FABRICATION

Designing a product is one thing. Actually fabricating that product is a whole other thing that requires taking an initial product design through an important step called fabrication design.

When it comes to the product development cycle, it all starts with conception — an idea, if you will. Following this stage comes product design, then engineering, prototyping, and, finally, fabrication. In other words, there’s quite a few steps between product design and production.

Essentially, just because a product has been designed doesn’t necessarily mean that it can be manufactured as such. This is especially true for custom fabricated steel products, which often go from the “design” step along to a “fabrication design” step prior to the product moving on to the other stages of product development.

During the fabrication design stage, the designer and fabricator have to work together to make any necessary alterations to the product in order to address any conflicts between the initial design and the fabrication process that’ll be used to create the part. It’s a collaboration that’s commonly referred to as “steel detailing.” Here’s a closer look.