Marketing / Appearance Models

• Marketing / Appearance Models (photographic quality)

• RTV - Cast Urethane models ( 5 - 50 units )

• Machined – Sheet metal / plastic

     WD offers complete high quality marketing / appearance models.  Marketing or appearance modelmaking is used by sales and marketing management to visualize and evaluate a products or machine’s final manufactured appearance or styling Marketing or appearance models are usually full color, solid or hollow, non functional, with all exterior appearance surfaces and features presented.  It may be finished in a custom color paint and clear-coated to simulate injection molded plastic.  These models are often used in promotional marketing and sales materials prior to the product being manufactured.  The intent is support evaluating the final design; form, color semantics and geometry, relating to industrial design, styling, aesthetics and functional component layout, human factors, user-interface, motion and interaction tasks and perceived value.

     Due to costs of tooling, and manufacturing prototyping costs, a Client may request an appearance model to get final approvals from the management team prior to proceeding to tooling or get initial market reaction and focus analysis data.  SLA’s are commonly used for creating marketing appearance models, although they are usually non functional and fragile. RTV urethane and silicone models are also a low quantity production prototyping process

Materials: SLS and RTV, materials high density urethane foam board 2-6” thick (Ciba – renshape urethane styling board), Machined or stock OEM metal and plastic stock materials (See Materials Engineering)

Size limitations: unlimited    Accuracy: +/-  0.01”  -  0.005”

Basic Steps: Shop Drawing, Structural layout, framing / panel layout, panel – joint attachments, panel sub-assembly (major components), final assembly finishing – clean-up priming & painting  

Limitations: non functional construction, usually solid or not load bearing or operational.  For appearance quality, the SLA model finishing process require 2-4 days of automotive quality finishing including prep, primer, standard or custom color & clear coats.  Photography usually used to document the results.