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How Toyota Changed the Way We Make Things
…and how their system was inspired by 1950s American supermarkets
By Rain Noe - Aug 29, 2018
Something every designer knows is that having less makes you more creative. In fact one of the first things we do when beginning a new project is to figure out what the constraints are; having those boundaries to bump up against forces us to innovate.
A particularly profound example of this, which every industrial design student should study, is how TPS--the Toyota Production System--and their kanban, a/k/a lean manufacturing/just-in-time manufacturing methodology, has influenced how things are made all around the world. Not just by Toyota, that is: I witnessed kanban practices during my visits to German power tool manufacturer Festool as well as Jonathan Ward's amazing Icon facility, and everyone from Pixar to Boeing to IBM has borrowed from TPS.
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Enter a caption (optional)So what exactly is TPS, and why does it work so well? In this video, Bloomberg succinctly explains not only the system, but how it came about--as a result of having less resources:
Rain Noe
Rain Noe is a writer and industrial designer based in New York City.
3 Comments
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I am I the only one who thought of the Ron Howard film "Gung Ho"? Lol
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Excellent stuff, in engineering school “ the toyota way” and “the goal” where required reading and as well as other itinerationsof continuos improvement. The actual toyota system fell a little out of favor between 2009 and 2012 after the infamous sticky pedals incidents that harmed toyota’s reputation. The principals are solid and used in every good plant, but are not necessarily named after toyota.
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For those interested in the subject, have a look at The Machine That Changed the World by Daniel Roos and James P. Womack. They were the ones that brought the Lean Manufacturing systems of the Japenese car manufacturers to light in the 1980's to the Western world. They had lead an international study based in MIT over several years on the subject which lead to their writing of this book.
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Continued Reading
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By Rain Noe - Aug 28, 2018
Design vs. Engineering: Q&A With a Mechanical Engineer on What It's Like to Work With Industrial Designers
"They'll design something impossible, then we'll try to make it reality, then they'll be like 'That's too big….'"
It's easy for us industrial designers to have love/hate relationships with engineers. We want them to clean up our tooling drawings, sure, but we hate when they make changes without telling us, and we often dismiss them as not "getting" design, or UX, or aesthetics. If engineers had the final
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By Rain Noe - Aug 10, 2018
Inside Belkin, Part 2: The Industrial Design Process of the TrueClear Pro
An in-depth interview with Oliver Seil, VP of Design
After dropping and shattering my expensive iPhone several years ago, I replaced it and took steps to prevent it from happening again. I kept the phone inside an absurdly bulky, tank-like protective case by Pelican, completely obscuring the beauty that Apple's designers had slaved to produce. This case was
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By Emily Engle - Jul 23, 2018
Good Thing Releases Food-Safe Vessels Designed by Car Mechanic Turned Product Designer Shinya Yoshida
For snacks, for keys—for both snacks and keys?
This morning, Good Thing announced a new product in their lineup—a trio of food-safe vessels designed by Japanese product designer, Shinya Yoshida. As former car mechanic, Yoshida naturally took inspiration from the flowing curves and shapes found in the auto industry when designing the G3 Vessels. The result is a
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By Emily Engle - Jul 18, 2018
Sketchfab Launches Online Store for 3D Models that Allows Full Inspection Before Purchase
"What you see is what you get."
Sketchfab recently launched their Sketchfab store out of beta, which allows creative professionals and hobbyists to sell and purchase 3D models for web, mobile, AR and VR online. If you're on the creation/selling side, this means you finally have the chance to monetize your work. On the other end,
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