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46 CONTENTS TS-590S
6 APPEARANCE DESIGN: “DESIGN CONCEPT” REVEALED
BY DESIGNING ENGINEER
The design development of the TS-590S was started by asking myself “What are the characteristics
that make Kenwood’s HF transceivers just what they are?” Among the key words adopted to describe
the characteristics were “innovativeness”, “high quality” and “sharpness”, based on which I pursued a
design that captures the trends of the times.
On the development of TS-590S, I exchanged lively discussions with my colleagues and finally
settled on the design concept of “deep and heavy”. This means “a genuine HF transceiver that
nobody can make light of” or “a design that, when it is placed among other peripheral devices in a
shack (which is inevitable due to the nature of the product), does not stand out distastefully”.
The work of designing a transceiver does not end with just creating an outer shape, but includes a
wide variety of tasks ranging from scrutinizing colors, materials, character fonts, etc., to examining
the size, thickness and balance of characters displayed in the LCD.
A horizontal line penetrating the front panel describes the sharpness and the DNA of Kenwood’s HF
transceivers that has been handed down from generation to generation.
When it comes to the main knob that a user touches most often, I have devised a design that never
makes a user tired from long hours of operation or slips out of the hand while handling. Also, for the
material I have employed fluorine-containing rubber that does not attract dirt and dust.
As for the color of the body, I have selected matte-black finish to give it a typical look of a transceiver
and to prevent the reflection of light as much as possible when a user operates from a portable station.
Much attention is also paid to the printing of the characters and graphics to express the typical
preciseness of Kenwood’s HF transceivers and to deliver better visibility to enable intuitive operations
and eye-friendly views.
Figure 6-1 A Sketch of the TS-590S
Figure 6-1 shows a sketch that is almost complete. We make a lot of such sketches in the process of
finalizing the outer design for the purpose of discussions before creating a full-size mock-up sample.
The TS-590S is an HF transceiver launched by Kenwood after a long interval. We felt desperately
sorry each time a customer asked us, at the annual ham fairs, when Kenwood’s new HF transceiver
would be available.
I was more than happy that our hard work was rewarded when the TS-590S was eventually launched
and a customer told me “My patience finally paid off!” It was my greatest joy as a designer.
Finally, as one of the developers, I hope the TS-590S will be used by as many amateur radio
operators as possible.