In a collaborative project, a team in the Department of Mechanical and Mechatronic (M&M) Engineering is printing headbands for plastic face shields to be used as protective gear for healthcare workers during COVID-19. This project is under the leadership of Dr Rudolph Venter, an orthopaedic surgeon and lecturer in clinical anatomy at SU’s Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences. Dr Venter approached M&M with the request to put the Department’s spare 3D printers at the faculty’s disposal.
“The finished product consists of a clear plastic sheet and an elastic strap that are attached to the parts (headbands) that we have printed,” says Kevin Neaves, who is driving the 3D printing of headbands in M&M.
“The headbands are generally printed in a stack of four to reduce the number of times that you need to visit the machine. The stack is then split, and a minor clean-up is performed on the surfaces if necessary.” The final assembly of the shields is done at the Tygerberg campus by a group in the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences.
“We recently received a donation from the Harry Crossley Foundation, a longstanding partner of the University, and have been able to purchase an additional printer and consumables. M&M is now running five printers for this project. The University is doing its collective best to battle COVID-19 and to protect the community. It is truly inspirational to see the skills, knowledge and technology come together towards this good cause,” explains Neaves.
To date, over 500 headbands have been printed at M&M. This amounts to over 7 km of filament and well over 1 000 hours of printer time, and with the generous support of the Harry Crossley Foundation, we will be able to increase production significantly.