A Simple Pleasure Everyday - Where One-stop Manufacturing Meets Coffee Machine

A simple pleasure every day—A few sips of coffee in the morning to enjoy the rich aroma of it. How do you usually brew your coffee? Hand drip, moka pot or coffee maker? In a busy working day, a quick shot of espresso from a coffee maker is the first choice for most people.

There are various types of coffee makers—the fully-automatic, the semi-automatic and the capsule coffee machine. Besides, it is also subdivided into commercial machines, home machines by its different applications. The development of all these coffee machines involves a lot of technical considerations and manufacturing processes. RPWORLD as a high-mix, low-volume manufacturing service provider, has been supporting designers and engineers of coffeemaker customers to develop machines from exhibition mockup, verification prototypes, low-volume production to mass production. We’re delighted that our extensive know-how and turnkey manufacturing services have become the cost-efficient and rapid solution for the commercialization of coffee makers.

Mockup

A project proposal usually needs a mockup that can be touched and felt, and can be used frequently for R&D team’s internal display. The mockup, in most cases, is free of complex interior structure and mainly presents the machine appearance and shapes. With simple geometries, though, the mockup usually has a high requirement about the surface treatment such as painting, polishing, transparency, brown/black translucency, plating, anodizing, etc. The wide range of finishing options at RPWORLD enable our customers to always find the most suitable solutions.

Prototyping

Once the project is launched, engineer will design complex geometries for coffee maker based on its designated functions and application. This can be a long process, and involves prototypes for different applications: model exhibition, structure testing, functional testing, etc. 

Exhibition Model, with the mockup’s similar high requirement about the surface treatment, is produced with complex geometries and specific materials such as ABS, PMMA, POM, Aluminum and Brass. This kind of model is frequently used for internal demonstration by R&D team, or for many exhibitions. RPWORLD stocks 30+ materials to fulfill customers’ diverse requirements for application, and the coffee maker models have been exhibited at Host Milano many times, arousing great interest of audiences. 

The in-depth DFM analysis RPWORLD engineering team can optimize part designs and eliminate production risks before mass production. Take our capsule coffee maker project for instance. The water tank and brewer unit components are produced by CNC machining and vacuum casting. Before production begins, we analyze the part design, exchange ideas on the potential risks with customers, and provide DFM analysis with solutions to put everything right at the very beginning. It should be noted that we provide in-depth DFM analysis for every project for free when quoting. 

Low-volume Production

Photo by Blake Verdoorn on Unsplash

The coffee maker design is basically finalized at this stage. Our customers might receive numerous inquiries and orders from Host Milano from their customers. However, it is still risky to put them into mass production at this stage due to the uncertain market demand. Instead, low-volume production serves as a better choice. Moreover, stricter requirements are raised for materials as the final products to put into actual use. This is a smooth transition to mass production.