Swivelcut
A compact cardboard-cutting system that makes low-fidelity prototyping safer, more accurate and more accessible in secondary school Design & Technology workshops. It grew out of research across two schools, where students told us cardboard modelling was slow, rough and risky with a craft knife. A fold-away arm with swappable heads: students trace a shape by hand, then the arm cuts it with an enclosed blade, so they don’t need any CAD.
Developed with:
GitHub
The Swivelcut device repository on GitHub.
Read Research Report
Interviews, surveys and benchmarking that shaped the brief.
Read Design Report
Concepts, testing, branding, engineering and manufacture.
My contributions
Research
- Secondary research
- Interviews and observations
- Insights, HMWs and affinity mapping
- Survey design and analysis
- Data and meeting notes
Product design
- User interaction
- Design language
- Final design and control panel
- Material selection
Mechanical design
- Piercing and drag force testing
- Arm reach and motor selection
- Gear and belt reductions
- Shoulder and elbow joints
- Latching mechanism
- Tracing head, base and clamping
- CAD for everything but the cutting head
- Electronics layout and integration
Manufacture and business
- Open mould direction
- Design for assembly
- Product costing
- Production volume
Team and delivery
- Whole submission video, filmed and edited
- At every interview
- Shared: concept, plan, testing, future work
- A small share of the report
Academic project, not affiliated with Bambu Lab in any way.
