Revolution Via Rotational Molding.
The Avalon Aura represents a new first in the pontoon industry. Designed and developed in house by Tangent, the Aura is the world’s first rotationally molded modular pontoon.
With over a decade of experience in the Marine Industry, Tangent and its talented design team went looking for new and innovative solutions to some of the Marine Industry’s most glaring problems. At the top of this list, was the development of a low cost, easy to assemble, entry level pontoon that was high on style and functionality. While innovations and massive improvements to quality were being made at the upper ends of the Pontoon market, lower end offerings continued to lack the creative design thinking necessary to add value to such an overlooked segment.
Beginning as an internal, proprietary project, Tangent’s design team began creating concepts exploring several ways to style and assemble a low budget, modular pontoon. After multiple rounds styling concepts and exploration, it became clear that rotational molding modular segments was the way forward.
This production process conveyed several advantages over typical aluminum side wall production. Tangent realized right away that the modular pieces could provide the exterior styling, as well as the interior structure, seating, and storage, all in one tool. Ease of assembly was another clear advantage, as the modular pieces eliminated the need for costly metal fabrication, allowing for simpler and more repeatable assembly techniques.
Simplicity Over Everything.
Another goal from the beginning of the project was to simplify every element of the entry level pontoon. As a result, The Aura’s exterior styling uses clean lines, and a simple silhouette to convey a more modern and user-friendly experience than traditional fence boat pontoons. The interior corral of the Aura pontoon keeps this minimalist and user-friendly ethos alive by using simple, bold upholstery, and a 360 footprint that allows users to face each other from all corners of the boat. Flip up seating and built in storage in every roto molded section make the Aura a remarkably spacious pontoon.
Not to be outdone, the Aura’s helm uses a compact footprint and streamlined design aesthetic that reduces the number of buttons and gauges to the essentials, allowing the user to focus more on boating and less on UI. With the proliferation of smart phones and portable Bluetooth speakers, stripping the radio and built in speaker system was another way to reduce complexity and allow for more user flexibility.
Color From the Start.
Core to the Aura’s ethos of simplicity and style is the creative use of color in a segment largely devoid of it. With this in mind, Tangent developed four key color themes from the very beginning of the design process, each with its own unique story and palette. Rotational molding’s robust properties allowed the Tangent design team to pick any color plastic under the sun without the need for painting or graphics, which can weather and wear over time. With the base colors set, Tangent worked to incorporate bright and bold pops of color into the accents, trims and upholstery, helping the Aura’s color packages stand out in a sea beige and grays.
Dynamo & Every Detail
Not content to design a whole boat from the ground up, Tangent also worked to create a name, logo and branding strategy for the Aura. This included developing a custom type face for the Aura’s badging and dictating logo and badge placement on the Aura’s various parts.
Additionally Tangent developed an interior and exterior pattern for the Aura’s roto-molded parts in Dynamo, a script-based 3D software that allows for the creation of dynamic 3D patterns and textures on full scale parts.
A Lasting Partnership
With an initial design and strategy in hand, Tangent took the Aura to one of the industry leaders in Pontoons; Avalon. Working closely with Avalon’s engineering team, Tangent worked to bring the Aura concept into the real world with the help of Avalon’s years of boat building expertise and development infrastructure.
Virtual Reality to Actual Reality
One of the most critical aspects of the Aura pontoon’s development was copious amounts of time spent behind VR goggles evaluating every aspect of the Aura’s innovative design. Using 1-1 scale digital models allowed Tangent and Avalon the ability to step into simulated environments that could mimic the dynamic lighting of various marine settings. Thus allowing Tangent to evaluate and massage surfaces more accurately than from just 2D monitors alone. These 1:1 VR settings also gave Tangent greater insights into the Aura’s various ergonomic challenges.
