After designing and publishing our open source, laser-cut facial screen, several hospitals asked us to deliver substantial numbers as soon as possible. We are now in full swing at manufacturing and the first screens are already in use. Read below how we made this happen this past week.
Unprecedentedly fast startup
Over the weekend we started the manufacturing . The mask consists of four parts and three different materials. The screens made of PET can be cut in 12 pieces at a time in the SPOTmini machines. This is fast; operators are constantly changing the material and thus have no time for supply or removal of materials. Additional personnel were scheduled for this purpose. The polyacetal strips take the longest to make. For this we chose the autoSPOT machine. AutoSPOT is our fastest machine and can load and unload fully automatically. Programming the machine takes a little more time, but after that it runs automatically. During the first hours of a large manufacturing , many things always come to light that could be done more efficiently. An extra dash in the drawing to make it easier to unload residual materials, an extra tool to grab parts faster, a better layout of the workshop. Every little bit helps.
During this first weekend, we have already been able to produce 1,000 sets of parts.
Serious numbers
On weekdays, we scheduled extra work hours. We now work in shifts to get more manufacturing-hours out of a day. So we managed to scale up to over 4,000 parts per day on top of our regular manufacturing pretty quickly. As a precaution, we decided to temporarily not offer the rush delivery option of snijlab.nl.
Material supply became acute at this point. European production chains are currently disrupted and many suppliers cannot supply (enough). With very welcome help from some customers and partners, we were eventually able to source enough materials. The consequence, however, was that we had to temporarily switch to thicker polyacetal. In order to keep the stiffness of the mask the same and make the joint work, we created an alternative design on-the-fly. This allowed us to accommodate the thickness difference and still continue to make sufficient and functioning masks.
Volunteers
In just the first two days, more than 100 volunteers volunteered to help with assembly. An assembly line was built up in a short time in the play factory that was compulsorily closed due to corona measures. Now a team of 12 volunteers led by Gerard works daily assembling and packing the screens. The finished screens are delivered daily to ErasmusMC.
Within a week of ordering, more than 5,000 face screens were in the hospital and in use. More than 20,000 screens have since been purchased.
Digital manufacturing within the Netherlands
This project shows the value of being able to produce locally. It also shows the power of digital manufacturing ; Because we are free in form and material, we can start immediately and deal flexibly with challenging circumstances such as material shortages.
We solved the main objection of digital manufacturing, the low capacity, by developing innovative machines that can laser cut quickly and serially.
Serial digital manufacturing fills the gap between 3D printing and mass production.
We are happy and proud to do our part in this crisis.
