This is a publication on innovation, problem-solving, concept design and new product development. You may not think it looks very much like a formal textbook, but rest assured, to offer an educational text is the intention. The reason this book diverges from the expected form of an educational text is that the technical subject upon which this work is based is perhaps a little niche and potentially a little dull. This is a pity, as the results of applying this topic can offer an entertaining diversion that often ends in the delightful surprise of a puzzle well solved. As a consequence, I have attempted to present this topic adorned with a little additional novelty that I hope is sufficient to make the educational journey a little more accessible and perhaps even entertaining.
This text also does not stand alone as a self-contained work. The purpose of this text is to offer a catalogue of case studies that are exercised by the core subject upon which this work is based. A comprehensive treatment of this core subject is offered in an earlier text. If the reader does wish to study the core subject, there are many texts to choose from and I direct you to my previous text, Dragon Egg: A practical guide to innovation as a good starting point for this journey.
To fully demonstrate the operation of those innovation techniques described in this reference requires a large repository of problems to which these techniques can be applied. To offer case studies I found a large list of interesting problems within that large list of solutions offered by the global patent record. Thousands of patent records are available from which to draw inspiration. Each describes the problem solved and also the solution at which each inventor arrived. This book employs the inventions of the patent record to showcase innovation and concept development techniques.
To showcase the method of solution, the case studies selected must be accessible to the reader and not demand specialist scientific or engineering knowledge. This drew the selection process towards problems resolved by mechanical means that demand levers, springs, nuts, bolts, fire and steam, and away from records that describe the electrical and electronic inventions of the 20th and 21st Centuries. This constraint in the selection of suitable case studies led back into the ingenious designs of those inventors to be found in the 19th Century. This places suitable problems firmly within the Victorian era, at the height of Britain’s global Empire.
Of particular note is the outcome of a concept design study. At the early genesis of an idea, one is unlikely to possess the answer to your problem. The early concept should be treated as a potential strategy that may lead to a solution. In its simplest form, this strategy can offer little other than a list of questions for the lab. Only after a strict analysis of this solution strategy should one begin to suggest a solution is at hand.
The purpose of this text is to demonstrate how one might arrive at that preliminary solution strategy. The techniques described allow you to describe the problem with precision, and derive that list of questions that will demand technical verification using the great many science and engineering topics available to the designer, not all of which I personally possess. The case studies offered in this book therefore bring you to that list of questions, and no further. The calculation of technical viability I leave as an entertaining diversion for the reader.
Beyond a desire to focus specifically upon the ideation process, I offer a second reason for eschewing the technical viability of each patent. The effort would exclude from this text some of the more fantastical ideas to be found in the patent record. All of the inventions that we see around us every day are those that were successfully transformed into a viable solution to be disseminated by a successful business. A great many inventions described in the patent record did not evolve to successfully form the infrastructure of our historical past. Only the seeds of these ideas remain, hidden within the vaults of the patent record. It seemed a worthwhile effort to showcase some of those inventions lost to history, and to allow those whose creative reach exceeded their technical grasp speak for a moment longer. As a consequence, strategies to resolve the problems stated are offered, but the technical effectiveness may be overstated, to allow reality to catch up with these inventions in its own time. This strategy that I adopted to offer case studies in concept design gave me an idea.
This text is also a fiction. What is not recorded in the catalogue of patents is the process by which each inventor arrived at each solution described. In this text, I have exploited this gap in the record to showcase the operation of modern innovation techniques. As a consequence, this text incorporates into each invention an entirely fictional process by which each problem might be described and how each invention might be discovered.
This approach led me further. If a fiction is to be incorporated into the patent record, then why not offer a rich fictional context within which each problem is solved? To this end, this text offers a fictional correspondence between two gentlemen who live their lives throughout the latter half of the 19th Century. This correspondence can speak aloud the innovation process that could link each problem to each solution, even if the true inventor did not necessarily take this path. Each correspondence can demonstrate how formal innovation practises can methodically solve a problem, but using 20th and 21st Century techniques unknown to these fictional characters. As a result, this text could be regarded as an alternate history fiction, perhaps cast in the mould of the 1990 novel The Difference Engine by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling. In this novel, set in Victorian Britain, technological and social change has diverged from the historical record after entrepreneurial inventor Charles Babbage succeeded in his ambition to build a mechanical computer. In my own fiction, I adopt much the same approach, in which Victorian engineers possess access to engineering design methods only available a century later.
However, in the early genesis of new ideas, before business building can weave its magic and transform a good idea into a successful business, the only currency to trade is the quality of your best idea. As a consequence, credit must be offered where credit is due. To maintain this good practise and to correct the true historical record made fictional by the narrative device of this text, at the end of each case study a brief summary is offered that describes the true inventors, their inventions and a reference to the associated patent record number should the reader wish to study the historical truth.
Finally, this book is also a folly. It is a building constructed primarily for decoration but suggesting through its appearance some other purpose. This function of this text is educational, whilst the extravagant structure most likely poorly represents the character of the time period and persons represented. I am but an engineer, and I am neither linguist nor historian. As a consequence, the best I can manage is a mere caricature of historical habits and communications to act as entertaining backdrop to the true purpose of this text. If you hope for an accurate portrait of Victorian England, I am bound to disappoint.
