IADDIC Shelters LLC has a mission: provide housing for the “houseless.” Their product line of affordable, durable dwellings supplies disaster victims and urban renewal projects with a solid-structure housing solution which offers superior privacy and weather protection compared to temporary accommodations such as tents and tarps. The shelters are manufactured from a chemically treated foam. They can be collapsed and packaged in vacuum-sealed bags for optimal storage and transportation. Once in the field, they are easily deployed and quickly cure to a sturdy structure.
IADDIC dwellings are the easiest to erect, longest lasting, overall least expensive dwellings available, how-ever, the path to these accomplish-ments required significant design and research. In the process of developing a prototype, CEO Rich Grabowski, realized that in order to impact the most people he needed an efficient design that not only kept manufacturing cost low but also provided a quality product. A colleague connected with the Automation and Robotics Research Institute at UT Arlington recommended that he contact the Texas Manufacturing Assistance Center (TMAC) for their industry knowledge and experience in product development.
“Right away we were mutually impressed,” said Grabowski. “TMAC was impressed with the scope and humanitarian impact of our mission; I was impressed with their intellectual horsepower.” A lean design analysis was conducted in a formal manner whereby the product was deconstructed into its functional requirements and scrutinized for candidate designs and fabrication processes. One of the many ideas generated in this exercise was the possibility of molding the shell in a single piece, rather than assembling it from cut pieces of sheet stock. Following the lean design methodology, this concept was investigated further in the second phase of the project—automation assessment and equipment survey; TMAC identified foam molding equipment manufacturers in the local area to approach, and ultimately establish whether this was a feasible route given the shelter characteristics and dimensions. In time, this sequence of events would result in a completely new direction in producing IADDIC shelters, which has substantially lower complexity and part count needed for high-volume production. In the final stage, a conceptual factory layout was delivered outlining equipment configuration and workflow in order to optimize production.
The design analysis achieved bottom-line results. Now, higher quality dwellings are able to be made faster and cheaper.
“TMAC did a phenomenal job. The contributions they made to our product design and business were not just evolu-tionary but revolutionary. This is going to allow us to do what we want to do; provide a quality dwelling at an affordable price.”
Rich Grabowski
CEO
IADDIC Shelters