During the Summer of 2011, we took an injected plastic version through tooling and initial mold tests. The results were passable and the product functioned relatively well after iterative tooling modifications. However, we were not satisfied with the product quality or the accumulative thickness of the plastic pieces when stored. We made the tough decision to abandon this approach and explore other material options.
We are currently exploring various manufacturing techniques to figure out which one will be the most effective way of executing the concept. Firstly, we are working closely with cut and sew manufacturers to explore how we can layer waterproof fabrics, stiffener material and foams to achieve the specified performance. One important activity with soft goods is to balance out achieving the desired performance with labor, material, time and complexity involved. In the case of Unhampered, some approaches require too much time to manufacture (mostly due sewing through the stiffening boards). Other approaches required too much fabric due to layering and are therefore cost prohibitive.
Going forward, we will be exploring other processes in parallel, such as die-cutting sheet plastic.
The boil buoy’s engineering work has been finalized. Our engineers were exploring all of the aspects of the sound that the Boil Buoy could produce. They looked into the decibel levels (loudness) along with the tone of the sound produced. The engineers needed to make sure that the decibel level was loud enough for a person to be properly notified when the water reached a boil.
The two major scenarios of when a person is boiling water are when the lid is on and when the lid is off. At first, they wanted to make the chirp loud enough so that even with the lid on, the noise wouldn’t get drowned out. When they increased the volume for this scenario, they noticed that when they took the lid off it was way too loud. So rather than having the chirp be alarm-like, causing ringing in the users ear, they believed that it was necessary to reduce the volume for the user’s sake. More people would rather leave the lid off when boiling water than have ear damage.
Knowing what decibel level the Boil Buoy would be, enabled us to know what circuit board and battery will go into the product. Having this knowledge, we then received quotes from our manufacturers, agreed on the price of all the parts, and we will now start the tooling phase of the product development process.
