Investment plan and self-explaining instructions

After the redesign of the legs of the table, a 3D CAD File was made to get a good visualisation.

For the consult on 19/4, two big questions needed to be answered:
1. How do we begin with the investment plan and what's the most important aspect of this plan?
2. We were thinking about using colors to make the assembly self-explaining

Jan:

The investment plan should contain the several steps, machines, tools and workers needed to produce the final product. An estimate of all costs and time needed to produce a product should be calculated, including material costs, time necessary for every production step etc. The investment plan should also consist a break even analysis and a comparison between high volume and low volume production techniques to select the most relevant and economic production process for our final product.

Davy:

To find out what the logical assembly steps are to convert the table into the basket and to convert the basket back into a table, we should construct an assembly tree. This assembly tree is a graphical representation of what steps should be done before the next step can be done and to what actions these steps relate. In this way, it is easier to find out in what order every action should be taken and with this knowledge, we can think about the self explaining design of the product. For example: when we know that we first have to do steps A and B, we might be able to relate action C to B in order to link the order of action. We should make such an assembly tree for both the table to basket conversion as wel as for the basket to table conversion because it is possible that different actions should be done in a different order in the two different assembly processes.

We have to make sure that the assembly proces is as foolproof as possible. Due to the fact that people only use manuals when they encounter a problem and the product has to be assembled without a manual, we must avoid the possibility to make mistakes and encounter any problems. First thing we need to keep in mind is that people tend to act before they think and thus our processes we want to explain should be clear immediately, without asking for too much brain exercise of the costumer.

Finally, we should keep in mind that the investment plan is also intended to let us rethink our desing in terms of production. If we notice that the production cost would be too hign, we should redesign our product in function of a more economical production process. Also we may not forget about the 'small series production' and the use of these production methods in both our product and our investment plan.