Task 4: Bad design

I have chosen a product that has a badly designed feature which
creates confusion when using the product. The comsumer then is lead
to mis-use the product which leads to frustration leading
to an unhappy consumer.

The product i have chosen is a sandwich press. The sandwhich press
consists of two press parts, a lever, 4 legs, cable and a latch used
for storage of the press. The latch closes the press and holds it in place
so that the press is easily stored and moved around without the whole thing
flapping around.

The picture above shows how the latching mechanism works. It is a
simple sliding device that 'latches' onto the bottom plate of the
sandwich press.

The problem comes when you are using the sandwhich press. When you
lift the sandwhich press lever up to insert the food stuff you want to be
pressed in the sandwhich press, the latch automatically slides down to the
'closed' position. This is often done un-noticed by the user who continues
to load the food in and press it down. Upon pressing down, the user is suddenly
stopped by the latch which is in closed position. This is a badly designed
latch as it did not take into account of what would happen when you
pulled the lever up.

I believe this would be most easily solved by replacing the sliding latch with
a swinging latch as shown in the picture above. This latch would be easily seen
and noticed when using the sandwich press.

This latch would be a simple swinging latch that is spring loaded to
stay in 'open' position during the use of the sandwich press. Upon finishing
using the sandwich press you would swing the latch down and it would catch on
the bottom using a simple catching mechanism. I believe this solves the problem
of the badly designed latch