About two years ago I acquired a car repair manual, which ended up being an extremely valuable design reference for me. The manual is a foot tall, 10 inches wide, and 5 inches thick. I packed it in my carry-on when I flew back to New Haven and was pulled over at TSA for having a "large, unidentified, organic mass" in the middle of my suitcase. When the security agent unearthed the manual, all she said was, “So you’re into cars, huh.”
It was worth it, though. I continued to collect air conditioner repair manuals, hot-rod magazines, and many "DIY" car how-to guides that year. I am kind of obsessed with the design and layout of them. Their goal is to present as much information as possible about a technically complex mechanical contraption, not only guiding the mechanic through its working parts but also how to fix them when they are broken. The diagrams and the layouts of those diagrams are crazy crucial—they either help you fix the car or they don’t. There’s no playing around here. It’s all no-frills black-and-white high-contrast fix-it-or-f*ck-it design. I love that.
The most impressive (in my opinion) are the exploded view schematics, which bust apart the innards of engines and combustors along invisible vectors, each part then meticulously annotated and numbered. I’ve selected a few that caught my eye to appreciate here. There are other aspects of the repair manuals that I find interesting, but I need to gather my thoughts about their appeal first. There hasn’t been too much written about exploded view drawings/diagrams as a stand-alone concept, but it’s been ingrained in technological communication for hundreds of years (as early as Da Vinci’s notebooks) and has lasted to the present (Ikea furniture assembly instructions). These diagrams can often overcome language barriers and communicate without words. They can be made for anyone—kids can build Legos, carpenters can build furniture, mechanics can fix four speed manual shift transmissions with the help of an exploded view diagram.
There’s something deeper and more beautiful about looking at functional graphic design in places like Chilton’s Truck and Van Repair Manual 1992-1996. The content isn’t necessarily meant for me, and so I can approach it with a naiveness that allows me to just appreciate the shape and contrast of things, appreciate the grain of the photos, or the smallness of the text. That’s all I have to say really. I hope you appreciate the sh*t out of these diagrams.
AS 08/06/24