Quirky’s blowing up HSN’s YouTube channel with Click ‘n Cook and other awesome socially-developed products from the weekend’s premiere:

Broom Groomer

Cloak

Cordies

Digits

Scratch-n-Scroll

Space Bar

Split Stick

Travelstacks

Wrapster

It’s been a long journey since Space Bar hit threshold in March, and we are so, SO excited to get this one out into the world. A big congrats to ideator Mike Cavada!

We’re releasing limited quantities of FOUR brand new products, just in time for the holidays:

Order confirmation e-mails got sent out this afternoon. We’ll be fulfilling all commitments on a first-come, first-served basis, and supplies are limited… so don’t wait to complete your order if you’re hoping to receive one (or all) of these products by Christmas!

And this is just the beginning. Keep your eyes on your inboxes in the coming weeks as we continue to move products out of production and into your hands for the holidays.

Production has been greenlit!

Projected ship date: December 1st

And to make a short story long:

We just received the T4 version of Space Bar earlier this week. Great stuff! This prototype was a fully functional test to reveal any issues still remaining with the product.

There were a handful of tiny issues, but nothing major: some tweaking on the aluminum parts, finishing touches on the finish, polishing on the mold cavities, adjusting on the hex screws, etc. etc.

Overall, we were very impressed with the T4 prototype, and we’re excited to move forward with this project. To ensure the items above get resolved, our incredible partners in Asia will be reviewing parts from a small production run to ensure quality and regularity of each unit early next week. We are moving forward with this pre-production run as an extra step of quality control and opportunity to have the factory calibrate and refine their production processes before our larger run.

Some tasks to be completed before the final quantity run:

- Developing QA (Quality Approval) sheet. This will be submitted to the factory to help them understand our expectations of craftsmanship during the production phase.

- Completing packaging design.

- Reviewing the small production run for remaining imperfections.

After that, we’ll be ready to get the show on the road!

Happy Monday! Our latest Quirk of the Week, Michael Cavada (pictured here with his lovely wife Clare), joined our awesome community last fall and we just can’t help falling for him. In addition to being ideator of The Space Bar, Mike has influenced fifty products in every stage of development, from eval to industrial design to logo design and beyond. That’s a heck of a lot of products, but it doesn’t stop there. Mike has enthusiastically shared the Quirky process with fellow teachers who were then inspired to create a curriculum to teach kids how to create product designs and develop them into actual products. He’s helping to shape the next generation of Quirklings!

Mike shares the story of his father, who lost an arm during WWII. “Growing up as a child, I really took his handicap for granted. One day as a teen, while trying to complete a task in his presence, I got frustrated and gave up. He stepped up and said, I’ll do it, and he did just that. Wow! Since then I knew, I could do anything, if I just kept trying.”

Wow, indeed. Learning lessons from the past and helping to shape the future, our Mike Cavada is a man for all times!

It took a few weeks to do more prototyping, and now I’m proud to present this photograph of the T3 sample that recently hit our office.

Improvements since last post:

- Continued tolerance adjustments between aluminum and plastic parts
– Specified color way information on plastic parts
– Specified and tested electronics

The next step is to get a fully functional T4 sample in to do additional testing. Stay tuned!

Today we received the second tooled sample, which we call “T2″. The good news: we’re nearly there! This version includes modifications that we requested after we received the first sample, which include adjusting the tolerances between the plastic and aluminum parts. The interaction between these materials is important to us because any gaps can disrupt the sleek character of the product.

Internally, we altered the design of the plastic housing structures that keep the various electronic elements in place. Our sourcing team is also working on securing final FCC approvals for the USB parts and UL approval for the adapter.

If you’re at all interested in product manufacturing, you can learn more about aluminum extrusion, which is a significant part of the Space Bar’s manufacturing process, through this video:

Again, thanks for your support and patience… and stay tuned for more updates in the coming weeks!

We’re getting a T2 sample of the Space Bar on Monday. So enjoy the weekend. We’ll be baaaack with a full production update after we’ve reviewed the sample!

- We will provide a date estimate only when full production has begun.

- We will send confirmation e-mails and have SKU (color/version) selection only when the product is on hand.

- We will provide a full production report on each post-threshold product every three weeks.

Stay tuned for the following post-production reports coming your way…

Wrapster: later today!

Space Bar: 9/10

MugStir: 9/14

Sling Back: 9/23

Switch: 9/30

Click n Cook: 10/4

Pivot Power: 10/5

We’re truckin’ along on manufacturing for the Space Bar, and we’ll be ready to post some progress updates soon. In the meantime, whet your appetite by checking out these awesome new renders*, uploaded today by the Quirky Design Staff.

As you can see, we’ve made some small design changes to this iteration of Space Bar. We’ve added two USB ports to the back of the unit, along with mini USB and AC power ports. We’re also working on perfecting some small details so we can keep the product’s original sleek form.

*Keep in mind that these photorealistic renders represent our current plans for the product. The final product may be tweaked slightly during the manufacturing process.