Product Description

An encyclopaedic guide to production techniques and materials for product and industrial designers, engineers, and architects.

Today's product designers are presented with a myriad of choices when creating their work and preparing it for manufacture. They have to be knowledgeable about a vast repertoire of processes, ranging from what used to be known as traditional "crafts" to the latest technology, to enable their designs to be manufactured effectively and efficiently. Information on the internet about such processes is often unreliable, and search engines do not usefully organize material for designers.

This fundamental new resource explores innovative production techniques and materials that are having an impact on the design industry worldwide. Organized into four easily referenced parts—Forming, Cutting, Joining, and Finishing—over seventy manufacturing processes are explained in depth with full technical descriptions; analyses of the typical applications, design opportunities, and considerations each process offers; and information on cost, speed, and environmental impact. The accompanying step-by-step case studies look at a product or component being manufactured at a leading international supplier.

A directory of more than fifty materials includes a detailed technical profile, images of typical applications and finishes, and an overview of each material's design characteristics. With some 1,200 color photographs and technical illustrations, specially commissioned for this book, this is the definitive reference for product designers, 3D designers, engineers, and architects who need a convenient, highly accessible, and practical reference.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #16291 in Books
• Published on: 2007-11-30
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 528 pages

About the Author
Rob Thompson lectures on materials and processes at Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts, London. He is Senior Designer at Bolton Associates, where he is involved in researching and developing materials and products.

Customer Reviews

the best so far
As an industrial designer and a professor of ID at a Furniture Design college, I am very pleased with this book. It is probably the best book of its kind, so far, covering most processes and describing them in the most excellent manner (with nice diagrams, case studies etc). I would love to see bigger pictures in the next edition. This can be used as a great reference textbook! A big "thank you" to Rob Thomson and the publishers!

Best book I've seen on the subject
It is an excellent book on manufacturing processes and materials. Not overbearingly technical, just the right thing for designers. A step in the right direction, like Ashby and Johnson's book Materials and Design: The Art and Science of Material Selection in Product Design

now, that's a book!
A great design book for insiders! No coffee table album for amateurs. Recommended as substitute for pornography. The only problem I had - it is too physically heavy for reading in the lavatory... enjoy!