Here's what we looked at this week:

Personomic's 3D-printed bike saddles: A perfect match for your specific butt.

Specialty tool design: A rocket-launched rope thrower for emergency rescue.

Kohler's new in-toilet camera for analyzing gut health.

Anduril's AI-powered EagleEye, a new military helmet, confers video-game-like abilities.

The Mind line: Nike's bizarre, experimental mind-body-connection-promoting footwear.

Automated drone docks for disaster relief and catching criminals.

Robotics firm Dephy's bionic footwear is being adapted into Nike powered sneakers.

Toyo Kitchen Style's revolutionary, gigantic kitchen sink design.

Remember the Reebok Pump? Nike's doing that with a jacket.

Well, it's happened. 1X is now taking pre-orders for NEO, their humanoid servant robot.

The RETRADISC, a Gen-Z-targeting transparent Bluetooth CD player, has landed in the MoMA Design Store.

A clever DIY jig for repeatable lathe work.

Toyota's brilliant plan to sell unfinished cars. Could this model also be applied to the housing crisis?

Lexus' bizarre one-person autonomous luxury taxi concept.

Toyota is a gigantic company that serves all markets. As a reminder of that, this three-wheeled LS Micro concept by Toyota's Lexus arm is the polar opposite, in terms of both style and function, of their IMV Origin vehicle.

The LS Micro was just unveiled at the 2025 Japan Mobility Show, so at press time there was no explanatory press materials. The brief description of the concept is that it provides "autonomous chaffeur capability" to the luxury market, and that "its role is to deliver unparalleled luxury and presence, specifically handling the last mile of travel in urban areas."

So it's basically a single-seat people mover. And unlike autonomous taxis designed to move groups, like Amazon's Zoox, there is no generous glazing designed to give passengers an unobstructed view of the surroundings. Instead, this being luxury-targeted, the passenger is visually shielded from the outside world, ensconced in a sort of throne with blinders.

As with most of their concepts, Lexus loses me with their design language; not being the target market, I can't quite grasp the pastiche of angles and arbitrary forms that make up the exterior and interior.

If there's any one design motif here, it seems to be "repeating series of parallel lines."

From a marketing perspective, I imagine they would launch this like that Raya dating app: An exclusive version of Uber that you have to be invited to join, keeping the riffraff out.

Toyota revealed something crazy-sounding at the 2025 Japan Mobility Show. (The event is currently underway, so no official press pack loaded with images has yet been released—images are sparing.) Revealed at an on-stage event, this is their IMV Origin. And yes, this is what it would look like in production:

The plan is to make the vehicle's parts at a Toyota factory, and ship it in pieces, initially to the African market; "It is not yet assembled into a drivable car," Toyota President Koji Sato explains. "It is the local people who assemble and complete this car."

Why? Because doing it that way creates jobs.

"Even after [local workers] assemble it, it will still be in this state," Sato says, indicating the unfinished vehicle. "We only build the base." This leaves the door open for an entrepreneur to complete the vehicle according to local market needs.

Sato says that "deliberately not completing the entire process" was a challenge for the company. "As a car manufacturer, it was frustrating not to be able to build a finished car, but this is [ultimately beneficial] because people's needs in life and work are diverse. Will this car carry passengers, or cargo? It's up to individual customers to complete the car according to how they will use it."

I think it's a brilliant idea that could potentially boost local economies. And I have two further thoughts:

One is that this model would also potentially fly, I believe, in rural America. Out here where I live, it's not uncommon to see hacked-together trucks on the road. These are often older pickups that people buy because they're cheap, and then they customize them for functional purposes. I've seen work-truck Fords and Toyotas with their beds ripped off, replaced by DIY welded or wooden platforms and sidewalls that suit the user's trade; yesterday I saw a Dodge that had a small jib crane hacked into the bed, which was loaded up with commercial air conditioners.

Two, and I'm biased here because of the work I'm currently doing in residential construction, is that I think this model could also be applied to homebuilding. There's currently a housing crisis, and not just in America. As contractors continually migrate towards serving the rich, first-time home buyers can't find affordable starter homes.

About 25% of the cost of a new home is the interior finishes, and of that cost, about 60% to 70% of that is labor costs. I'm not saying that laying in insulation batts, hanging drywall, painting and installing flooring is easy; but it is something that, conceivably, a dedicated DIY'er could learn to do. Maybe not beautifully, but perhaps well enough to create a functional home that they could improve over time.

In other words, if a construction company could put up a code-compliant, functional shell of a house with all of the trades-requiring mechanicals put in, a first-time buyer could conceivably complete the interior at their own pace and over time. In theory they could buy a $250,000 house for around $206,000 if they were willing to learn and do the interior finish work themselves. I think that could make a big difference for a lot of families.

Alex Beloborodov is a Tbilisi-based custom furniture marker. Despite his experience with woodworking tools, he's new to turning; and faced with a project that required him to make hundreds of the same leg on a lathe, he came up with a clever jig that provides real-time visual feedback on which parts of the blank need to be removed.

As he sneaks up on the profile, the relevant pieces of the jig fall away, signaling completion of that particular contour:

I imagine it was painstaking to set up, but super satisfying to use.

Kirk James, Principal, CEO at Cinco

With every new technology platform or toolset, and with the general maturation of manufacturing alongside design and engineering, we've seen something subtle but powerful happen over the past few decades: deeper integration. Teams that once worked in parallel now converge. Those who thrive are those who can bring together supply chain thinking, manufacturing expertise, material innovation, and advanced engineering.

Consumer electronics brought out the best in this convergence, especially for electrical engineers. But I'd argue it was the mechanical designers who defined the interface, who built the shell between emerging technologies and the real world.

Editor's Note: This essay is part of a new series exploring how AI is transforming the way physical products are imagined, designed, and built. Hardware is the New Salt will spotlight several thinkers and makers at the intersection of AI and product design and their insights into this dynamic technology ecosystem. This series is supported by Enzzo, who offers an AI-first product development platform created to support the next generation of builders.

On the design side, we've always chased that moment when an innovation doesn't just give us better tools—it gives us more freedom. More expressive range. More opportunity to shape something meaningful.

Whether it was early CAD, SolidWorks, or modern simulation platforms, the deal was always the same: learn the tools deeply and you'll unlock their potential. Fluency was the price of freedom.

Now something else is happening. The tools are changing—and so is the nature of fluency.

What we're seeing with AI is a different kind of liberty. You don't necessarily need to master a tool in the traditional sense. Instead, you need to engage with it intelligently. If you can articulate your intent—if you can curate a process—AI can help you realize ideas that once required years of technical training. That's a profound shift.

It means a new kind of designer is entering the conversation. Not necessarily someone from a traditional technical background, but someone with imagination—someone who can guide AI toward outcomes that matter. And they're achieving results. Compelling ones.

But it's also confusing.

When someone doesn't come from product design, it's easy to jump too quickly into solutions that aren't thoroughly thought through. You can generate something that looks viable, but has no real path to manufacture. Due to the complexity and potential of AI, even the most brilliant minds are adopting a phased approach, beginning with a careful exploration of its possibilities to ensure effective and responsible utilization.

We're not at the point where AI can create a manufacturable product on its own. Not yet.

Still, the shift is fundamental. More people can now participate in design—and that's a good thing. But we're also witnessing a loss: specialized skills that were once rare are starting to feel like commodities. That's the cost of automation. And we're all going to feel it.

But the real opportunity isn't just in what these tools can do today—it's in what happens two, three, four generations from now. As our ability to curate and prompt improves, we'll get closer to truly intentional results. Not just happy accidents.

That said, there's value in those accidents. Early on, especially in branding, people loved the serendipity—put in a prompt, get something surprising back. Suddenly, you're the editor, not the maker. That's exciting. Serendipity reveals things we wouldn't have found otherwise.

But if we rely too heavily on it, we get soft. We stop pushing. We stop refining. And then we don't get what we intended—we just get what the algorithm gave us.

This applies in industrial design, too. Some interesting forms emerge from these tools. Yet, it still requires considerable effort to transform those forms into something that can be built. That gap is real.

The tools will improve. They'll get smarter, more accurate, and more aligned. But adoption right now is messy. Chaotic. Everyone's coming at this from a different angle, without shared standards or principles. It's asymmetric and scattered.

The winners? They'll be the ones who can bring order to that chaos. Who can tie systems together? Who can make the tools not just more straightforward to use, but better at understanding what designers want? Tools that align with creative intent, not just generative capacity.

And then there's trust.

That's the big one. Some people still have a gut reaction against AI-generated content—as if it's less valuable, less "real." That reaction isn't going away anytime soon. But trust will come. It'll grow when these systems start delivering reliably, when people see that creativity and AI can coexist, not in tension, but in collaboration.

We're not quite there yet. But we're getting closer.

About the author: Inspired to help craft a new generation of design-driven brands, Kirk James formed Cinco in 1998 to help innovators connect big ideas to people who crave them. Since then, he's been leading a dynamic team of strategic thinkers and designers working to bring 360° brand experiences to life, building brands that not only endure but keep breaking through year after year. Working with start-ups to Fortune 100, from C-Suite to the front line, he knows what it takes to drive affinity and growth. A designer at heart, he can't resist a blank sheet of paper.

Not bad for a company barely two years old. Kickback, an NYC-based electronics startup, makes this RETRADISC, a Bluetooth-enabled CD player. It came out last year, and has already been picked up by the MoMA Design Store.

The transparent player is aimed at the Gen Z and Millennial set who fully grasp the evils of smartphones, and would prefer to reach for something not connected to anything except their ears.

"Perfect for phone breaks," the company writes. "CDs are your escape hatch from the digital chaos. With RETRADISC, you can finally put your phone down and let the music do what it does best - transport you somewhere else entirely."

The anti-skip CD player runs $99.

Well, it's happening. This week California-based 1X Technologies started taking orders for their NEO, a humanoid robot that acts as a household servant.

The 5'6 'bot can do laundry, tidy up the house, fetch objects, carry groceries, water plants, open doors for guests and more.

The robot is fully autonomous. For any task it doesn't already know how to do, buyers can have a 1X employee remotely control the thing--it's got cameras for eyes--and "teach" NEO to perform the task. (Of course, that also means you've got a stranger eyeballing your space.)

It also listens and talks, so you essentially have a walking ChatGPT. You can ask it to identify things (reading a label on a bottle that you can't make out, for instance) or have it teach you a foreign language. And if you're out and about, you can use your phone to remotely see what the robot is doing, through its own eyes. (I can only imagine how the horror film genre will use this convention.)

It can even charge itself.

I find all of this deeply unsettling.

The company says the 'bot is safe, as its components are wrapped in a "deformable 3D lattice;" I assume that means you're protected from accidental bumps. Its lifting capacity is 154 pounds but it can only carry 55 pounds, so while it could conceivably body slam some adults, it can't carry them off.

You can either buy the 'bot outright for $20,000, or "subscribe" to it for $500 a month. Deliveries start next year.

If you purchase it outright, it comes with a three-year warranty. Which makes me wonder: What do you do with this thing in three years, when more capable, cheaper models will surely be on the market? The 'bot seems a bit more difficult to recycle than a smartphone. Perhaps in the future we'll be trading these robots in or leasing them like cars.

In 1989 Reebok introduced the Reebok Pump, a sneaker with internal chambers that users could pump air into by squeezing a ball on the tongue, tightening the fit. The shoe was a massive hit, and Reebok sold millions of units well into the 1990s.

Now, 36 years later, Nike's got the same idea—but for a jacket. Their Therma-FIT Air Milano Jacket contains inflatable baffles that provide more or less insulation depending on the inflation. Nike says it offers "warmth levels that range from a lightweight hoodie to a mid-weight puffer."

To inflate the jacket, you have to buy a pair of Reebok Pumps and attach them to a hose running up your leg to the jacket. Just kidding, wanted to see if anyone actually reads anymore.

The jacket is inflated via the included powered pump from Nike's ACG sub-brand, which you attach to a valve near the left pocket. To deflate it, you press a button on the valve.

We assume the pump is USB-rechargeable; Nike doesn't say. Inflating and deflating is said to take just seconds.

The Therma-FIT Air Milano jacket is so named because Team USA athletes will wear it at this year's Winter Olympics in Milan. You should be able to spot it during the medal ceremonies.

Last year a 7.6 earthquake hit Japan's Noto Peninsula, generating a 37-foot tsunami. Hundreds of aftershocks, nearly a thousand mudslides and rampant fires ripped through the region, damaging or destroying over 200,000 structures. Nearly 700 people died, a further 1,400 were injured, and thousands across the region were cut off, locked in place due to unusable roads. Elderly and rural residents had it the worst.

A week after the quake, a quadrotor drone buzzed over impassable terrain, eventually reaching an evacuation center where residents were sheltering. The drone was carrying medication that they needed and had no other way of receiving.

A heavy lift drone was used to haul diesel fuel to residents and rescue workers.

In addition to ferrying supplies, Japanese municipalities are finding that drones are useful during disasters in other ways. A Tokyo-based company called Blue Innovation has developed the BEP Port system, a series of unmanned, weatherproof drone docks that can be scattered across the region.

They serve two functions. One is that when a tsunami alert comes in, the drone launches itself and broadcasts evacuation messages through its loudspeaker. The second function is to record its surroundings following a disaster, capturing video of damaged areas so that officials can assess how and where to respond. Both of these things avoid the need to engander human workers who would ordinarily do those tasks in person.

The Noto Reconstruction Office recently revealed another drone dock system they're using, this one by California-based drone manufacturer Skydio:

I wasn't able to learn much about Blue Innovation's product, but the Skydio dock's specs are well-documented. The drones can be launched in 20 seconds (the delay is because the drones give themselves a pre-flight check), then flown autonomously or by a remote operator anywhere in the world.

When docked, they charge while being protected from temperatures ranging from -4°F to 122°F.

The drones can use radio, 5G and/or Starlink to stream video back to a base station.

Incredibly, San Francisco is using the Skydio dock and one of their X10 drones to catch thieves:

So is the NYPD, which has scattered Skydio docks around the city. Here we see a moped thief getting busted:

I wonder how New York's criminals will adapt. Perhaps this will drive them to do their stealing underground, in the subway system?

In Mark Bowden's book "Black Hawk Down," he notes that young soldiers repeatedly describe the shocking surreality of combat as "like being in a movie." As the book covers events that occurred in 1993, these soldiers have no other frame of reference.

The soldier of today grew up in a very different world, and in future, will surely describe combat as "like being in a video game." Particularly now that this EagleEye, an AI-powered helmet system developed by defense technology company Anduril, has been created.

The EagleEye pulls in information not only from its front and rear cameras, but from data sensors across the battlefield: Real-time drone footage, fellow soldiers' helmets, intelligence coming from HQ. Built-in AI aggregates the information and projects it onto a heads-up display showing friendly and enemy positions, fields of fire and mapped objectives. These are presented using a combination of AR overlays and a video-game-like circular map.

A "rearview mirror" shows the soldier what's directly behind him or her.

The helmet's built-in hearing protection muffles the sound of gunfire, but audio sensors can also pinpoint the locations of gunfire; signals sensors can locate nearby cell phones and radios.

In a sensor-rich environment, the helmet essentially gives the soldier X-ray vision and an unparalleled situational awareness. And yes, it all looks like something you'd see in a video game:

That said, the moment the soldiers walk behind the shipping container does indeed remind me of a movie, "Total Recall."

The EagleEye was privately developed by Anduril and presented to the U.S. Army, who has greenlit active field prototyping. A hundred or so units will be delivered next year for evaluation.

This concept demonstrates how primitive materials can become a source of endless imagination and cultural commentary where art, design, and sustainability meet.

View the full project here

The paradigm with kitchens is that you wash ingredients in the sink, do prep on the counter, then do cleanup in the sink. Japanese company Toyo Kitchen Style proposes an entirely different workflow with their Zero Flow sink. "We believe a truly user-friendly kitchen is one with short cooking paths," the company says, which explains their design.

The sink is enormous, at 76cm (30") square. In addition to its sheer size, the sink's key innovation is its staggered ledges, which support a large cutting board/worksurface and a perforated tray for draining.

The idea is that you've got enough room in there to do everything except the actual cooking. The demonstration video is in Japanese, but there are English subtitles available:

This ExoBoot was created by Dephy, a robotics company spun off from the MIT Media Lab.

Originally developed for (and currently being tested by) the U.S. military, the ExoBoot is a powered ankle exoskeleton that lowers the metabolic energy required to walk. Soldiers can march further without requiring extra calories.

Dephy has also expanded into the civilian sector, running trials with rehabilitation clinics and mobility research groups. Older adults and people with disabilities are the target market.

Now a third market has emerged: Athletes, thanks to a tie-up with Nike called Project Amplify.

For an athlete to use a powered sneaker might sound like cheating, but Nike begs to differ. "Akin to how electric bikes have made it easier to ride farther and more frequently, revolutionizing urban commuting," the sneaker giant writes, "Nike is developing Project Amplify to make slower running, jogging and walking easier and more fun, with a focus on athletes running between a 10- and 12-minute mile pace."

The Nike-ized ExoBoot "isn't designed for competitive, faster runners trying to shave seconds off their time," the company explains. "Rather, it's intended to serve athletes who want to go faster and farther with less effort by giving them more power for everyday movement — in effect, a second set of calf muscles." In their testing, they report that users "have shared that the system feels like it's part of their body and that it makes walking or running uphill feel like moving on flat ground."

Nike says their ultimate plan, once testing is completed, is to release Project Amplify "to a broad consumer launch in the coming years."

Editor's Note: This essay is part of a new series exploring how AI is transforming the way physical products are imagined, designed, and built. Hardware is the New Salt will spotlight several thinkers and makers at the intersection of AI and product design and their insights into this dynamic technology ecosystem. This series is supported by Enzzo, who offers an AI-first product development platform created to support the next generation of builders.

Vineet Thuvara, Chief Product Officer at Fluke Corporation

Decades of physical product development now intersect with cloud connectivity, AI, and advanced computing, marking a shift in the way we design hardware. In the past, devices like Sony Handycams or Casio organizers stood on their own, disconnected and limited in their scope. Today, a fusion of intelligence and context powered by IoT, powerful chipsets and machine learning models are accelerating innovation at scale.

This moment is about speed, not just of computing, but of experimentation and iteration. AI allows us to compress what once took six months into six days. At Fluke, during the discovery phase, we're using tools like Enzzo to quickly mine customer insights, build personas, model value propositions, and simulate bill-of-materials, at pace. That acceleration allows us to play faster, test ideas more rapidly, and refine more precisely.

When we move into the delivery phase, AI helps bridge the historically conflicting models of hardware's waterfall approach and software's agile processes. From prototyping to firmware to rendering, AI-driven tools enable faster iteration across physical and digital boundaries. Then comes the sustain phase, where products are in-market and generating data. AI is changing how we ask questions about usage, performance, and customer behavior. No longer limited by dashboards or SQL skills, teams can now pose natural language queries and get answers in seconds. That's a revolution in operational intelligence, and a lever for continuous improvement.

However, what makes this generation of technology different from past shifts is not just power or capability, it's usability. With natural language interfaces, you no longer need to write code to be productive; you just need curiosity. That radically lowers the barrier to adoption, speeding up learning curves across entire organizations.

But speed isn't without risk. We take that trade-off seriously at Fluke, where safety and precision are paramount. There's a line we won't cross with generative AI. While we're happy to use it for product recommendations or visual renderings, we never deploy it where safety or compliance is on the line. There is an ethical responsibility tied to innovation, one that pushes barriers but never jeopardizes the intention of designing in the first place. With this at the forefront, our cycle of innovation prioritizes trust and human capacity, keeping a check on AI, its applications, and results.

This is where democratization comes in. For innovation to grow within any organization – there must be increased access to design tools, software, and training across departments. We've seen repeatedly that passion and curiosity can trump credentials. The ability to experiment, test, and iterate is innately human. AI enables more people to try, fail, learn, and eventually build meaningful things. That's how innovation should work.

Hardware has always been difficult; long lead times, complex integrations, and in some cases, expensive mistakes. But AI can help flatten that curve, giving us faster feedback loops and more dynamic product-market fit testing. At the same time, it rebalances the power dynamic between software and hardware. Hardware has been commoditized by software for years. Now, as AI commodifies software, the spotlight turns back to hardware as the irreplaceable interface to human experience.

It's this that also led me to return to hardware after years in cloud computing. Every interaction, whether with a device, a tool, or a service, ends in the physical world. You can't feel, touch, or experience software without hardware. The magic happens at that intersection.

Still, trust doesn't happen overnight. It's our job to educate and show the art of the possible with AI, so we host AI demo days, lunch-and-learns, and summit events to expose our teams to different use cases. More importantly, we explore what's possible when you can use AI responsibly in an environment where you are free to try and test, before scaling. [GM2]

Ultimately, this is about responsible acceleration. By giving people the tools and guidance, we can create environments where people are free to explore without setting them up to fail.

AI is still in its infancy, but its learning curve is exponential. Our responsibility is to guide it carefully, while it's still learning to walk, as one day we'll need to trust it to run.

About the author: Vineet Thuvara is the Chief Product Officer at Fluke Corporation, one of world's leading companies in test and measurement devices, software, and services. In his role he leads the Fluke business units and is responsible for growth, new product innovation and strategy apart from being a champion for AI. Prior to Fluke he was General Manager and Director at Amazon, leading the Echo product organization responsible for developing and shipping Amazon's First-party Alexa based AI devices and experiences.

Before joining Amazon in 2021, Vineet spent 15 years at Microsoft in various leadership roles across Surface, Xbox, and Server and Cloud product organizations. Prior to that he was the co-founder and CEO of 5th Quadrant, an Industrial Design company based out of New Delhi, India.

Vineet holds a Bachelor of Technology in Mechanical Engineering from University of Calicut, MS in Industrial Design from Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, and an MS in Engineering and Management from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA. He is co-author of the Life-Cycle Engineering Handbook for Indian Industries, guest lecturer at multiple universities, product advisor for start-ups, holds several patents, and has held scholarships at the Delft University, Netherlands and Hitachi Design Center, Japan.

Within the Nike Sport Research Lab is a new division: The Mind Science Department, whose purpose is "deepening Nike's understanding of the mind-body connection." This division employs actual neuroscientists who use both brain and body imaging to "study the nervous system, brain activity and cognition of athletes in motion — leading to unique insights informing a completely new category of products and services to help athletes better prepare, train, compete and recover."

Their studies have yielded the Nike Mind, a line of footwear with foam spheres on the bottom.

As you walk you can feel these spheres on the undersides of your feet, through the sole.

While that seems it might be annoying, those sensations are actually the point:

"Scientifically shown to activate key sensory areas of the brain via underfoot stimulation, the Nike Mind 001 mule and Mind 002 sneaker deepen an athlete's awareness, helping ground them in their bodies and bring them back to the present moment."

"The Mind 001 and Mind 002 feature 22 independent foam nodes per shoe that are bonded to a flexible, water-resistant material that allows them to act as pistons and gimbals as athletes move — imparting the feeling, and even the texture, of the ground directly beneath. This interaction heightens sensory awareness, which can help clear away distractions and enhance concentration."

The Mind 001 is the slip-on you see in the photos; the Mind 002 is the actual sneaker.

Breakthrough, or hooey? We'll have to wait for user reviews, which should come next year. Both Mind models will be released in January.

Panero & Zelnik's "Human Dimension & Interior Space" is the bible for anthropometrical design matters.

However, there's nothing in the book's 320 pages about butts (just hips).

It's possible that some design researcher will complete what Panero & Zelnik left out, a comprehensive measurement database of human asses, but technology means they won't have to. Personomic, the German company that makes 3D-printed bicycle handlebar grips based on scans of your hands, has expanded their technology to bike seats.

"[We] know the pain and frustration that comes with ill-fitting saddles," the company writes. "66% of cyclists have seating problems. Why should you put up with pain, pressure sores, and numbness when there is a perfect solution?"

The company promises they can print personalized bicycle saddles that fit your butt perfectly; if you deem it not a perfect fit, "we'll replace it without any hassle—until you're completely satisfied."

When you order one, the company sends you a questionnaire on basics like your age, weight, bike type, riding style, et cetera. Following that "you can measure your buttocks yourself using a few simple tools that everyone has at home – even the sit bone measurement can be done quickly and conveniently," the company explains. "The results will then be evaluated by the AI. The fitting takes only about 6 minutes in total – and provides us with all the data we need to create your perfect saddle."

A week later, you'll receive a perfectly-fitted saddle printed out of TPU and a carbon composite polymer structure. A stainless steel plate is laser-engraved with your name. The seat, designed to be adhesive-free, is 100% recyclable.

The company doesn't actually 3D print a you-specific saddle; rather, they've designed 32 different saddle variants that they've determined will cover every ass. What the AI does is analyze, using "comprehensive logic," which permutation is your perfect match.

This approach is both a practical measure and, ultimately, more sustainable than printing an infinite amount of designs. "We've found that with 32 variations, the differences between saddles are so small that you can't tell the difference from a custom-made saddle," the company explains. "The 32 variations allow for a four-times faster delivery time and easy exchange if it doesn't fit. With custom-made saddles, a returned saddle would have to be disposed of." (We assume the nameplate is removable.)

The $300 saddles appear to be Euro-market only.

For certain tradespeople, there's a need to accurately throw a rope over a great distance. Arborists use this Big Shot Throw Weight Launcher, an oversized slingshot, to get a rope over branches:

Contractors and roofers use the tool to fire rope over a house, for instance if they need to hoist a tarp up there:

The Big Shot has a range of about 100 feet. The tool below can go much further, thanks to, well, rocket science.

Imagine two ships side by side, one of them disabled. The other is there to tow it to safety. How do they get the tow line from one ship to another?

The answer is this Linethrower 250, a rocket-based tool created by Wescom Group, a UK-based manufacturer of maritime survival solutions.

The tool is designed to be used by one person, and its teardrop-shaped cross section is pretty form-follows-function. The large cylindrical portion contains a length of rope coiled around a spool. The smaller cylinder up top holds a rocket launching tube.

The user holds the handle with one hand to aim it, then uses the other hand to break the seal on the knob and rotate it.

This releases a spring-loaded mechanical striker, which then slams into a cap; the resultant spark ignites the propellant, firing the rocket, which trails the line behind it.

Here's that in slow-mo:

It can carry the rope up to 250m (820 feet) away. The thin "pilot" rope itself isn't strong enough to tow a ship; instead the heavier-duty tow line is attached to the pilot rope, and then the crew that fired the rocket pulls the tow line through the water and onto their ship.

The tool can also be used for rescue operations, say if a person is in the water and out of life-preserver-tossing range.

The reusable tool has a service life of nine years, with the rockets needing to be replaced every three.

People get grossed out by toilet-related matters, but the fact is, there's usable data in every bowl. "The bathroom stands as an untapped hub of vital health data and information," writes Kohler. "Every day, we flush away insights that could help us better understand our bodies and our health."

The company's new initiative, Kohler Health, is releasing this Dekoda device. It's basically a toilet-mounted (downward-facing) camera that images your poops, then analyzes them using machine-learning algorithms.

The captured data is sent to a Kohler Health app on your phone, where you can privately view "key health and wellness indicators" including "hydration, gut health, and the detection of blood in the toilet." (I'm no doctor, but that last one, I think I'd spot.)

"Each session [on the toilet] is a chance to discover new gut health insights."

If you're worried about someone stealing your poop data, you can order an optional fingerprint authentication module for the camera.

I don't know if all of this is helpful or hooey, but I'm impressed that the company was bold enough to even propose this object, let alone bring it to market. What I wouldn't give to see what those boardroom discussions were like.

The Dekoda retails for $600. The app, unfortunately, is subscription-based at $70 a year.

Here's what we looked at this week:

CalTech attaches a drone to a humanoid robot. This isn't looking good.

The floating Transatlantic Studio: For a show in Brazil, French artist Xavier Veilhan is creating the pieces en route—on a sailboat.
Hell in a Handbasket: An "emotional companion" smartphone with a built-in gimbal camera.

Historically accurate airport dioramas by AV Pro Designs.

Sikorsky has made an unmanned, autonomous Blackhawk helicopter. And it's going into production.

Canadian designer Jamie Wolfond's screw-mechanism adjustable lamp.

A clever use of augmented reality: Tracing virtual art to quickly create murals.

Dreamfarm's UpCup is a measuring cup that squeegees itself clean.

Architecture firm Blue Temple has designed inexpensive DIY bamboo disaster relief housing that can withstand earthquakes.

Forever object: The staple-less Oceanus Brass Stapler, a roaring success on Kickstarter.

Twig&Bot's elegant robot-arm-carved guitar holders.

Understanding the brilliant design of an automatic center punch.

Rivian's skunkworks yields the TM-B, a modular e-bike that will be sold under their Also spin-off.

Remedial design: Tidy Desk's decluttering add-on storage objects for slab desks.

I think desks without drawers are dumb, but the rise of sit-stand desks and aesthetic trends mean the market is awash with slabs-on-legs. The lack of storage space eventually becomes a problem, so companies start designing remedial storage objects, extra things for you to buy and tack onto your desk.

This series of remedial objects is by a company called Tidy Desk. Their "Desk Dock System" is aimed at the minimalist who cannot tolerate the sight of cables. Thus their Invisible Laptop Dock, which has you leave your laptop out of sight beneath the desk (though still cabled to your screen).

The Dock is just two plastic brackets.

The "system" also includes charging docks for AirPods, Apple Watches and external hard drives.

The promise? A clutter-free desk (at a cost of $35 to $39 per docking object).

Surely drawers will make a comeback at some point?