This report is a product development project of a ball launcher as requested by Sörmons HundklubbLKk. The project har been carried out as a thesis for the Bachelor of Science for the Innovation anddesign engineer program at Karlstad University.The client wished to begin training in a dog sport called Flyball. This sport can be likened to a relayrace where two teams of dogs race against each other. One dog per team runs along a path, leapingover obstacles, up to a ball launcher. When the dog jumps at the ball launcher to stop its momentumand turn back, a ball, launched about two feet, is to be caught by the dog. The dog then returns thesame way along the track as it came to switch with the next dog on the team. The last dog who finishfirst wins for their team.Due to large costs when importing a ball launcher, and the product not being available in Sweden,the client wanted a Swedish version developed. The goal was to minimize the price with the criterionto maximize longevity.The work of the project has followed the product development process as studied at KarlstadUniversity, with great influence by idea generation techniques, analog and digital sketching, 3Dmodeling and mechanical drawing techniques. Construction of the prototype has been carried out inthe workshop at Karlstad University with an evolutionistic design approach. A combination of lateralthinking for creativity and vertical thinking for logic and confirmation was used throughout theproject.The result of the project was a prototype that could be tested in a real environment at the dog cluband was confirmed to function as desired. Due to the availability of material at the workshop,construction of the ball launcher was possible at no cost to the client. This was a request, althoughnot a requirement for the project.The client also wanted to keep the prototype which was constructed to use within the club fortraining purposes. Therefore the ball launcher was completed to a finished prototype after projectclosure. / Denna rapport behandlar ett produktutvecklingsprojekt av en bollutslungare på uppdrag av SörmonsHundklubb LKk. Projektet utfördes som ett examensarbete för högskoleingenjörsprogrammet iinnovationsteknik och design på Karlstads universitet.Uppdragsgivaren önskade börja med en hundsport som heter Flyball. Sporten kan liknas vid stafettdär två lag med hundar tävlar mot varandra. En hund per lag springer längst en bana över någrahinder fram till en bollutslungare. När hunden hoppar på bollutslungarens framsida för att vändakastas en boll ut en dryg halvmeter för att fångas av hunden. Hunden återvänder då längst banan föratt byta av med nästa hund i laget. Sista hund först i mål vinner för sitt lag.Då bollutslungaren var dyr att importera och inte fanns tillgänglig i Sverige önskade uppdragsgivarenatt en svensk version skulle utvecklas. Målsättningen var att minimera pris med kriteriet attmaximera livslängd.Arbetet följde produktutvecklingsprocessen såsom den studerats på Karlstads universitet med storinflytelse av idégenerering, analog och digital skissteknik, 3D-modellering och ritningsskapande.Konstruktion av funktionsmodell utfördes på verkstaden på Karlstads universitet med evolutionistiskutveckling av designen. En kombination av lateralt tänkade för kreativitet och vertikalt tänkade förlogik och bekräftelser användes genom projektet.Resultatet av projektet utmynnade i en funktionsmodell som kunde testas i verklig miljö påhundklubben och bekräfta att konceptet fungerade enligt önskemål. På grund av tillgängligt materialkunde konstruktionen av funktionsmodellen utföras utan kostnad för uppdragsgivaren vilket var ettönskemål, dock inte ett krav, för projektet.Uppdragsgivaren önskade behålla funktionsmodellen som skapades för att använda inom klubben förträning av Flyball. Därmed färdigställdes funktionsmodellen till funktionsredo efter projektets slutoch levererades till uppdragsgivaren.

<p>Software prototyping is considered to be one of the most important tools that are used by software engineersnowadays to be able to understand the customer’s requirements, and develop software products that are efficient,reliable, and acceptable economically. Software engineers can choose any of the available prototyping approaches tobe used, based on the software that they intend to develop and how fast they would like to go during the softwaredevelopment. But generally speaking all prototyping approaches are aimed to help the engineers to understand thecustomer’s true needs, examine different software solutions and quality aspect, verification activities…etc, that mightaffect the quality of the software underdevelopment, as well as avoiding any potential development risks.A combination of several prototyping approaches, and brainstorming techniques which have fulfilled the aim of theknowledge extraction approach, have resulted in developing a prototyping approach that the engineers will use todevelop one and only one throwaway prototype to extract more knowledge than expected, in order to improve thequality of the software underdevelopment by spending more time studying it from different points of view.The knowledge extraction approach, then, was applied to the developed prototyping approach in which thedeveloped model was treated as software prototype, in order to gain more knowledge out of it. This activity hasresulted in several points of view, and improvements that were implemented to the developed model and as a resultAgile Prototyping AP, was developed. AP integrated more development approaches to the first developedprototyping model, such as: agile, documentation, software configuration management, and fractional factorialdesign, in which the main aim of developing one, and only one prototype, to help the engineers gaining moreknowledge, and reducing effort, time, and cost of development was accomplished but still developing softwareproducts with satisfying quality is done by developing an evolutionary prototyping and building throwawayprototypes on top of it.</p>

Software prototyping is considered to be one of the most important tools that are used by software engineersnowadays to be able to understand the customer’s requirements, and develop software products that are efficient,reliable, and acceptable economically. Software engineers can choose any of the available prototyping approaches tobe used, based on the software that they intend to develop and how fast they would like to go during the softwaredevelopment. But generally speaking all prototyping approaches are aimed to help the engineers to understand thecustomer’s true needs, examine different software solutions and quality aspect, verification activities…etc, that mightaffect the quality of the software underdevelopment, as well as avoiding any potential development risks.A combination of several prototyping approaches, and brainstorming techniques which have fulfilled the aim of theknowledge extraction approach, have resulted in developing a prototyping approach that the engineers will use todevelop one and only one throwaway prototype to extract more knowledge than expected, in order to improve thequality of the software underdevelopment by spending more time studying it from different points of view.The knowledge extraction approach, then, was applied to the developed prototyping approach in which thedeveloped model was treated as software prototype, in order to gain more knowledge out of it. This activity hasresulted in several points of view, and improvements that were implemented to the developed model and as a resultAgile Prototyping AP, was developed. AP integrated more development approaches to the first developedprototyping model, such as: agile, documentation, software configuration management, and fractional factorialdesign, in which the main aim of developing one, and only one prototype, to help the engineers gaining moreknowledge, and reducing effort, time, and cost of development was accomplished but still developing softwareproducts with satisfying quality is done by developing an evolutionary prototyping and building throwawayprototypes on top of it.