4-ID blog

A couple of months ago a team from the Campeonato de España de Velocidad, asked us to design their official team truck. They got a beautiful set of Suzuki RGSXs to start the new Championship and a silver  Mercedes Actros to transport them.  The race team comes from a specialty workshop for Racing Motorcycle.  They have over 20 years of experience in that specific sector as well as international clients.  For that reason, at 4-id, we kept the graphics dynamic but with a sense of mechanical precision and development.    We look forward for a second round and do some work on the bikes as well…  Cheers!!

It´s now a fact.  The work done in the Speedcar GTR Front end, wins races.  The Open España – Prototypes 2010 started the 15th of May with 2 races, both of which had at the podium three different teams but with the same front-end evolution. Industrias Lahoz, the manufacturer of these cars, states… “Above all, the new front hood significantly increase aerodynamic efficiency of the vehicle, allowing the new Speed Car to lower by two seconds its best times from last year in the Madrid circuit.”

At 4-id, we are glad to hear about the accomplishments done by our clients as well as to feel the excitement of seeing the pilots of those cars in the top three positions.  The season has just started… next round, Albacete, 12th of June.

We have not received the photographs of the first pre-series models but we wanted to show an update of the project since it has evolved since our last post.  The client ended up having the design manufactured in Injection molding, rather than rotational molding which was the initial process.   Even though it’s a less flexible process for shaping, I think we were able to preserve the essence of the design, as well as optimize the parts.  The product is also going to be proposed to other markets with cargo needs since the evaluation done in Barcelona was quite successful. More to come…

As part of it’s on going growth and exploration to give solutions to even the most simple problems, 4-id has come up with a new new concept for a Display to communicate to users of Metro, Subway,and other commuting trains, when and how full is the next train to arrive at their station.  With this new information, people can better choose what carriage to board depending on their needs. A simple but attractive graphic shows users the amount of people that are on each carriage and which of them are accessible for Trolleys, Bicycles and Wheelchairs users.  To complement this information a light strip is located along the platform that will also give the occupational density of the carriages in “real” scale.

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We are close to show our bike frame project. Is a very special type of bike, and thus it needs a very special kind of frame. But it will be also a complete different way to integrate structural and cosmetic part for other projects. In the meanwhile we are making some FEA analisys of the frame and the results are promising.  So stay tunned for our project presentation, very soon in our web site and blog.

Well we’re working  on the new bodywork for the EV Racer. It will have two main distinctive areas, one smooth aerodynamic GRP part, and some air inlets and outlets optimised trhough parametric modelling.  These are being modeled with Grasshopper a tool that is revolutionizing the way that some architects create complex structures and fantastic buildings. But we can say that is also an awesome tool for designers, despite it’s initial complexity. It’s possibilities range from surprising aesthetics details to new ways to think  about structural design from scratch. We strongly recommend you to test it! And remember, it’s a free plug-in for your existing Rhino license…

PS: Here is some more Ev Racer image test with track tires and rims.

After a couple of months of development, 4-id is proud to present it’s brand new website.

www.4-id.pro

With the help of Sandra Wesse from Stylofoam.com, this Network has a nice crisp and fresh new face.  Even though we intend to have the website updated frecuently and show its evolution, the blog will be an integral part for comunicating the work we do.

We hope you like it, find inspiration for your own projects or drop us a line to help you solve a design challenge.

As promised, here is a preview of the team designs for the Speedcar GTR that will race on the Open de España CM next 18th of April in Catalunya.  The two teams that have asked for our experience to exalt their competitive machines have been the Bedtrans Team from Tarragona and the official car of the brand Speedcar that is part of the Monlau Competició racing team.

4-id will try to attend the first race for the championship to document the real cars, their performance and looks.  We’ll keep you posted.

Our former Flemish intern, Gilles Van de Sompel, has finished working with us, just as he completed a very interesting design project that will be published in our site soon.  We hope he learned as much from us as we did from him. Well, maybe we did not learn as much dutch as he tried to teach us , but many other things for sure!

Good luck Gilles, we’re sure we’ll hear a lot of good news regarding your future as a transport designer!

Bona sort! and tot gauw!

We have gone to beautiful Lleida country on the inside of Catalunya to see one of the first Speedcar’s GTR race car to be sold. We were already happy with the first impression of the car in pure white, but like all race cars… color and sponsor sticker give them life. This is not our graphic design but we are now working on two different sets of paint job designs for our clients. We hope to see them win races soon. In a new post we’ll give you a preview of the graphics.   Keep in touch!!