Transcript

Welcome to the last week of our course. We have been discussing about design thinking as a tool used for developing agricultural products or implements. So, we have gone through every stage very detailed and there were few lab demonstrations of the low fidelity and high fidelity prototype shown to you. So now in this week we will try to talk about three case studies which we ourselves underwent and we developed using design thinking approach to make products such that the user were happy and we could sell it in a big way. So the first case study is going to be Amla de-seeding.

So Amla is a small berry. This berry has a flesh outer core and then it has a seed inside. People when they eat the fruit they always find it difficult to remove the seed and throw it. So now there is a market need for this fruit to be deseeded. The seed is hard and it is at the center of the fruit. So current state of the art is we try to do it only manual. So moment I say manual so per piece cost evaluation is done costing is done and so to get your decent amount of daily wages salary they have to de-seed women or men or children have to de-seed minimum 400 to 500 in numbers. So here buying an industrial grade machine is not a viable solution because these fruits are seasonal and these fruits sometime they have to be sorted out according to shape and size. So keeping all these things in mind we have come up with a machine which can try to help these people for de-seeding.

Why an Amla De-seeding machine?

So why an Amla De-seeding machine? A machine like Amla deseeding closely reflects the economic activities of bottom of the pyramid people. So, this is discussed when we have used frugal innovation. Frugal innovation is always used in developing for bottom of the pyramid, for a mass people, with a low cost where in which you can sell more in numbers. So that is what is bottom of the pyramid people. Does not require high capital to fabricate. See this product has to be slightly better than your high fidelity type prototype and it cannot be capital intensive why because these ladies who are involved, these farmers who are involved, these children who are involved in deseeding don’t have such a bandwidth of money to buy capital intensive machines. You can definitely develop devices which can be attached with a motor and which can precisely do. The throughput capacity can be very high. The production and the throughput will not match the throughput will be very high the production rate will be very low and it is a seasonal business so anything which is capital intensive cannot suffice to bring the need. Increase the productivity of an informal sector of associated with agricultural implements. Decrease the effort and work hazard conditions for people who may or may not be associated with any organization directly. Homemakers try to be an entrepreneur. Today looking into the world economy people have being promoted or people are asked to promote themselves to become small entrepreneurs who can satisfy the needs of bigger customers or who can satisfy the needs of a bigger industry.

Empathy Study

So we did empathy study of four or five students, three batches each went and spent almost a week trying to understand the fruit, trying to understand the different shapes, size of the fruit, market, where do they get, how is it getting packaged, how is the longevity of the fruits maintained, and how are they got inside the factory or inside their house, how are they doing the process. So they were looking into the process so here is a photo which talks about their the residence they have, how they pick up the fruits, how they package the fruits and keep after deseeding, and while deseeding the seed falls inside the bucket and here these are all deseeded ones, and these are all ones which is yet to be deseeded. You can see while doing deseeding the coloration is different. So actually speaking people don’t eat the deseeded one directly. The preservatives are added, the medicinal values or the sugar coating is added to it, it can be made as a candy or it can be made as a sweet, then it is packaged and it is sold. So for doing all those things deseeding is a proprietary operation. So an empathy study was done by fifteen students, three batches, one week, they did video recording, they did audio recording, they asked questions and they spent the nights with them to understand what is the plight these ladies or these farmers undergo in their home. So what is their socio-economical background. Moment they have a feel for their socio economical background. The understanding and that developing will be focused towards socio economical, rather than keeping technology alone. So here they were looking into the process the process was less productive and every fruit when they took in their hand they took a needle this needle has to be pierced and while talking or while they become fatigued many a times this needle pierce’s their fingers so, they get injured and this injury over a period of time leads them to paralysis which is a very dangerous one. So, now and every individual in the farmer’s house is a breadwinner so, if one person falls sick the average income of their family falls down and on top of it they have to spend medicinal expenditure for the sick person so injuries are quite common and it is very time consuming. And it is also pretty interesting the mother starts deseeding and while the efficiency goes down for her immediately the husband the king player of the family comes and pitches in and he starts deseeding along with his wife and moment they both cannot satisfy to their individual targets of the day then the children are also asked to deseed and help them in the business. So in this way what is happening the entire family is involved in the business. So this entire culture is understood by doing a proper empathy study and in the empathy study we also saw if at all they get hurt what are the medicines they use, how do they apply, do they use pharmaceutical one which is chemically rich. So, if they apply it then they cannot further process. And the other thing is if there is a bloodshed happening because of the injury again they cannot process it because these are all not according to the edible standards, and on top of it this market is, and this fruit or the this candy finds an international customer so, it has to be certified by the health authorities so they also come and see the entire process. So, by this what happens many a times their capacity might be hundred but they do only 60 or 50 percent efficiency they work.

Ideation

So now looking into all those things after doing the empathy study we came back and we started doing ideation. Ideation is defining the problem statement. Defining the problem statement what we did was we picked up the key words so, the key words are improving productivity, reducing drudgery, drudgery can be in turn talked in terms of fatigue, and this fatigue in turn can be also talked in terms of injuries. And then we also understood looking into their socio-economical thing whatever machine you develop it has to be rugged and it should be free from maintenance. So that means to say it should not have any high level sophistications and we also realized when we started working with them electrification of their home was also a problem. So, we have to develop your device which can be manually operating. So, the key words were manually operating, low maintenance, high throughput machine has to be developed at an economical price. This was the problem statement we came after doing the proper empathy study. In fact we also try to define what is the per day wages they are supposed to get so that they can have a happy livelihood. So depending upon that so per piece cost we know so, then we try to figure out what number of deseeding has to happen and we also found out when they do that what is the rejection rate they have in this amla while deseeding. Suppose, while deseeding if the complete food gets shattered then that is rejected, for which also the farmer buys he pays money for the defect what he has generated. So we have to keep that also in mind and then we came out with this problem statement.

Steps

So based upon the problem statement then what we did was we started looking into the different stages. So the stages of Amla deseeding is first stage is removing the seed from the Amla, then breaking the Amla into individual pieces, that means to say they are shattered. Like take an orange so, the outer skin is peeled then you can take individual piece of orange which is ready for edible thing. So in the same way of fruit which is deseeded then it is broke or split into four or six pieces and these six pieces are used for further processing. Removal of the seed from the Amla to be done is mainly having again three steps because they have now, we are trying to automate it. So when you trying to automate what did the manual step do? They went and picked up so, you think your hand as an end effector your end effector went and picked up an amla. Then, it was brought to a fixture so where, and then it was placed in a fixture and it was supported by your hand. Then the next operation was you took a sharp piercing tool which pierced inside the fruit. So, then it was then when it pierced the seed was deseeded. So, a moment it is deseeded now two things have to be collected – one the seed has to be collected, then the next thing is the fruit, deseeded fruit has to be collected. So that is the third step. So three steps were involved – so one is feeding another one is deseeding and the third one is collection. So we did a thorough video about it, then only we could come to this. Now, what we did was each event, while feeding, what are all the individual sub events we analyzed. For example, picking it from a bin, then placing it in a fixture, gripping it in a fixture, taking a tool this tool has to be used with a certain stroke length and then you try to pierce, and as and when the resistance get built up while piercing they have to apply more muscular force so, all these things we evaluated. We took fruits, we ourselves peeled, we when we peeled it we also try to calculate what is the strength, so we brought the fruits to a universal testing machine and then in the universal testing machine we placed it, and then we did some 10 samples, figured out what load is required to do it. So, why is this important because later when we try to plan for a spring-assisted so we should know what is the stiffness of the spring. So for this, these were all the steps we did for developing the device. Then with this statement problem definition in mind we started doing several ideations. All these ideations what we have first did was we did virtual ideations. So we tried to make several different types of models, infact the 15 students I gave an assignment to all 15 students for each of them to develop 5 different mechanisms and ways of deseeding without discussing with each other and for individual I said you should not repeat the same mechanism or the model within your five times. So, totally we got 15 students, 5 different models and within the 5 there is no repeat. So approximately we got 75 different types of virtual models are prototypes. With this 75 when we applied all sorts of logic we tried to figure out 15 different types of solutions for the same problem in the virtual prototype. Then we tried to pick up 50% of one idea, attach it with 20% of that idea, and we start merging or start unioning this 15 ideas into 5 best virtual prototype ideas. Now all the 5 virtual best prototypes where mood so that means to say here what I am trying to talk about virtual, virtual is these are all brainstorming sessions, creativity was applied and different ideas are getting developed and now from that different ideas we picked up 5 best ideas and for this 5 best ideas we started making prototypes. So this is the virtual idea which is there and then from there we went making fidelity prototypes. The first one which is shown here is called as low fidelity prototype. In the low fidelity prototype we used the raw materials which were available in our lab so without spending much of money we try to use glues, we tried to use nails, we tried to use boards, we tried to make a prototype and understand our five best ideas in making prototypes, you have low fidelity prototype was made. So, in the low fidelity prototype we try to bring in the concept of feeding one at a time, piercing one at a time, and then collecting bins so that shattered food can be collected, the seeds can be collected. So we just try to look into the model. Then what we did was we tried to now improvise our idea. Why, because the five ideas which we were having and then when we made prototypes out of which we realized two of them demanded for a motor. So looking at the socio-economical conditions we realized when you ask demand a motor then the electrification is required, for which again they have to spend money for it. So then what we did was we try to avoid two ideas where motor was involved, try to bring out with three ideas where in which these three ideas were completely redefined and then we try to make the prototype, virtual prototype and show it to them. From that the customer gave a feedback, they said this is acceptable from there we went to again to low fidelity prototype, made some crank the shaper mechanism what we use in normal machine shop. We try to make and then we also try to make Scotch yoke mechanism to convert circular into linear, we got a feel of it. So for which we try to use a low fidelity prototype. Look at it here we have made a fixture and from the feeder the Amla is resting here, and now only one at a time it gets pierced and we try to first pierce it, pull out the seed out, and then when we give further load there will be a gate which opens and the fruit is directly falling into a tray. So this was a low fidelity prototype which we developed once again after one more iteration. Till now the machine was operated by hand. So we were trying to see how can we, while doing by hand also a lot of drudgery so we were just stuck with that problem, we were thinking about it, again doing lot of brainstorming sessions. Then after doing all brainstorming sessions of several iterations working for 30 days. Finally, we came out with this virtual prototype after doing several low fertility iterations we came up with this prototype. So, here what we did was, there was a hopper attached to this so as and when the Amla fruits are dropped they get sorted out depending upon the shape and size and they roll down we used the gravity, because gravity there is no drive required so free gravity it came down and then we have a feeding mechanism so, in the feeding mechanism it was taken one at a time and then it tried to push it to the place where you see pointer was there and then below it the pointer is a tool and below that the fruit used to come and fall there. And, then since we now realized that it was more difficult to use it by hand so we converted to use it by leg. So, then we took this idea from a typical stamping shop so, that idea was integrated into it. So, we developed a manual high productivity damage-free amla deseeding machine which uses foot as a drive power rather than hand. So, initially we started with a hand, then we said several iterations we improved it and then we came up with the final design. This we made a high fidelity prototype, and this high fidelity prototype was given to the user for their demonstration for three months time. The end of three months, end of one season, they ran it left and right, harsh, in an abusive manner, we recorded all – all failures. So once we recorded all failures, we saw what are all the frequent failures and then we identified those things we started reworking on it and finally we came up with a developed final version prototype which we are able to package it and sell it to the customers. So here is a video which we will play at the end of the case study for your understanding. So these are all different types of prototypes which we made and this is how we were trying to fabricate individual subsystems. This is a tool, this tool is nothing but a punch. So, a punch we had a progressive punch, so we had the first the advanced tool which will be used for piercing through the fruit and deseeding it that was one, and then we were trying to hold the fruit when it was doing. So this was there, so we had a fixture made, so the feeder was exactly feeding to the fixture and then we were deseeding it it got deseed and we got shattered bael, or shattered Amla which is what the customer wants deseeded and shattered.

Capacity

So the main capacity feature for Amla deseeding machine developed at our campus where four amla’s are deseeded at a time. So rather than one we now try to improve. Relaxation time and the feeding time was two seconds. The time for settling an Amla was three seconds, but we were doing it little slow, we did not wanted to have a very high mass production rate such that the entire bin is covered within one hour. So handling time was two seconds, then time for punching was 1.5 to 2 seconds, then we finally did four amlas are punched in 8 seconds, so hence 30 amlas per minute we could do. So the productivity was improved 6 to 7 times and people were very happy by using this product. So this product completely got evolved using design thinking approach.

Technical Specifications

So we did also calculations, we tried to find the force and the power. So force required for deseeding 120 Newton’s. The force required for a foot press was 400 Newton’s. So we have taken it for a normal human this is available in the literature. So the last per train drive is 10 to 12 percent again from the literature then a spring constant we calculated and this was attached. So these are now the engineering specifications which we got after doing all the ideation and then getting a feedback we got it done and then the final prototype was fabricated.

Product Characteristics

So what are the product characteristics benefits – four amlas are deseeded at a time, no need of pedal all the time, so just press whenever you need, less maintenance cost. This was a similar concept we took from a tailoring machine. In very small rural villages they used to have inhouse tailoring machines. So in tailoring machine also they use foot, so we got the idea from that. Needs less maintenance along with the deseeding hard part is also remove the seed. Enables to assemble and dismantle for transportation is very fast so we also brought in the modularity concept into it. What is that limitation sometimes it do not divide the amla into four pieces or six pieces exactly in the same size and shape you need and use of hand required at the end of each cycle sometimes if it is getting stuck you have to use your hand to remove so which if we start the improvising our fixture this problem can be eliminated.

Prototype Costing

So this is the costing we developed for the prototype cost and which was around about approximately twelve thousand rupees. So this cost, plus when we do packaging and other things, we could develop a low cost machine including all the profit and package and transport for twenty thousand. People were very happy to invest twenty thousand because this could be recovered by them within a couple of years and the banks were also interested to give loan of twenty thousand through their small-scale banking segment with no interest so people were ready to buy these machines and try to improve that livelihood. At the end of the day the entire team went to different villages and they recorded videos to see their smiling face the kids could go to school, the women could be more productive, their health were secured and the delivery of the fruits whatever was coming out of these machines were worthy for approving by the health certificate agency and then further processing was done very fast so, the quality of the product was improved.

Prototyping: summary

We have learnt why we took such problem to solve that looks so insignificant but can create a bigger impact because this is hitting towards BOP. Number of machines could be sold much, the profit margin is very low. We have taken a problem, empathized the people with the people who suffer with the problem and generate ideas for product and prototype. We generated some solution first on CAD then using cheap material that is low fidelity and then we made final fidelity. Assess our design for some engineering parameters was also done and we could make a successful product.

Thank You