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Produit final après reconception

SEWING MACHINE

 

Spring 2018

Team : 5 students

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Design a new sewing machine:
cost reduction and improved usage
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Context

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Our team used a product redesign strategy on the sewing machine. The aim is to propose a new concept more adapted to the needs of today's customers, and more specifically their uses. 

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Usage study

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Thanks to a widely published survey, we have better targeted sewing machine users:

  • 45.7% of consumers have already tried at least one sewing machine

  • The sewing machine is often shared between several users

  • The mechanical sewing machine is more widely used

  • The majority of users are women

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During a focus group of ten people, we discovered that the sewing machine is often perceived as too complex, too long to set up (thread, reel, fabric...), and men are discouraged by the colors and shapes too feminine of these machines.

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External functional analysis

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An external functional analysis (EFA) then makes it possible to know the functions expected from a sewing machine. The EFA is an approach using: 

  • The "Horned beast" diagram 

  • Diagrams of the different phases of the product's life cycle

  • The hierarchy of functions

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QFD - Quality Function Deployment

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EFinally, we can cross these last two lines of thought thanks to the QFD matrix tool (Quality Function Deployment). It allows to study which functions are the most sensitive and satisfactory for users for possible improvement, and which functions contribute only superficially if necessary.

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This tool also allows you to rate competitive products in order to find the features (sometimes not expressed by users) that can make a difference in the market.

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Internal functional analysis

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At this stage, we partly disassembled a sewing machine in order to connect the functions to different functional blocks, which themselves consist of parts.

This step allows you to create:

  • a nomenclature

  • activity-function diagrams

  • functional diagram blocks

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All these tools lead to the Functional Analysis Table, which links the price of a part to its usefulness in the overall system.

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Example: We found that 34.72% of the production cost of the machine studied is allocated to the function "Allow the user to sew fabric". 

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Questionnaire

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Diagramme pieuvre 

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Schéma de principe

The redesign without increasing the price of the sewing machine must therefore be done according to the following formula:

Value  =

Satisfaction

Cost

Technical solutions to reduce costs
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We then looked for solutions to the redesign axes concerning the modification of the technology. This is what the user does not directly control, such as drive systems and "hidden" mechanics. In the case of the sewing machine, it is expensive without really adding value. The obvious solution is to bring the controls closer to their final point of application.

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Solutions techniques pour rapprocher les commandes de leur point d'application

Uusage solutions to inscrease satisfaction

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In order to improve the use that has not already been made during the technical solutions, we have thought of:

  • Add a tool to make it easier to thread the yarn into the eye

  • Transparency of part of the shell to "popularize" the internal technology of the machine while guaranteeing soundproofing

  • Relocate the accessory storage box to release the sewing arm

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Thanks to our solutions, design efficiency has increased by 1%. 

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Storyboard d'utilisation après modifications

Discussion

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This improvement is not significant but shows that there is a margin for the production costs of sewing machines.

The costs had to be affected subjectively, so there is a high percentage of error.
For a more complete study, the machine would have to be completely disassembled to give a more accurate cost. To be able to quantify product satisfaction, it would be necessary to be able to prototype the redesign, and perform user tests, which we had not had time to do. 

Team :

Samuel CLEMENDOT

Anthony MAIRRE
Fanny MONNIER

Caroline PERES

Amandine PIREYRE

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