Grayhill
Grayhill Electronics was founded in 1943, and has a long history of developing touch encoders, optical encoders and joysticks, rotary switches, keypads, and pushbuttons. I work with Joe Jasinski and Grayhill with the development of the Grayhill Touch Encoder and other touch surface technologies. I help with concept ideation, keyshot rendering, widget design and 3D modeling design ideas.
Grayhill products are often used in commercial applications. Grayhill knobs, switches and touch interfaces are used in aeronautical, military and medical fields.
The Grayhill touch encoder is a very popular and versatile product. Some notable applications for the TE include the latest Hestan Ranges, Hennessey F5 supercar,
the Range Rover and Buick GNX retro-modified interiors.
Touch encoder
The touch encoder is one of Grayhill’s most popular products. Companies can utilize touch encoders as a way to consolidate complicated controls into an easy to use, and customizable interface. The touch encoder knob contains a touch screen and a rotatable bezel. This technology can replace many buttons and switches in many scenarios.
The construction of the touch encoder is fairly straightforward. It’s waterproof and durable, so it can be used in a variety of applications.
The touch encoder can come in several options: 1.5” screen, 1.5” flush mounted, 2.1” screen and 2.1” flush mounted.
Customers can modify the touch encoder to suit their branding and needs. There are many options for the outer bezel, lens bezel and screen interface.
Next gen Buttons and knobs
For the 2023 ConExpo show, Grayhill displayed their new branding. Along with their new branding, they requested a redesign of their knobs to follow the new aesthetic, which is influenced by tick marks on a gauge. I helped out with the designing a new line of knobs that fall in line with the new design direction.
Initial ideation explored different themes. The first theme looked at a soft shape with tick marks. The second theme looked at a completely soft shape. The last theme looked at a soft shape with an incorporated geometric design.
Grayhill preferred the geometric pattern, because its aligns with the new graphic design direction.
Some concepts were sketched on how this aesthetic can be applied to the various knob shapes.
There were a few rounds of CMF exploration, as well as looking at variations with the overmolded pattern.
Initial layout on how the display panel will look with large knobs, switches and smaller knobs.
More panel variations were explored
The selected sketches were laid out in CAD and rendered using Keyshot.
CMF documents were sent to ModelsPlus, and prototypes were made for the 2023 ConExpo show.
CONAG 2020 EXPO ARMREST
Seeing how construction/agriculture is a big market, Grayhill asked us to come up with an armrest design that can showcase their technology for a display at the 2020 CONEXPO-CON/AGG. We designed a fully interactive armrest that incorporates the touch encoder, touch surface buttons/sliders, and joystick that with a touch encoder.
The fully functional armrest model is very well received at trade shows. Anyone can have an interactive experience with the various touch technologies from Grayhill
and see how its easy to use.
The Grayhill engineers had an initial idea on how the armrest would look, and the various features it will have.
I used their provided CAD model for a quick rendering that will be used as an underlay.
The initial round of sketches explored placements for each item and how it would effect form development.
After the first round of sketches, the engineers made changes to their CAD model and finalized placement for the various components.
This round of sketches explored form development around the component placement based on the revised 3D model.
The chosen sketch led to the finalized design thats used for the functional model.
The Grayhill engineers created a final model that showcases Grayhill’s products.
This armrest features: 1.5” TE, a joystick with a 1.5” flush mounted TE, IME touch buttons and sliders.