Not all heroes wear capes. Some only carry 3D printers. Indians are finding new ways of meeting the existential challenge posed by the coronavirus. A startup in Mumbai plans to mass-produce face shields for doctors — the need of the hour — using 3D printing, a computer-aided and cost-effective manufacturing process. It would defy accepted wisdom about 3D printing technology.
“One drawback to 3D printing’s detail-oriented process is that it severely limits how many objects can be printed at one time,” points out All3DP, a 3D printing-focused German magazine.
But Boson Machines has found a way. It has done so by employing more machines to scale up and procuring raw material in bulk to cut costs. Further, it has raised money through crowdfunding to keep going. It’s a gripping narrative that has unfolded over the nationwide lockdown. Read on.
It was a Saturday, but March 28 was a very busy day for a small three-year-old startup — Boson Machines. Most people across India were busy grappling with the fallout of the three-week nationwide lockdown announced on March 25. And then, Arjun Panchal, 25, co-founder of Boson, tweeted that Saturday afternoon that his 3D printing enterprise had repurposed itself to produce face shields for frontline Covid-19 workers.
Panchal’s tweet received over 3,000 retweets and 160 replies, many from people trying to procure these 3D printed face shields for doctors or from doctors themselves. Boson Machines had raised about INR21 lakh through a crowd-funding campaign to make and distribute 12,000 face shields. But through the responses to his tweet alone, Panchal saw a requirement of more than 500,000 face shields.
While most of the demand was from Maharashtra, people from as far as Assam and Jammu & Kashmir requested for these face shields.
The problem now for Boson Machines, apart from the obvious challenge of funding, was scaling up operations quickly. Panchal, his brother and co-founder Parth, and their small team was making 500-800 units per day, but now they needed to make at least 4,000 units a day. And they began thinking of possible ways to rapidly scale up.
Adapting 3D printing
Boson Machines was established in September 2017 at Goregaon, a western suburb of Mumbai. When the business started, both brothers were focused on production of indigenous 3D printers, but gradually they also began 3D printing services, mostly for small prototyping orders.
“Additive manufacturing (as 3D printing is known) was being used for prototyping only, but Parth and I planned to change this scenario and actually mass-produce parts. So, by the end of 2019, we were able to deliver around 3,500 parts to a customer and we believe that it’s not just prototyping, but we can actually run quantity if we have the correct set of machines,” says Panchal.
To be sure, across the world, 3D printing is challenging traditional mass-production methods such as injection mould. Companies such as Airbus and Volkswagen have committed to manufacturing a rising number of products with 3D printing technology.
According to a study by French 3D printing company Sculpteo, “3D printing is a cost-effective manufacturing method for mid-quantity series of high complexity objects.” While the cost for manufacturing via injection mould or traditional manufacturing decreases with a rise in production volume, for 3D printing the cost remains optimal and steady from start to finish, the study showed.
But in the case of face shields, Panchal is confident that costs will come down. The current production cost for 12,000 units was around INR150 each. But with more machines being employed in manufacturing, he sees material costs sliding as bulk order rates are usually lower.
“Right now, it’s a flat rate of INR150 per unit, but we are trying to get it under INR100 right now,” says the mechatronics, robotics, and automation engineering graduate.
The idea is simple. Employ more machines to print and procure raw material in bulk. Boson isn’t new to this and has adopted a similar game plan in the past as mentioned earlier. The company is currently using up to 120 machines to make face shields.
According to the price chart available on B2B marketplace IndiaMART, face shields made for the medical industry are available at a price range of INR151 to INR355. Most manufacturers use traditional production processes for making the shields.
3D printing to the rescue
Boson is not the only example of 3D printing coming to the rescue of frontline healthworkers. Yesterday, Jeff Bezos founded space-tech company Blue Origin announced on Twitter it was using its 3D printers to make face shields.
Swapneil Parikh, an internal-medicine specialist, and an author of one of the first books on the coronavirus, first got in touch with Panchal two weeks ago via a WhatsApp group of doctors and engineers who wanted to contribute to the fight against the disease.
Within six hours of putting out the SOS message on the need for protective face shields, Panchal got in touch and 10 hours later, his team had printed the product, recalls Parikh.
“Next morning, he (Arjun) brought a few pieces to Jaslok Hospital and then we field-tested them to see if they could be used under general condition. We tweaked the design and made modifications to improve it. He went back and the next day he came with 50 units. They worked beautifully,” says Parikh, who got involved at the request of one of his teachers practising at Jaslok Hospital.
This task could only be achieved because of the swiftness of 3D printing technology. Within a span of two weeks, Panchal, who had no prior experience of manufacturing a face shield, has been able to develop and perfect it. What’s more, Boson also plans to meet the demands of other medical products which are in short supply.
But going ahead, as demand for face shields surges, Panchal will also use injection mould-based manufacturing method to meet the demand in a limited timeframe. “One doctor at Jaslok required at least four face shields per day,” says Panchal.
The bottom line
For the first 20,000 units, a couple of office interns and Panchal’s family members and friends put in the effort and labour. But thanks to that tweet on March 28, the state machinery came to his help with permissions for open manufacturing sites, logistics, and even labour.
At a time when fighting a pandemic is more important, the battle between old and new manufacturing techniques may not be important so long as the product is delivered on time. But in an emergency, a new technology can rise and flourish in unimagined ways.
via Mumbai startup reshapes 3D printing to mass-produce cheap face shields for doctors. – ET Prime
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