Last January, in discussion the OSCAR open source car project, we posed the important issue of the linkage between the design phase and the construction phase, assuming that the deep linkages between designing and actually making are vital for the success of open source production models in the physical world.

Since then, I’ve been alerted to the fact that Erik von Hippel’s The Democratization of Innovation specifically mentions the built-only model of manufacturing, which already exists in amateur sports like kite-building, however, I have still to read that book, but if anyone has more knowledge, please do participate in this discussion.

I’m also happy to announce that this very issue is being debated in the automobile community, and so I recommend that you read the detailed discussion of this topic here in Autoflippers.

This article was harvesterd from a commentary by Donal Reddington, which contains all the original links, and I therefore recommend reading the full version there.

I’m only excerpting the paragraphs where the author starts describing a case study, where this kind of open source production is actually already function, around the Ford Model B. See the full blog entry for details.

Excerpt 1:

“There may be an alternative approach to seeking the goodwill of a large scale manufacturer. There is an existing community numbering in the tens of thousands who could provide the production capacity required to bring a project like OSCar from concept to reality. They are the hot rodders.

In addition, there is an existing auto design which has become a de-facto open standard, providing evidence in support of the proposal that open source can be successfully applied in the automotive sector. Many different smaller manufacturers offer products and components based around the same basic architecture. This de-facto open standard car is not some present day design project. Enter the Ford Model B.”

After describing the hot rodder community functioning in some detail, Autoflipper then gives some recommendations about the way forward for open source car development:

Excerpt 2:

“So, if the OSCar community could arrive at a beta design for the Open Source Car, and then engage with amateur and professional hot rodders by posting design details on hot rod community websites, it might generate curiosity among some builders, who may be tempted to try out this new idea. The possibilities of this would be increased if the published architecture is sufficiently robust (in the physical sense) to enable high-performance engines and drivetrains to be used. (Open Source transport does not have to be synonymous with eco-friendly or slow)

Another automotive community that could contribute to the development of OSCar are those who build component cars, sometimes called kit cars. Component car builders are likely to be culturally closer to the OSCar community than the hot rodders. However, they tend to prefer assembling from a pre-existing set of components, rather than fabricating from scratch.

By providing effective feedback mechanisms for those who would take on the beta design and construct examples, improvements could be published for approval by both designers and constructors. These approved changes could then be incorporated into the later iterations of the design, before a finalised Version 1.0 is published.”