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Low-Cost Arduino-Based Ventilator

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Re: Low-Cost Arduino-Based Ventilator

#141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HI! I’m a robotics engineer with mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, Linux and embedded programming skills, and I have 8 3D printers at home including two Prusa printers, a high resolution resin printer, and a large format printer. I’d really like to help! But there’s no central organization for this. I think we have to quickly organize ourselves! If anyone has any ideas please add them here in these hack…

The bottleneck with distributing new ventilators isn't physically producing them - it is getting them tested and approved by the FDA. So the use-case here is people putting their loved ones on these ventilators at home because the hospitals are full (which is entirely possible). Ideally, we should be working with existing ventilator manufacturers in the US to have them increase their current output.

I just wonder to what extent an emergency would change that situation. Let’s say I had a really nicely working design that some medical professionals helped test. Let’s say I was able to fabricate hundreds of them. I feel like some emergency exemptions could be offered if the alternative is people dying due to lack of ventilators.

Re: Low-Cost Arduino-Based Ventilator

#142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HI! I’m a robotics engineer with mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, Linux and embedded programming skills, and I have 8 3D printers at home including two Prusa printers, a high resolution resin printer, and a large format printer. I’d really like to help! But there’s no central organization for this. I think we have to quickly organize ourselves! If anyone has any ideas please add them here in these hack…

FYI, I tried to comment on the thread you linked, but it does not allow me to make a new user and then comment. Using Chrome on a Mac.

Hmm. I'll have to look in to that. Thanks. :-/

Re: Low-Cost Arduino-Based Ventilator

#143
post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rocket engine purchases were/are a strategic decision to keep the rocket scientists employed rather than having them sell there wares on the black market. I thought this was common knowledge for 30 years.

Then why all the angst among US military and government about being unable for so long to produce their own rockets?

This isn’t an opposing point. You want both.

Re: Low-Cost Arduino-Based Ventilator

#144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HI! I’m a robotics engineer with mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, Linux and embedded programming skills, and I have 8 3D printers at home including two Prusa printers, a high resolution resin printer, and a large format printer. I’d really like to help! But there’s no central organization for this. I think we have to quickly organize ourselves! If anyone has any ideas please add them here in these hack…

FYI, I tried to comment on the thread you linked, but it does not allow me to make a new user and then comment. Using Chrome on a Mac.

Thank you so much. Ive just done some server maintenance and tried the new user flow with another email address. I was able to sign up, confirm my email, log in and post. Hopefully it’s fixed now.

Also I’ve worked out a potentially simple functional solution. I’m going to try to make a YouTube video to appeal for input.

Re: Low-Cost Arduino-Based Ventilator

#145
post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They actually didn’t. German rocket scientists were smart people and they surrendered to US to avoid horror of dealing with NKVD. That said, there are reasons why USSR was first in space. For example, USSR deliberately ignored human life cost. In particular, they seriously considered first human flight to be a failure, so they announced it publicly only after Gagarin landed successfully.

It is well documented that some Nazi scientists worked on Russian rocket programs after ww2.

Some, yes, but I think most of them went to US.

Re: Low-Cost Arduino-Based Ventilator

#146

What we really need is a simple ventilator, designed by manufacturers who already know how to design and build these and produced at enormous scale using a shadow factory system similar to that developed in world war 2. In this model, the original manufacturer steps in to guide production, carry out quality control and probably supply the control electronics and software. All physical objects on which our civilisatio…

Devil's advocate: Why would a manufacturer consider damaging what is a potential mega cash cow? I read earlier that ventilators generally sell for $40-70,000USD to hospitals (who then go on to charge $20-40k for ventilator based treatment.) We're much better off right now with the government seizing the means of production and figuring out how to make as many as possible.

> Devil's advocate: Why would a manufacturer consider damaging what is a potential mega cash cow? I read earlier that ventilators generally sell for $40-70,000USD to hospitals (who then go on to charge $20-40k for ventilator based treatment.)

Because capitalism only works with a functioning economy. If everything goes all pear shaped, and we have tens of thousands of people dying because we don't have enough ventilators (and the numbers suggest that this is quite possible), these companies that have been filling their bathtubs with cash are going to have angry gun toting mobs of newly homeless and bereaved Americans using their office windows for target practice. This will happen regardless of what's right or wrong, legal or illegal. We haven't seen this here before because we haven't had a strong enough economic collapse yet (excluding the Great Depression of course, where some of this did happen). It's happened in many other countries, and may happen here too if CEOs don't take a more long term perspective on pricing.

Re: Low-Cost Arduino-Based Ventilator

#147

This probably should have gone on the thread about flattening the curve not being enough. But. Where is the core team of 12 people plus 108 collaborators that should have been assembled a month and a half ago to figure out how to retune US manufacturing to start producing stripped down ICU beds and the supplies needed to keep them operational? This game is easy. The parameters are well understood. You could assign th…

Hello from Montreal, Canada! My employers are industrial equipment dealers who remember WW2, and the pivoting of industrial production that it took to win the war. We can still make a major difference if we are able to manufacture open source ventilators en masse. What am I doing about it? First I'm reaching out to the engineering departments of two major academic institutions to find local engineering leads that can…

re: patents

I agree. I wish the system did as well. :(

https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/17/21184308/coronavirus-ital...

> Medical company threatens to sue volunteers that 3D-printed valves for life-saving coronavirus treatments

> The valve typically costs about $11,000 — the volunteers made them for about $1

Re: Low-Cost Arduino-Based Ventilator

#148
The CPAP part of this project is by far the most expensive component required and it's the part lots of people already own and don't use or have a use for. Anybody with an unused CPAP can buy an Arduino for next to nothing and put this together, you really need to put 'CPAP' somewhere in the title.
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