Do the locomotion
There is something intriguing about transportation. It has the almost unique power to polarise people absolutely. Whether it be beasts of burden, pedal power, steam propulsion or the power of flight, transportation seems to awake arousal and repulsion in equally large measure in almost the whole population. Some obsess over their personal favourite forms of transport. They preen, polish and pimp or watch, record and log with a passion that often far exceeds that for their fellow humans. They lock themselves into pursuit of the superlative biggest, shiniest, fastest, rarest, loudest, oldest, strongest, lightest, highest or indeed cheapest. Fascinatingly, this isn’t a new phenomenon. It has been going on for millennia. In many respects it is the pinnacle of achievement for man’s two earliest technological acquisitions: fire and the wheel.
I was enraptured from an early age too. I was especially intrigued by the spaceships that inhabited my imaginary Sci-Fi adventures. Strictly speaking it was more the other way around. I would dream up fantastic interstellar conveyances and then try and think up stories about them. The same went for the cars, planes, boats, trains and submarines I conjured up. There had to be some history and purpose behind each one. The imagined shapes, colours and abilities, which were often inspired by nature, weren’t enough in themselves there had to be function and purpose. As I matured and completed my education and training as an engineer the roles reversed again. Purpose became the original inspiration which then necessarily lead to function which only at the very end became form.
In the transportation project you can find a catalogue of some of my wide ranging mobility inventions. There is everything from sports equipment to space vehicles. In each case there is more than just a pretty picture and a shallow description about what it is for. In accordance with axiomatic design I try and depict the whole genesis of each device as far as is possible. Though the objective is to get all the way from perceived purpose and need right the way through to manufacture and test, some of the more ambitious projects are obviously going to take a bit longer to get there. In the meantime I am sure it is still going to be exciting enough, and just a little bit scary, when even the smaller projects get turned into working objects and tried out in real life.