How did you come across the idea to use CGS printers to print the shields?
I follow a lot of technology communities and noticed there was a large movement growing in response to Covid-19 shortages globally of PPE for medical personal. In particular the company that makes the schools 3d printers Prusa was leading a global effort to use idle 3D printers to create face shields. They released a design as open source so anyone can download and print the shields free of charge. You can find out more information here.
How long does it take to print a shield?
When I started printing it took about 4 hours per shield. I've now made configuration changes to the printers the time is down to around 1 hour and 30 minutes per shield. There are designs out there that print faster however feedback from the hospitals we are working with was that they didn't provide adequate protection.
What materials do you need to create them?
There is three parts to the shield:
- The frame which is 3D printed out of PLA.
- A clear piece of plastic to attach to the frame (a4 laminate sheets)
- A elastic strap to secure the shield to the wearers head.
At the moment we are supplying the 3D printed frames and the hospitals are supplying the rest.
How did you make contact with the medical team that are now using the shields?
Through a friend of mine Dr Ivy Fan who is a doctor at Western Health. I showed her the first shield I made and she asked if she could take it to show her colleagues who thought it was a great idea and asked if I could make more.
You said so far you’ve made 135 shields and they have a severe shortage, do you know how many are needed in total for the teams you’re supplying to?
I've made about 300 now, there is a large demand out there we have been asked if we can supply around 8000 at the moment. We cannot do that alone so we have set up a network for schools, businesses and individuals with idle 3D printers that wish to help.
If another school or business has a 3D printer, how do they find out whether they can help?
We have together a website to coordinate efforts between businesses, schools and individuals https://protectourfrontline.org/.
