Technology

Earlier this month, Carleton University Industrial Design student Rob Shudra placed as national runner-up in the James Dyson Award international design competition. The prestigious contest, which runs annually, draws entries from engineering and industrial design students and graduates from countries across the globe. Shudra’s placing project innovated on a product which most of us hope never to have to use: the fire extinguisher.

Shudra’s extinguisher aims to reinvent the way the typical person interacts with the product. Named Twist, the design bears only some resemblance to the classic extinguisher most of us are familiar with. But here’s the real question: why a fire extinguisher?

According to Shudra, the reason is simple: fire extinguishers are long overdue for innovation, with current designs dating back almost sixty years. “[Extinguishers] are often quite confusing and they’re built around mechanical aspects rather than usability,” Shudra explains. “What I mean by that is they’re really designed in a way that makes them economical to be built rather than intuitive to use.”

Beginning as a project in a third-year university course, Shudra spent months researching fire extinguishers before settling on a final design. Ultimately, he identified a number of problems with current extinguishers in the market and aimed to rectify them. In particular, he wanted to improve on the design’s safety switch mechanism, the hose, and the product’s overall usability and ergonomics.

“The original design was intended for right-handed users,” says Shudra, who wanted to make the device more accessible for everyone. “In emergency situations, every second counts – you can’t afford to be sitting there trying to figure out how this extinguisher works if there’s a fire in front of you.” To remedy this, Shudra created a safety switch which the user can activate using the thumb on their dominant hand. This also rendered the safety switch a single-handed operation, departing from the traditional model where users must hold the extinguisher with one hand and pull the pin with the other.

In addition to changing the safety switch, Shudra also internalized the hose system on his extinguisher, as well as altering the grip on the handle and moving the centre of gravity of the product to directly below the user’s hand, making them able to hold the weight of the extinguisher for longer.

Shudra emphasizes that for a product as important as a fire extinguisher, intuition is critical during the design process. “What I mean by intuitive is that when you pick up something, it just has to make sense.” Recognizing the fundamental role of the user, he considered how the typical person might interact with a fire extinguisher every step of the way, aiming to design the device in such a way that the user can feel in control. “A big part of emergency situations is how the user is feeling and really making sure they are feeling as comfortable as they can despite there being an emergency.”

As for Twist, the idea that began as a masterpiece of toilet paper rolls and duct tape, Shudra is hopeful for its future. “If the opportunity arose for me to work with a manufacturer and fully develop Twist, I would love to see it come to fruition,” Shudra enthuses. “The thought of actually seeing Twist be a real product and have the potential to save lives is a very exciting prospect.”

Currently, the Carleton student is pursuing a six-month internship at eliumstudio, a product design firm in Paris, France. In the meantime, Shudra’s passion for the impact he can have as a designer remains strong: “Designers really have a social responsibility to design for the greater good of people and ensure that products are inclusive of everyone.”

Judging is currently underway for the next stage of the competition, where Shudra will compete with 109 other national winners and runners-up for the international title. Results will be announced in late-September to early-October.