What are the 3 product design optimizations and best practices that you shouldn’t miss if you’re bringing a new product to market?
- Optimizing the design for cost, size, and weight.
- Following best practices for PCB design and layout.
- Ensuring the product’s functionality and reliability.
We explain these here so you can implement them in your design and get a better result!
If you prefer listening to reading…
Here’s a summary of the episode, but listen for full details:
1. How to optimize the design for cost, size, and weight?
Optimizing for cost.
Avoid over-engineering as this increases a product’s cost quality. Keeping costs under control requires a focus on components, materials, and standard items. Selecting readily available components that are already certified off-the-shelf will often be better for costs than custom-making new ones. Optimizing to use just one type of screw instead of many different types of fasteners can also reduce costs (IKEA do this in their flatpack kits). Materials should be selected based on your product’s design and requirements. Are the most expensive and exotic materials strictly necessary for the product to perform as required? If not, don’t use them or the costs will be high.
The lowest cost is not always the best option, either, as the product may not meet its requirements if made from the cheapest possible components and materials. You need to find a balance between cost and quality/performance. (02:51)
Optimizing for size.
Size is connected to the product’s functionality, and there is often room for manoeuvre. Reducing it can lower costs in some cases, such as for parts, although miniaturization can be more costly for electronics. (10:51)
Optimizing for weight.
Lighter materials could reduce costs, such as using plastic instead of metal. The product could also be designed to have hollow materials instead of solid blocks, and implementing, say, a honeycomb structure won’t compromise on structural strength, either. Using less material generally results in lower costs. You need to find a balance between weight and functionality, don’t sacrifice necessary durability and performance for the sake of shaving off weight. (13:40)
2. What are the best practices for PCB design and layout?
PCB design and layout best practices include focusing on the following:
- Signal integrity
- Optimizing the ground plain
- Power
- Voltage levels
- Thermal management with heat sinks, heat paste, etc
- Component placement
- Layout techniques
Peer reviews are an important best practice for your PCB design, as another set of eyes may find issues that need to be fixed that you miss. Using breadboard prototypes provides a basic way to test component placements, functions, etc. (17:29)
DFM for PCBs.
PCBs may be one part of a product but they need to be designed for manufacturability, the same as other key components. By designing the board to be more efficient (perhaps using standard components, reducing its size, using less material for the board, etc) you’re also going to reduce costs in many cases.
Using standardized components that are not end-of-life and have been tested and verified already in relevant ways should be a part of the DFM checklist. (26:31)
3. How to ensure the product’s functionality and reliability?
A key concern for most products is to manufacture something that lasts for the desired product lifecycle. Optimized cost, size, and weight all tie into product reliability and functionality.
Design for Reliability involves designing a product holistically to function consistently and not fail during its expected lifetime. Designing a product to be reliable will require focusing on:
- Selecting high-quality components
- Temperature/environmental condition resistance
- Ability to withstand vibration during normal use and in transit
- Stress-testing the product past its expected use level (usually done in a test lab) such as material strength, crush, drop, voltage, hardness, HALT, and environmental condition tests, etc
Products should be optimized to meet the functionality and have acceptable costs, weights, PCBs, and be reliable. Using checklists and peer reviews are key methods to achieve success.
No doubt you will rely on your supplier for their expertise to make some of these optimizations, so carefully sourcing the right supplier and building a good relationship with them is also necessary. (31:47)