We have $10,000 - what should we buy?

Photobooth equipment would be awesome. Lights, Cameras, Sweeps, Turntable, Microphones, etc . Mini content creation space.

Photogrammetry set up if it has to be “cutting edge” tech.

Foldio 360 is nice too.

Ignoring the tongue in cheek nature of the post, getting a few professionals to come in and do some all day workshops is probably a great way to spend the money.

Thank you all for your contributions to this thread. One of the ideas floating around is a 3-axis CNC machine. Someone I know suggested a Tormach 440 with some add-ons, however, we are trying to find something cutting edge .

As valuable as a professional workshop would be, I think one of the constraints is that the money is spent on something tangible that can be passed on to the future classes.

Could you give an example of “technology components and associated behavior?”

Thanks everyone!

A great coffee bar without seats, a wonderful ceiling lamp as centerpiece, a beamer and presentation screen to do daily lunchbreak presentations/pecha kuchas. You won’t believe the increase in quality and enthusiasm from employees.

Talking about cutting-edge, for $4,000 you can buy a Kuka robot on ebay. That leaves 6,000 for software, a professional workshop, and resources to convert it to a 3D printer/CNC machine. And all the opportunities for AI are there, you can program it to do complex motoric tasks, even dancing.

Awesome suggestions! This is the sort of direction we’re looking for. Thanks!

Although I think this is a really cool suggestion, I would also tread lightly. I used to work for a company that was heavy on the engineering side and we had a few of these robots that we used for testing products, some light production work, and various other tasks. 99.9% of the time everything was great, but there was an occasion where someone who was not properly trained was injured pretty badly. This is also a company full of engineers who are masters at these types of machines. When putting this technology into a group of people with possibly zero knowledge of its capabilities, be careful.

Agreed on the risk for robots, we deployed a robot to execute rapid scanning tasks and building safety required it be in a giant metal cage where no one could be within range of it striking or throwing something at someone. Once you get building facilities involved that cost suddenly goes up because you’ll have to bring in a contractor for all of the additional wiring and construction work.

RE slippyfish’s comment - students who understand how electronics work at a very basic level can often make more educated decisions about how something should function or work. Think of some of those electronics kits for kids - once you understand how a servo or LED or PWM controller responds you can start to understand how to build complex experiences and behaviors. That becomes ultra useful for ID students because now you can actually prototype your robotic soda machine, test the experience, and learn from that prototyping cycle. Compared to the kid who makes an awesome surface model of a robot soda machine and then says let the engineers figure out if it will work.

(FYI I can’t tell how many times I was able to out-pivot engineers who refused to do something as part of my design by having that basic knowledge and them admitting it wasn’t that complicated, but they really didn’t want to do it).

I think you can get a $50 arduino kit on Sparkfun.

Focus on getting tools that help students understand concepts in a hands-on way. Easy access to prototyping equipment and low-cost/free consumable materials is nice. I don’t know what exactly you’re looking for when you say cutting-edge that’s not too risky or frivolous, perhaps take a look at what MIT Media Lab is doing? But definitely consider what Cyberdemon said - being able to prototype with small electronics is no joke and the experience goes a long way.

Also, my school had some 3d printers, but it was a big pain to get easy access to. We had all these resources that many students didn’t really use due to inconvenience (or bad learning/low interest?)… Not really a factor you can control, but something to keep in mind.

These robots are cheap and relatively safe. I know they are in use at my alma mater, and student teach themselves how to use them, so it certainly is doable.
As with most of the more complicated tools the biggest challenge is to pass on knowledge once the people who set it up and get it running graduate, especially true for “cutting edge equipment” :wink:

I agree with all the previous sentiments of warning against “cutting edge” technology that will not actually be utilized or out of date in 2 years. (robotic arm, VR, etc)
The design school I went to went through the process of getting 2 kuka robotic arms and they were definitely underutilized show pieces just there for tour groups.

Basic electronics lab is definitely a great way to go! Soldering station, power supply, oscilloscope, assorted components, ect.
Hell, even a set of “littlebits” electronics would be a great reusable set of electronics.
Knowledge in this area can create some amazing creative output. Prototypes that can move, speakers designs that actually make music, and the ability to talk intelligently about the hardware we are designing around.
Its one of the biggest areas I had gotten more education in through school. (recent graduate)

https://shop.littlebits.cc/products/workshop-set

seriously check out little bits. They have a lot of power, great hardware, and compatiblity with Arduino etc.
Don’t be fooled by the “toy” aspect. You can easily configure a minimally viable prototype that works! throw them in your 3D printed parts.
Pull them out and they are reusable!
Some of their hardware is really cool - like a smart home tech kit

What’s your situation regarding 3D printing? Do you have a 3D printer at school?
Talk to Dave Gaylord at www.matterhackers.com in Orange County. Maybe get 2-4 extrusion 3D printers so the whole class can share and not depend on one during portfolio review. Maybe he can offer student pricing if it’s for the school…
Yes it requires consumables, but cheap compared to more advanced 3D printers. I’m sure students can afford filament. They SHOULD learn how to use them and experience the cost of running bad parts and troubleshooting when machines crash.
We’ve ran parts for CSULB students in the past and it’s amazing some of the parts we get. Parts at different scales, faceted, paper thin walls, flat parts, etc. Not to mention the sticker shock when we tell them how much parts would have cost if they weren’t students.
Just a thought.

I kind of agree. I would also think about what would help my students get jobs in the end and to become successful designers. I understanding breaking from traditional ID, but if there’s not a need in the market for what you’re producing, your students will fail and just spent a ton of money on being able to use some fun stuff. With that said, I wish when I was a student we got to make $10,000 recommendations, could be really cool if the money is used wisely!

On another note:
Students who can speak intelligently about designing for manufacturing seem to a have a large edge.
So many of the industrial design jobs deal with designing injection molded products so why not equip students to speak intelligently about that.
I have had friends get asked in interviews how a part they designed would be made. While its discussed in school I feel that most students never think about the mfg process when designing in CAD.

Idea for the $10,000 = Get a desktop injection molding machine
Allow students to learn with the actual equipment used for consumer product.
Use it for demos. Learn about draft angle and designing for 2 part molds. Discuss mold design. Allow students to make parts for projects. Design products with real snap fits ect.

http://www.apsx.com/APSX-PIM-Desktop-Injection-Molding-p/apsx_pim.htm

This could be interesting, especially since you can 3d print the molds out of plastic and get some shots out of it for cheap. I was blown away when I saw pieces being molded in plastic tools.

+1 on the desktop injection molder, that would solve our having to gently break it to recent graduates that “you can’t really mold that you know”. Didn’t know such a thing existed.

On the electronics prototyping kit - I recall reading some story about Jony Ive and his student telephone project. When he brought the phone to his first interview he could take it apart and show how the components fit. Imagine being able to take some student project gadget to an interview, talk about the surfacing and gesture on the outside, and then open it up and name the individual components on the inside.

ORRRRRRRR you can say that your school has a robot.

A small injection molding machine will still require an in house CNC machine for creating tools, and that’s prohibitively expensive for materials as a student. Students can learn as much about injection molding with a good teacher and a weeks lesson in drafting plus sketches. I would also argue that theres very advanced tooling approaches (we commonly had parts with pulls/slides/cams in all 4-6 directions) that allow very wacky things to be built. Not to say students shouldn’t understand those things, but early on in your career you can also be limited by a smaller amount of knowledge and thinking everything needs to be an A-B tool.

With that said, I had a girl in my ID studio in college design a bucket for horse shit (literally) and then when asked what it was made out of her response was “Carbon Fiber, because it’s light”. Needless to say her ID career never took off. :laughing:

I think that its a super valuable experience for a student to be able to do this and show that they understand the design process as a whole and know how to do real user testing.

I had to make a stud finder for a 3rd year project, part of which was building the pcb for sound, light etc. feedback and a controller so that we could test how usable the design was. Getting responses on a working prototype from people around the uni and making design changes based on those responses made the project far more realistic, and I definitely learnt a lot about making something functional.

On the desktop IM machine ( which I think is also a good idea) an innovation lab here was 3d printing successful tools from Nylon (I think) rather than machining them, but the prints are from a 250k objet printer which puts the material costs outside of what the average student can afford.

Ferrari bucket? :laughing: Reminds me of all the carbon fibre trinkets than luxury car brands sell.

This sounds like a great little project with both educational and real-world relevance. Sparks curiosity about “why does something do that” and recognizes the relative level of complexity in even simple tools and products. Lamps, alarm clocks, remote controlled gadgets, all worthwhile types of projects.