For the past 15 years, on and off (more off than on, actually) I’ve played around in the field of industrial design. I say “played around” only because ID, even though one of the things I’ve always loved and do love doing, never became a full-time career for me, though I have had my hand in designing things from motorcycle luggage for the Honda Rune (which I managed to have 13 sets of luggage made in total), to some of the first tablet PC’s for Xerox through Stellcom, to redesigned dashboards and front facias for my DeLorean – to which I haven’t done anything beyond conceptual mockups.
Below is a sampling of all that work, including the process for the Honda bags, which I gave the name “RunePaks”.
Enjoy.
Honda RunePaks
These were a labor of love, more or less. This was my first foray into not only designing something functional, but also into the whole prototyping, physical modeling, and then production stage. What a pain this was. The idea for these came before I bought my first motorcycle, a 2004 Honda Rune. The Rune was a very limited production bike Honda decided to make for only two years, all in the quantity of 1500 or so. I had found that no one at the time made bags for the Rune, and if I was going to convince my wife I needed one to use for commuting to and from work, nevermind that it was probably, and still is, one of the most beautiful motorcycles ever designed and made, I had to find a solution for storage and hauling work stuff.
So I came up with these. Actually, I had several iterations, and did some market research among other Rune owners, known commonly as Rune Riders. This design was the one that was most popular, as it could hold a lot, even a full-face helmet, including being very aerodynamic. I had about 30 people say they wanted one (and should have taken deposits..). Altogether I made and sold 13.
Live and learn.
DeLorean Facia and Instrument Cluster Conceptual Redesigns
I love my DeLorean. I’ve wanted one since they first came out and I was a teenager in my Senior year of High School. To me, before the popularity of Back to The Future, I thought the DeLorean was design genius. I had already loved designs by Giorgetto Giugiaro, famous of ItalDesign for the Lotus Esprit, Porsche Tapiro, Maserati Boomerang, and even the VW Scirocco. All of those (except maybe the Scirocco) looked like spaceships you could get in and take off to the stars at any moment. It would be years later that I would finally get my own DeLorean – 34 years later actually.
The nice thing about mine is it came pre-modified with a 1980 Chevy 350 small block, lowered suspension, and even a spoiler. Being that it’s not a stock car anymore, I figured I’d design some concepts for the dash (as the current one is pretty dated, even by 80’s standards) and the front nose. Personally I like the iconic front end of the car, but thought “What if Giorgetto had the chance to redesign the car here and there?”, and I hope some of these concepts come close. As far as the dash, well, people like the old school one as that’s what they expect to see. And if I ever make my DeLorean into a time machine, then it has to have that dash.
I could however get a second stock dash/cluster and use that to swap back and forth.
But I digress…
rule of 3 