Tiller Design unveil key design aspects - New Shark Shield FREEDOM+ Surf

After 18 months in the making, Tiller Design are thrilled to announce today that their latest piece of work, the Shark Shield FREEDOM+ Surf has hit the market.

Robert Tiller, Founder of Tiller Design said, “From the first sketch to prototype and final production, the product design brief and project posed a number of significant industrial design challenges. Our team overcame each of these to deliver a product that each and every surfer in Australia should be proud to use. Considering the latest news headlines and recent shark encounters this product couldn’t have come to market soon enough, but we had to ensure the devices lived up to the claims they make.”

The three key product design and development challenges included:

1. Develop a sealed waterproof enclosure: Our experience in rugged waterproofing on previous

   projects including Epirbs for sub mariner fleets, ruggedised mining equipment and micro engineered sealed medical devices, enabled us to create the compact sealed waterproof enclosure. This sits inside a grip pad and does not impact the size or surfers expectations of a traditional grip pad.

2. Design a system that could be retrofitted onto existing boards: In order to remove the need for any board modifications we developed the world’s first adhesive antenna. This is applied by the user, is extremely thin (Only 500 microns thick), yet durable and conductive in certain areas. Several prototypes designs were made and tested before the final was approved.

3. Create a design that does not impact the surfer’s experience: Our design team kept everything low profile, thin and easy to use. We designed a grip pad, following the conventional grip pad design but allowed easy insertion and removal of the electronics unit. This allows multiple boards to be fitted with the low costs grip pads and electrodes, while the main electronics unit can move across different boards.

Lindsay Lyon, Shark Shield Managing Director says, “The team at Tiller Design worked tirelessly with us to ensure that the new design had no impact on the surfing experience while performing the job it was designed to do – protect the user from sharks by converting the board into a personal electric deterrent.”

About Tiller Design:

Tiller Design are award-winning specialists in product design and development. Having spent over 25 years in the business of product design and commercialisation, Robert Tiller and his team are the geniuses behind some of the world’s breakthrough medical, consumer and tech products available on the market today. From a pencil sketch to the shelves of major retailers or hospitals and even your local coffee shop – Tiller Design are the go-to when it comes to getting quality products to market.

About the Shark Shield FREEDOM+ Surf:

The new Shark Shield FREEDOM+ Surf is an electrical shark deterrent designed specifically for surfers. The removable power module is housed in a custom designed Ocean & Earth tail pad kicker, enabling the user to move the power module easily between boards and for recharging. With a weight of just 230 grams and a near zero drag adhesive decal antenna, there is no impact on the surfing performance. This FREEDOM+ Surf bundle includes everything needed to turn a surfboard into an electrical shark deterrent and is now available at an RRP of $599 from www.sharkshield.com.

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