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Client Comments on Report 1

We received your report, and we have some comments and questions. It sounds like the most prominent opportunity you identified is improving the ability to adjust the bindings easily during use conditions without tools. You seemed to have concluded that for most analyses that product is already designed well and there are no identified opportunities for improvement. This is good to know, but please keep an open mind about possible ways to make improvement as you move into brainstorming to avoid limiting innovation by implicitly assuming that the product cannot be improved. Please respond point by point to the items below. We are looking forward to seeing your ideas in Report 2.

• Executive Summary: Clear summary of major findings.
  • The executive summary has been condensed, only covering the most important conclusions.
• Stakeholder Needs: Distinguish needs from implementation - it is not clear that "high quality materials" (what does this mean?) is needed if the end goal, durability, could be achieved in another way. Looks like a good list. Some needs appear to be missing like ease and speed of strapping on and taking off, comfort, and flexibility to work with different boot types.
  • We have updated the Stakeholder needs to better reflect needs of the stakeholders and not simply solutions to the problem.
• Use: Good description. Did you time the user making adjustments and compare with and without gloves? Including quantitative information will help sell the idea if you decide to move in this direction.
  • This is an excellent point we neglected to mention. We repeated this section of the user study using people with varying levels of skill. The assembly time as well as strap-in times were averaged amongst the participants and can be found in our updated Report 1 under the "User Study" section. These quantitative results show an increase in time to assemble for all participants regardless of skill level.
• Assembly: Please provide an assembly drawing with all components labeled. Each component should have a part number to uniquely identify it, and part numbers can be used to identify components in the assembly drawing. An exploded image will help identify how components fit together, how bolts are fastened, etc. It is not clear from the documentation how the mounting bolts fasten to the board without leaving protrusions below the board that would interfere with snowboarding.
  • By looking at the second picture under "Pictures of Assembly," you can see that the slots for the screws end before completely going through the snowboard. Therefore, it is not possible for the mounting bolts to interfere with snowboarding unless they are forcefully drilled through the bottom sheet.
• Mechanical Function: Okay.
• Mechanical Analysis: There is no free body diagram, and symbols are not defined. There is also no explanation of or conclusions drawn from the analysis. We do not know how to interpret this.
  • A free body diagram has been added and points of interest labeled. A conclusion has also been added. We hope this makes it more clear.
• Bill of Materials: Please include a part number for each component.
  • Part numbers have been added.
• DFMA: Good observations.
• FMEA: The failures you have identified all have to do with excessive force. Are there any other important modes due to, for example, corrosion or mechanical/thermal fatigue? In the event of an extreme fall, it is much better for the binding to fail than the snowboarder's leg. How do you consider this in your FMEA assessment?
  • Changes made 2009.10.01. We have included many more failure modes including many due to excessive use (mechanical fatigue).
    
  • Corrosion was previously mentioned for all metal parts; we referred to it as "rusting." It was mentioned under "Toe and Ankle ratchet buckle" and "Bolts, washer, and nut." The rest of the components are plastic or padding, and are not in immediate threat. Although corrosion can occur with other materials, such as ceramics and polymers, these components of the snowboard binding are not subject to corrosion given the snowboarding environment consisting of not much more than salt, water, and snow.
  • Regarding a failure mode due to an extreme fall, we did not include one. This is because, unlike ski bindings, snowboard bindings are not designed to detach from the snowboard or the snowboarder's boots, under any riding circumstances. We do not see this as a failure because it has been previously determined by experts that it is in the snowboarders' best interest to stay fixed to their board during crash. This is inherent in snowboard binding design and has been for a long time. Therefore, an extreme fall would be categorized as a failure mode of the rider, and not the binding.
• DFE: General assessment seems reasonable, but you didn't answer our question about the implications of a carbon tax.
  • Thank you for your comments. We have reviewed our results from the DFE analysis and adjusted our responses in the DFE section of our report. Based on our analysis, a government tax on CO2 emissions would have only minor effects on material and production costs. Since the use of the product requires no electricity, a hypothetical tax would have no affect.
• If any of your images, figures, or text were taken from another source, please be certain to provide proper attribution.
  • All of our images, figures, and text are original except for a few images under Section 10, manufacturing. These were previously cited directly under the tables.

Client Comments on Report 1

We greatly appreciate your feedback on our initial Design Research.

We have been happy to make the suggested updates and answer the questions you had about this report.

Please refer to the comments above.