Newly Released Work (All Product Types)

This little EDC thingy recently launched - Hultafors OKF.
I wasn’t around for the industrialization phase this time, several features didn’t make it it seems.
Really happy to see that the clip made it though - it can be flipped for clipping knife blade down or blade up, on left or right side. Meant 8 holes had to be threaded instead of 2.

Very cool! Congrats!

This is great! I assume the small red “knob” is the lock/unlock?

I found a boring review, just walking through the functions, “B guitar guy” or something…but these two guys (Korean I think) are more fun, especially if you turn on closed captions. They seem to like the packaging we designed as well as the instruction-manual-for-each-language (we fought for that extra cost so that no matter the market it’s sold in it will feel like a home market product). And they seem to love the product as well. The closed captions mention ‘sex’ several times so I think that must be a complimentary translation :stuck_out_tongue:

Thanks yo and moi!
Yeah, spring loaded lock in 2 positions. It was supposed to be fully disengaged so you could flip it open/closed just using one hand. Not sure why it didnt make production, but it might have made it illigal in EU. Sadly, it’s a two-hand operation out of the box, though it can be hacked :wink:

Is there a special tool for the main pivot? Reminds me of the Mavic bike hub splines. It could almost be a one-handed operation if a pin was substituted for the nail notch. It looks nicely finished and I like the drop point. The open pivot ‘hole’ could make for some interesting grip affordances. Nice work, its unique in an area that has a lot of activity right now.

(Regarding GWNext’s instrument tuner)

Congrats on shipping! This (well, not this one, but another clip-on tuner) is a product I use daily and have a love/hate relationship with. I’m wondering if you’ve identified/managed to mitigate/solve the biggest problem that I see in tuners in general: difficulty in “zeroing in” on the note you want - this has a lot to do with the instrument of course, but I have always thought that some level of built-in “forgiveness” in the display (maybe it could be user adjustable) might reconcile the apparent accuracy of the tuner with the inaccuracy of the instrument. Cool area. How much UX were you able to play with?

Good questions - we identified 4 instruments to tune against and let the user choose. We also worked with the factory to add a choice of frequencies to tune to. There’s already a bit of forgiveness built into these things to counter outside vibration so to add more might have made it seem sloppy or ineffective but it’s getting great reviews for its technical accuracy. We worked with a factory already adept at making good tuners so the basics were already there. We thought having the flying bird show up only when in tune would be kinda cool as well. :wink:
Another complaint from users was the clamps on most tuners, they work great on some headstock, not on others so we opened the jaw further, increased the pad sizes, etc.

We’ve just wrapped up a cool guitar case for Gibson, it’s for a limited run of “Reverse Firebird Mod” guitars being released in '21 & '22. Most traditional guitar cases have a foam backed exterior material, then stiffener layers, then die-cut foam for cavities, then a felt skin. We created a block EVA with felt skin adhered prior to heat pressing a cavity designed for the guitar. We wanted to just drop the EVA assembly into the ‘bag’, attached at the zipper line. No stiffeners, no cut foam pieces, no glue.
First shots of the EVA had some burned corners as you’d expect so fine-tuning the heat and press time eliminated scarring/burning of the felt. Our pilot run looks great, the bulk runs will come soon.

+1 for the process and material descriptions. How many steps in the manufacturing or assembly were you able to eliminate? When you say “most traditional . . . cases” are you talking about semi-rigid cases like this one, or all types? Could you show any process photos? I would love to see the assembly steps and the “oopses”. Genuinely curious as again (like w the tuner), it’s an something I touch almost daily and have lots of little unmet needs lined up in the “file”. The large panel in the body area is something I haven’t seen; how’s that work as storage (assuming it is) vs. need for structural rigidity/protection in that area?

Thanks for the interest, that pocket below the body houses two pre-wired pick guards to be included in the kit.


The sketch below shows the construction we would have taken via a traditional approach.

But we eliminated everything on the inside except for the solid, felt skinned, foam ‘block’ and a storage pocket lid. This allowed us to beat the weight target by almost 2 lbs. By using the zipper line to connect the interior and exterior we simplified manufacturing quite a bit. Note the burn/scarring on the most dramatic height changes, caused by the heat press stretching the felt, making it thin and susceptible to damage - that had to be tuned quite a few times!


We addressed some common wants, needs and frustrations with small details - like a pocket integrated into the interior that is accessible by unzippering just a few inches at the handle area to slip your hand inside to quickly access keys, wallet, etc.

What a treat. Thanks for the details and highlights and great process shots!

Just wrapped 2021 with the biggest year so far in 15 years of the Studio!

2021 Race Kit Design Reel below.

Footwear Design and more Reel coming soon (awaiting public release of a few projects)

R

My latest project, the L460 Range Rover centre console. I all seems like a long time ago :smiley:

I’m really looking forward to the press and public getting a proper look at car. There are some features in the console that no one has shown yet.
I suppose cup holders and stowage aren’t going to get many youtube clicks :smiley:

I’m on a 26/7 MY car now

1 Like

beautiful work! That entire design is so fantastic. Such a nice evolution of an icon.

Nice!! I would certainly love to see it in real life. The RR design expression is one of the only car designs that interest me these days and from what I’ve seen of the new ones it’s taken to the next level!

Can you get us a Core77 discussion board member discount, AnthT? :slight_smile:

R

Maybe we’d all have to share one vehicle.

They are pretty big and there’s not too many of us left here on the forums, so it could work.

R

Ditto. Love what’s been going on at Land Rover lately, particularly the new Velar, RR, and Defender but also all the way back to the original Evoque. Nice work!

Just to clarify, I’m Engineering Design, not industrial design, but I do have a keen interest in industrial design and I work very closely with the team in the studio. We are a large team :wink: