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Masterful product design

Gene_Davis | Posted in Tools for Home Building on May 19, 2007 04:30am

Not about power tools for homebuilding, but about a tool and its design, nonetheless.

A Dyson vacuum.

I bought one for my wife (and me) and have never been as impressed with product design as I am with this machine.  Tools for homebuilding should be designed so well.

Beginning with the packaging, the setup instructions, and the usage instructions, everything is a wonder.

The packaging comes open and apart lickety split, no tools needed, no boxcutter, no putty knife, no screwdriver needed.  No ripped cardboard.  Why isn’t all product packaging done this way?

The setup?  Again, no tools needed, and everything just goes together, snap, click, like a James Bond weapon demo done by that guy that shows him how.

The instructions are all in pictures, no words, and are flawless.

What a great design!

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Replies

  1. john7g | May 19, 2007 05:03pm | #1

    >for my wife (and me) <

    yeah sure.  Was she standing over our shoulder when you wrote that?

    1. User avater
      Gene_Davis | May 19, 2007 05:24pm | #2

      How did you guess?!

      1. john7g | May 19, 2007 05:27pm | #3

        Same thing I do when she's standing over my shoulder.  :) 

  2. User avater
    dieselpig | May 19, 2007 06:22pm | #4

    I got one for my wife for her birthday last year (hey... it's what she wanted!).  I agree wholeheartedly... it's just a great design from A to Z.  I like it so much I actually use it myself now and again.

    View Image
  3. MVAgusta | May 19, 2007 06:35pm | #5

    I agree that it is well designed, but it is not up to any sort of heavy use. I just picked up a vacuum from the repair shop and the repairman had one on the bench from a day-care center. One year of use and the carpet brush roller was worn out. The bearings seemed to be of reasonable quality, but everything else was made of the lightest plastic possible. I asked the tech what he thought of them: "Good for me, bad for you".

    1. Stuart | May 19, 2007 07:48pm | #8

      I asked the tech what he thought of them: "Good for me, bad for you".

      I have no personal experience with them but that's what I've heard as well...there's a guy on another internet board I frequent who owns a vacuum cleaner repair shop, and he says the same thing about the Dyson.

    2. rasconc | May 20, 2007 04:16am | #12

      I would think that that use would be a bit severe for any vac.  I talked to a Vac Tech one time and he was talking about the Panasonic I was about to buy.  He said a guy brought one in that was pretty worn and about a year old.  He asked him what he was doing and he was doing a large party/dance place in Wichita.

    3. User avater
      Gene_Davis | May 20, 2007 04:24am | #13

      Yes, we have a dog, but no, we don't vacuum nearly as often as a day care center does.  Nor a motel.  Nor any other kind of commercial operation.

      Our house is small, and a three-layer cake, with vacuum-able surfaces on all three floors.  We aren't retiring our older machine.  This new Dyson will be used on two of the three floors, and I'll bet we get many years service from it.

      1. tek | May 21, 2007 08:28pm | #14

        Sunday Morning had a report on Dyson yesterday that was very interesting.  He set to improve the vacuum and it took him something like 1,000 tries before he got what he was after.  He said the final inspiration came from a trip to the lumber yard where he saw the device they use to remove sawdust from the millshop.

        He's used some of his billions to establish a think tank in England to expand on engineering and design.

  4. Piffin | May 19, 2007 07:04pm | #6

    But with all those wonderful comments, you don't mention whether they work to pick up the cat hair off your pillow!

     

     

    Welcome to the
    Taunton University of
    Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime.
     where ...
    Excellence is its own reward!

    1. MisterT | May 19, 2007 07:16pm | #7

      It's supossed to vacuum TOO???I don't Know what I am doing

      But

      I am VERY good at it!!

  5. reinvent | May 19, 2007 11:11pm | #9

    " everything just goes together, snap, click, like a James Bond weapon demo done by that guy that shows him how."

    That would be Q

  6. pino | May 19, 2007 11:17pm | #10

    "Tools for homebuilding should be designed so well."

    Having recently purchased a Festool TS 75, I'd say they come awfully close to the design quality of the Dyson. Be careful though. You keep fawning over that Dyson and your wife's going to add vacuuming to your job description.

    1. diamond_dodes | May 20, 2007 02:45am | #11

      I had an older model Dyson for years with no problems.

  7. JonE | May 21, 2007 11:57pm | #15

    Bought one ourselves, don't much care for it.  Hard to get under furniture, cheap plastic, we've replaced several parts, things wear quickly, now on our third hose.  We only vacuum one floor, the basement is done with a shop vac. 

    It does suck, however.  That's 'suck' in a good way.  No filters or bags to clog. 

    I would not buy another, especially for the price.  We used to have a Kenmore canister that worked well for fifteen years, it eventually wore out (more cheap plastic).  I don't know what we will do when we need another vac.  I was too cheap to put central vac in our new house. 

     

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