We explore the power of Agile Pretotyping to accelerate innovation and improve decision making in the enterprise.
As I described in my previous article “Digitization – The 9th of Agile Factory Fundamentals,” the development of a physical product requires the evaluation of several alternative solutions among them, each of which is evaluated according to the different perspectives of design for X.
When mathematical models, accurate enough in reproducing reality, are available, a digital model is produced. In many cases, the solutions to be verified or validated are difficult and sometimes impossible to implement digitally.
An example is the case of usability verification of a hardware product, which requires physical contact with the user.
Example of an Agile Pretotype
For example, if we are studying the ergonomics of a product with a handle, it makes no sense to wait for the physical construction of several alternative prototypes among them .
You can think of building with 3D printing the different handles of the product you want to compare, each created together with the approximate shape of the remaining product.
By placing a mass at the product’s center of gravity, in such an amount that the whole weighs as much as the final product, the ergonomics of alternative solutions can be verified.
This is an example of Agile Pretotyping that allows a solution design the verification without having to build the physical product.
I remember the case of an industrial product developed with one of my teams. This was a grinding spindle consisting of a light aluminum-magnesium alloy body hinged to a holder also made of light alloy.
The construction of each of the two elements involved a steel mold (shell), which took about 3.5 months to manufacture. It then took another 1.5 months for casting the first elements (sampling) followed by 15 days for machining the whole thing.
With my teams we did the digital simulations possible with 3D CAD and structural calculation software.
Together with other components, the two light alloy elements form a hinge and provide for flexible elements such as cables and tubes that connect the two parts. The hinge showed possible functional and assembly difficulties to be verified experimentally.
In my role as project sponsor and technical director, I authorized the team to develop a 3D printed pretotype of both light alloy elements.
Technically, the mold is built with additive manufacturing, inside which the light alloy casting is made.
I speak of pretotype because what was made did not correspond completely with the final prototype.
In this way in only 1 month we could receive the parts ready for assembly.
The team assembled the pretype, finding some critical issues and correcting the design of light alloy parts and other components. This all took place while the supplier was procuring material for the mold.
This made it possible to modify the drawings, in time to make the mold with the final solutions. As a result, 24 spindles, needed for the machine under development, were built immediately without further modification.
The costs of pretypes and the cost of delay
The ratio of the cost of the 3D-printed agile pretotype to the shell-cast prototype was about 18, but the total time for validation was one-fifth.
The cost of the delay in delivery of the machine with the 24 spindles, including the necessary modifications, would have been about 2 orders of magnitude greater.
A further case is described in my previous article “The pretotype as a true forerunner of the prototype”
Agile pretotyping is the mode of verification of a design solution that, like concurrent solution development and design for X, becomes a mindset adopted by designers.
In practice, the pretotype makes possible, in the world of hardware products, test-driven development, what is called Test Driven Development (TDD) in software.
