Professional development/Design thinking/Detailed designs

A detailed design is something that should be created in between a concept drawing and the start of prototyping. The purpose is to have a concrete plan of what the prototype will look like and what components might be needed. This is not to say that it cannot change as progress continues in the project, it should be updated as you learn from testing various prototypes. The goal is also to start quantifying different parts of the project and thinking about how each part will be built or where it will come from. A good design does not need to be made from scratch, you do not want to reinvent the wheel so use existing pieces where they exist.

A detailed design will not look the same depending on the type of project you are working on, below are some examples.

Mechanical

For a mechanical project a concept drawing might be a rough hand sketch to get general ideas across of what the system could look like and what functions it needs to perform but it typically does not have much detail. A detailed design should include:

1. All individual parts in the design with thought into how exactly they will be manufactured (laser cut, 3D print, machined, etc) in which material (plastic, wood, metal) or what items will be bought.
2. Assembly of all parts and thought into how exactly they will be put together (permanent, temporary, etc) and how (fasteners, adhesives, etc).
3. General dimensions are also important to be able to think about how much material needs to be bought and if items are readily available in that size.

A detailed design can also be a hand sketch, like the concept drawing, but it can also be done using a CAD design software, like Onshape, tinkercad 3D or Solidworks (remote apps for uottawa students).

Mechanical design examples

Project	Concept drawing	Detailed design
Camera attachment	Concept drawing of a camera attachment	Detailed assembly drawing of a camera attachment	Detailed part drawing of a camera attachment	Detailed part drawing of a camera attachment
Camera attachment	Concept drawing of a camera attachment	Detailed assembly CAD of a camera attachment	Detailed part drawing of a camera attachment	Detailed part drawing of a camera attachment

Electrical

Similar to mechanical, an electrical project concept drawing might be a rough hand sketch to get general ideas across of what components will be used or what the behavior of the system should be but it typically does not have much detail. A detailed design should include:

1. All individual parts in the design with thought into how exactly they will interact together (what voltage is needed to power each part, what voltage does the data run on, what life does a battery need to have, etc).
2. Assembly of all parts and thought into how exactly they will be put together (use of protoboard, use of headers, etc) and how (directly soldered together, use of connectors, etc).
3. General dimensions are also important to be able to think about how much space is needed for the items and how much wire would be needed for example.

A detailed design can also be a hand sketch, like the concept drawing, but it can also be done using a design software, like tinkercad circuits, fritzing (can be found for free) or circuito.

Electrical design examples

Project	Concept drawing	Detailed design
Car monitoring system	Concept drawing of a car monitoring system	Detailed circuit of a car monitoring system
Remote button push	Concept representation of a remote button push	Detailed circuit on breadboard of a remote button push	Detailed circuit on protoboard of a remote button push

Software

Similar to mechanical and electrical, a software project concept drawing might be a rough hand sketch to get general ideas across of what the behavior of the system should have or what the layout of a UI (user interface) might look like but it typically does not have much detail. A detailed design should include:

1. All individual parts in the design with thought into how exactly they will interact together (what libraries or APIs are needed to execute a certain feature, what elements are needed in a UI, etc).
2. Assembly of all parts and thought into how exactly they will be linked together (backend and frontend data transfer, number of functions, etc) and how it will be hosted (server, local, app, website, etc).
3. General data representation is also important to know how much storage is needed or what transfer speed will be possible.

A detailed design can also be a hand sketch, like the concept drawing, but it can also be done using a design software, like google drawings, draw.io or figma. See software tools for more suggestions.

Software design examples

Project	Concept drawing	Detailed design
Loyalty reward app	Concept drawing of a loyalty rewards app	Detailed interface of a loyalty rewards app
Personal safety app	Concept representation of a personal safety app	Detailed interface of a personal safety app	Detailed flowchart of a personal safety app	Detailed UML chart of a personal safety app