Thames & Hudson Manufacturing Processes for Design Professionals

This is a truly beautiful book which I am glad to own but I am not sure that it really delivers on its title so I have knocked a star off. Design professionals are surely going to feel there is not too much meat once they strip away the plumage.The plumage: High gloss paper, thousands of photographs, enough processes to populate an encyclopedia - which is really what this book is - and a heck of a lot of book design with boxed off coloured areas for technical descriptions and icons telling you the functions each process performs.The problems: - The manufacturing processes are actually treated rather superficially with coverage dominated by photographs. You could get similar depth of text from Wickipedia. You could get video of processes off Youtube. I am sure that the sellers of manufacturing equipment detail case studies for many/most of the processes. - The book is divided into essentially independent sections, one for each manufacturing process but there is little or no organizational material at a higher level. For example, if you know you want to mould a part in plastic then the book offers 17 possible processes, each described in its own section but there is no section with a title like 'molding in plastic' to guide you to a choice between the possibilities or to understand in depth the trade-offs.I feel a bit mean focussing on the drawbacks of a book I genuinely like. If it had only been called "Manufacturing Processes for the Design Professionals' Coffee Table", I could have given it five stars.

A mighty book that picks up where Chris Lefteri’s finish. How products and materials are formed, cut, joined and finished. For a product design to be successful you have to be able to make it, this book will help you design and develop for manufacture from the initial concepts. The descriptions are highly detailed and it is worth revisiting regularly.

Excellent value for £30. It's a huge book, and contains detail on a whole array of manufacturing processes. Great for anyone with an idea for a product who is unsure which materials or methods to consider for its manufacture.

Fab well layed out immages and script. It has a good starter explination. Clear understanding.

I am a product designer and this book did bring tears to my eyes, no kidding, i just felt like i could have done with such a book years ago ! what a treassure, thanks to the author , the best purchase of my life i dare say, very impressed. The huge volume covers any manufacturing process that you can think of in reasonoable depth, priceless!