I’ve always been a fan of lean design, even before I knew it was a thing. Lean design is the principle of simplifying and optimising a process or product to be the best that it can be. This could be anything from software development to car manufacture, and general outcomes include better reliability, longevity, supportability and reduced support cost.
Growing up in an engineering household, I watched in awe as my father crafted many magnificent machines over the years in his workshop. What each machine did was useful and important in itself, but for me, the engineering-behind-the-engineering was what fascinated me – the over-engineering, the doing more with less, the repurposing, the sub 1000/inch precision and the classic – this shouldn’t work, but we’ll see what happens (it ALWAYS worked)
During Covid, I discovered the Munro Live YouTube channel and was fascinated by Sandy Munro’s ability to deep-dive into the manufacturing minutiae of how a given item was created, and how ideally, it *should* have been created in the most economical | strongest | fastest or most automatable way.
Imagine my delight, when I realised my cross country trip would take me north of Detroit, right past Munro Inc’s offices! I couldn’t help but get a couple of photos (with permission)
I didn’t get to meet the man himself (it was after hours), but I still consider this one crossed off the bucket list
J