with a reduced bill of material cost.
“We brought Christophe in to take over a mechanical design job that had previously been taken to first prototype stage, but that was lacking in terms of what it needed to be usable for a real-world system. He refined the design and produced variants for three different manufacturing technologies to enable us to migrate to different manufacturing solutions as the product scales. His work and approach are exemplary, participating fully as a member of the team and contributing above and beyond expectations.“
Mike Callender – Klarian
Suspension Kinematics
Dyson Automotive employed Convert Design services to help with the design, fit and function of the suspension and brake system for their new electric vehicles.
We supported the company onsite at Dyson Automotive Head Office in Hullavington Airfield UK, to make sure all the supplier designed components fitted together and that the assembly was working as it should through the full range of motion a car suspension will experience including extremes of movement.
We helped clean and set the assembly structure to a working system which was easy to implement within the full car assembly.
We also supported the project engineer to refine the design, allowing a low piece price with optimised design for manufacture.
Bill of Material
We worked with the PLM team (Product Lifecycle Management) to create a bill of material of the vehicle’s components so it is user friendly, customisable to fit all car variants and options, but also to allow future cars to be created with a template.
This brought consistency to the company design and standardised the way they planned vehicle design, making sure smaller components were not forgotten, such as fasteners and other small items, as that could be detrimental to the working or manufacturing of the vehicle. This hence made it easier to discover potential problems at the earliest possible design review stage.
Sill Treadplate
Aston Martin Treadplates on their current vehicle range are made as an aluminium extrusion then machined to a finished and beautiful design. Convert Design saw an opportunity to design them as a carbon fibre option to complement the already existing carbon pack which includes a lot of interior and exterior carbon fibre trim.
We worked with their Commercial and Quality Team to find a suitable supplier and worked to design and develop a robust design that has been approved by their Studio Design Team to fit within the original design of the cars. We then presented a Financial Business Case and Return on tooling investment analysis to determine the concept viability.
The parts are now in production and introduced on the cars by us via a ‘line trial’ where 10 chosen vehicles were fitted with the newly designed treadplates.
Bonnet Vent
The bonnet vent is usually made of one-piece of carbon fibre as standard but, after many considerations and with the help of their design studio, we were able to define a design that would complement the beautiful and timeless design of the V12 Vantage.
We worked with their Commercial and Quality Team to find a suitable supplier and worked to design and develop a robust design that has been approved by their Studio Design Team to fit within the original design of the cars. We then presented a Financial Business Case and Return on tooling investment analysis to determine the concept viability.
Their marketing team came back with a report that 50% of their customers preferred the standard design as a mesh compared to the full carbon fibre design. The earlier one-piece carbon became part of the option list.
Greenstar Oil Boiler
The design of the Worcester Bosch Greenstar oil boiler range looked outdated, and we were approached to help refresh the look. Worcester Bosch supplied us with styling pictures, sketches and a brief. We then went away and designed a drawer system that fit seamlessly within any kitchen and allowed their fresh new look dashboard to be fitted inside the drawer.
All hardware was researched and integrated within the design, leaving them to find a commercial and manufacturing solution.
Are you ready to convert a concept to reality?
Get in touch with our team to see how we can help to transform your idea from a prototype to product.
