AQA A2 Product Design June exam

Hi peopleeee Done a bit of revision today. Went over my notes i wrote ages ago (basically main points from book) and im feeling much better. Gonna basically spend most of tuesday (about 7 hours doing practise questions)

THanks for offering to help btw, really appreciate it. I will get my A* hopefully :P



Btw are you sure they ask you about research techniques? I have never heard of ETHNOGRAPHY?????

Also apart from DYSON, IPAD/IPHONE, MINI, what else have you talked about in regards to good/iconic design?

Also what products other than a phone or shower/bath are good to change so they are suited to the disabled???

Thankssss

I scored 25/28 for one of the practice essays.

TBF, you need to know good examples/case studies in order to do well. You also need a good understanding of the subject itself. I made good notes for this over the Easter break and I haven't really gone over them yet.

Make sure you know about the legislation and regulation such as the 'Ecolabel' and 'COSSH'.

This is what I feel may come up. Feel free to add.




You still have time to go over this stuff. Im going to spend three hours on technology today and tomorrow, and then on Tuesday evening, Im going to go over all the case studies.

I'm actually quite impressed with the quality of writing in your essay. The syntax works really well and there isn't many wooly sentences, so you definately already hit the intermediate band. I don't actually understand how the marks work reliably. A lot of it seems like preference of my style of writing and the way I say things, rather than actual theory as there is no specific modelled answers in the DT Spec... Oh well.

Anyway, back to your question:
I think you are getting a bit confused about free hand isometric drawing. You made it sound like it's a way for the designer to use to show the client and all that. Here's my take on it:
The free hand isometric drawing is a useful personal technique for the designer to quickly mock up any solutions that he might want to include in later designs. The idea of it being free hand means that he doesn;t need to waste time with using other tools other than a pen or a pencil, buy the isometric rules are there so the proportion of the drawing are still kept as well as some point of reference for the viewer to visualise the drawing realistically. Usually, these are used for initial design ideas which can then be developed in later stages of design. Rendering can also be used in order to quickly apply texture effects for later references.

I don't know, I just thought this is the purpose of FREE HAND. Always to do **** without really caring about what pops up on paper. However, I did not model my answer on any others, it came from my head, literally.

It's also good that you try and give real life examples for each of the aspects of presentation. That will definately move up your marks.

Did you time yourself writing this, or was it literally just how long it took you?
I struggle with timing myself in this, what would be your guidelines to time allowance per question in the exam? DO you plan your answer before hand too?

Thanks for all the help everyone.
Peace

This is a question I found lying around my room. Gonna attempt it, without timing, and with the book. I just think that I might as well use all the help that I can get at this moment.

Designers must consider sustainability and the effects of the manufacture and use of products on the environment.

With reference to two dissimilar products, explain where concern for environmental issues has been an important factor in determining the design.

You should make reference to the following in your answer:
-The use of raw materials
-The manufacture of the product
-The use and function of the product
-The final disposal of the product

Today's increasing eco-conciousness of the governments and the general public means that designers are more and more pressured to make their products more environmentally responsible, considering the 'Six Rs' is vital for a successful product.
A great example of such a product is a plastic drinks bottle, such as the one designed for Coca-Cola. Coca-Cola is a huge company which pays great attention to their status, so making themselves become more sustainable and eco-friendly increases the positive image amongst the public.
The packaging for the 500ml bottle is made of Polythene (PET), a thermoplastic, which is easily recyclable, an important factor when it comes to mass production such as Coca-Cola's. The cap is also a thermoplastic, high density polyethylene (HDPE). This, together with the calendered Low Density Polyethylene (LDPE) makes the whole bottle fully recyclable. [A diagram of the bottle with labelled parts]
The processes used for the manufacture of the bottle must also be considered to reduce the company's carbon footprint. Blow moulding is a quick process, which although expensive to set up, is profitable and efficient. Such heavily machined process, however, can put people out of jobs. This means that the ethical and moral sustainability of the company decreases. To make the public more aware of the product's sustainability, Coca-Cola should comply to legislations such as the ecolable or the packaging directive.
Another product that should be heavily weighed on sustainability and environmental issues is a kitchen kettle. This is a product that has been designed specifically to limit it's effect on the environment. The raw materials that are extracted in order to make the kettle are exhaustible, so to make the product more environmentally friendly the design would be reduced in terms of the materials used, or be heavily made up of already recycled polymers. The manufacture of the kettle will lead to material wastage, so the process should be made of efficient mould designs to mould as many parts in one cycle as possible. Distribution wise, the transport from point to point leads to greenhouse gas emissions and consumption of fossil fuels, so efficient box designs to allow easy transport are vital. Use wise, kettles can consume unnecessary amounts of energy, so a number of solutions can be applied to decrease this. An easy to read filler gauge could be included to aid precise fillling, a thermocromic patch to show if it is necessary to re-heat or not or even using air to insulate the water when hot could increase the environmentally friendly value of the kettle. Finally at disposal, the kettle also produces some difficulties, such as polymer degradation or the difficulty of separating curcuit boards. THis can be helped by the designer making the kettle use a 'timeless' aesthetic to extend it's useable life. The kettle should be made of a minimal amount of different types of polymers to aid recycling, and the curcuits should be made from surface mount components in order to separate them easily with the use of infra-red oven.


So yeah, that's my take, agains sorry it's so long. It took me a long time because I get distracted easily on 9gag and 4chan :P
Feel free to criticise, I'd appreciate constructive comments.

Peace, have fun revising.

what you have is good i think but you could maybe expand - in the first part you could go into a lot more detail about extracting then transporting the raw materials - you could also talk about using recycled materials.. i would then talk about reusing and recycling materials/parts too.. and imho your examples are quite similar i would choose things made out of two different materials as there is more to talk about. i would do a car.. then something plastically/papery such as fast food, or drinks bottles.. or course cars can use polymers to. in the kettle you start to wander off topic a tad and talk about redesigning the filling gauge or using thermochromic pigments whereas the question states "With reference to two dissimilar products, explain where concern for environmental issues has been an important factor in determining the design." you are jsut critisizing a product not suggesting developments.. so i may be a bit careful about that.. its possibly worthwhile including but i wouldn't focus on it too much.. just state it and move on!

Thanks for the feeback! I see what you're saying!
I didn't think that the two were simmilar, although of the same material. One is a single use product, that involves no electricity at all, it simply gets used, thrown and then re-cycled. The kettle on the other hand, is a product which uses electricity and it had to have a lot of consideration into that.
I see what you're saying about me merely 'criticising' the kettle. Maybe this was due to the fact that i used words like 'should'.
But I did try to get the environmental impact that the kettle has and then compare it to a design approach. All of what I mentioned are part of the design of the kettle in terms of it's environmental impact.
Remember the question is not asking for me to suggest developments, but explain how the considerations were made by the designers.
I don't know though, maybe I structured my sentences wrong and it came out with not enough opinion on my part.

I will definately keep your comments in mind when doing another practice question, thank you very much!

Damn, after doing that other one, I really don't want to do another They take so long... Argh! I'm so lazy....

This is a question I found lying around my room. Gonna attempt it, without timing, and with the book. I just think that I might as well use all the help that I can get at this moment.

Designers must consider sustainability and the effects of the manufacture and use of products on the environment.

With reference to two dissimilar products, explain where concern for environmental issues has been an important factor in determining the design.

You should make reference to the following in your answer:
-The use of raw materials
-The manufacture of the product
-The use and function of the product
-The final disposal of the product

Today's increasing eco-conciousness of the governments and the general public means that designers are more and more pressured to make their products more environmentally responsible, considering the 'Six Rs' is vital for a successful product.
A great example of such a product is a plastic drinks bottle, such as the one designed for Coca-Cola. Coca-Cola is a huge company which pays great attention to their status, so making themselves become more sustainable and eco-friendly increases the positive image amongst the public.
The packaging for the 500ml bottle is made of Polythene (PET), a thermoplastic, which is easily recyclable, an important factor when it comes to mass production such as Coca-Cola's. The cap is also a thermoplastic, high density polyethylene (HDPE). This, together with the calendered Low Density Polyethylene (LDPE) makes the whole bottle fully recyclable. [A diagram of the bottle with labelled parts]
The processes used for the manufacture of the bottle must also be considered to reduce the company's carbon footprint. Blow moulding is a quick process, which although expensive to set up, is profitable and efficient. Such heavily machined process, however, can put people out of jobs. This means that the ethical and moral sustainability of the company decreases. To make the public more aware of the product's sustainability, Coca-Cola should comply to legislations such as the ecolable or the packaging directive.
Another product that should be heavily weighed on sustainability and environmental issues is a kitchen kettle. This is a product that has been designed specifically to limit it's effect on the environment. The raw materials that are extracted in order to make the kettle are exhaustible, so to make the product more environmentally friendly the design would be reduced in terms of the materials used, or be heavily made up of already recycled polymers. The manufacture of the kettle will lead to material wastage, so the process should be made of efficient mould designs to mould as many parts in one cycle as possible. Distribution wise, the transport from point to point leads to greenhouse gas emissions and consumption of fossil fuels, so efficient box designs to allow easy transport are vital. Use wise, kettles can consume unnecessary amounts of energy, so a number of solutions can be applied to decrease this. An easy to read filler gauge could be included to aid precise fillling, a thermocromic patch to show if it is necessary to re-heat or not or even using air to insulate the water when hot could increase the environmentally friendly value of the kettle. Finally at disposal, the kettle also produces some difficulties, such as polymer degradation or the difficulty of separating curcuit boards. THis can be helped by the designer making the kettle use a 'timeless' aesthetic to extend it's useable life. The kettle should be made of a minimal amount of different types of polymers to aid recycling, and the curcuits should be made from surface mount components in order to separate them easily with the use of infra-red oven.


So yeah, that's my take, agains sorry it's so long. It took me a long time because I get distracted easily on 9gag and 4chan :P
Feel free to criticise, I'd appreciate constructive comments.

Peace, have fun revising.

Hiyaaa, Happy to see your all revising hard lol

I wont be on here until monday night now cus im revising hard at mainly physics but also at Maths and Further Maths, predicted to get A*'s in all.... like thats gonna happen lol.

Anyway on monday night i will drop lots of comments and start posting my answers, however i must say my answers are generally much longer than all of yours??? like double at least? anywayz cya

Nice! Im predicted A*AA >.< and I feel the same...like thats going to happen! LOL and okay I will defo be here monday night, it will be nice to see your answers thats are so much more longer !! Maybe it will help give me an idea on what the hell I should write XD

Stop talking about ridiculous predictions! Its making me sad T_T haha.

Thanks for your ideas ds4143. I was sitting here, reading your ideas and nodding along with them. Real help!

As to the 6Rs, it might have been something our teacher mentioned rather than the book but it goes like this.

Refuse - say no to certain materials, which may be very daunting to the environment
Reuse- reuse old ideas or materials which can help reduce the products impact on the environment
Recycle - self explanatory
Repair - rather than getting a new product, think about ways to repair the existing one. For designers it might be adding a new feature, or for the customer, getting a part and replacing it.
Reduce - reduce the amount of material used to make the product
Rethink - this one is a bit wooly. It's about rethinking people's attitudes to the environment and thinking of new more eco-friendly solutions.

I usually remember them with the acronym: F.U.C.P.D.T (****-up dt).

So,
ReFuse
ReUse
ReCycle
RePair
ReDuce
Re-Think

Just saw this and had to reply before i done my next physics past paper...

Predicted A*AA ... niceeeeeee :P what other subjects do you do? and im sure its possible? Also what uni you going to next year? and what you studying?


I am predicted A*A*A*Aa and yet my teachers want my last A to be an A*, there mad


And i just basically explain my ideas more clearly and come from all angles in my answers maybe i just blabber on too much, hopefully you lot can all help me

CYA

Ah GOSH I could not do another subject Im doing Maths, Biology and obviously product design.

Nice predicted

Going to Kent for Architecture if -pray- I get the grades XD haha

And studying Architecture...Yes I kknow, why the hell did I take biology if Im going to do architecture? Because it interested me alot XD LOL what about yourself? Uni? course? a level subjects?

And i guess its good you can write tons...atleast that way you got EVERYTHING covered. Just be careful of timing in the exam! 3 questions in 2hours

BUt yeh I would defo love to read your answers and help ya out if you need any