An organized toolbox for the coxswain of a rowing team
Coxswains, (the non-rowing member of a crew team) have a lot of things to keep track of as they lead their boat through the water. The Cox-Kit neatly organizes all of their tools, including custom-made wrenches, so they can focus on actually coaching their team rather than finding a missing part.
My team interviewed and observed rowers, built mockups of increasing fidelity, and ended with a high-fidelity 3D printed prototype with a fully integrated hinge and clasp.
Northwestern University Club Rowing Team // Human-Centered Product Design
March 2019 – June 2019
Siemens NX Modeling / 3D Printing / Low to High Fidelity Mockups / Rigorously Narrowing Brainstorming Ideas
Takeaways.
The low and medium-fidelity mockups my team and I created weren't just cheap versions of our final protytype. Rather, they helped us form physical intuition for different concepts and were instrumental in helping us analyze and get feedback on our ideas.
This was my first design process that utilized 3D printing. Experiencing the efficiency and flexibility that designing in CAD & 3D printing offered for creating higher-fidelity prototypes (in addition to learning more about 3D printing) was exciting, and definitely something I've carried into other projects.
If you are interested in learning more about our design process, feel free to explore the project details below!
Coxswains have many moving parts to keep track of during practice – all while their most important responsibility is directing the rest of their team.
A coxswain (highlighted in the first image) has a diverse array of responsibilities during every practice and race for a rowing team, as we learned through interviews and journey-mapping their daily process.
In addition to carrying water bottles and data-gathering equipment, as pictured, another responsibility the coxswain has is to store any tools or spare parts that might be needed to repair the boat on the water.
We determined that a custom tool-kit had the most potential to improve the coxswain's daily experience.
Their current fanny packs can get cluttered and disorganized easily, making the process of locating specific parts cumbersome and time consuming.
I created higher-fidelity mockups of tool-kit layouts for user testing.
After brainstorming, creating quick mockups, and conducting another round of interviews, we were ready to further flesh out our tool-kit concept.
A teammate and I constructed these mockups out of corrugated cardboard. We explored different layouts for a toolbox, and used the mockups to conduct user testing with coxswains.
I designed and 3D printed our final prototype.
I designed a two-part tool box in Siemens NX, including features such as a fully integrated hinge system and clasp, and spaces for magnets to be inserted. The two-part design was then 3D-printed using a Stratasys Fortus 380.
We also manufactured custom box-end wrenches, structurally welding two different halves together to cut the number of wrenches the coxswain needed to bring on the water in half. The wrenches were held in place by the magnets that lined the bottom of the Cox-Kit.