A couple weeks ago I posted about retooling my company Toast to manufacture face shields. Feedback was great, a lot of ideas were generated and buzz that helped us get off the ground.
Many of you asked for me to come back and give an update on how this has gone. I did a post last week : www.dailykos.com/...
but it didn’t get seen by many. Oh well. I am back for another update. This time focusing on the redesign, since so many of you wanted to get into the weeds of the design.
Strangely, our sales have really fallen off the cliff. Maybe the need for PPE has been met? But I doubt it.
There seems to be a real disconnect between makers/ producers and those working on the front line. I have tried to register on some listervs and databases but nothing has come from that. We have reached out to hospitals and health insurers. Not much has happened.
But we have had good luck delivering to smaller clinics, many local Oregon ones. We have shipped about 1500 shields so far. So we are making an impact, and for that I am proud.
We have also we opened up purchasing to people who want to donate face shields. Donation Link
With these we ship small boxes of 20 directly to clinics. We have shipped some to cancer wards, hospitals, and even to Italy and Nepal.
We have received great feedback from front line works. They really like the shields generally but asked for ways to make the forehead contact more comfortable. They even did experiments with materials and made great suggestions.
Though we had spent two weeks refining the manufacturing process, I was itching to revisit the design and see how we could improve it. One of the great things about using flexible manufacturing equipment like laser cutters is that you can make changes at anytime.
So it was time for another crack at this. Could I make it more comfortable with the materials we have? Could I design it for faster assembly? Could I hit the unicorn trifecta of better quality, time, and cost?
At first, I tried to simply modify the existing design by adding foam. One doctor had a pretty brilliant solution using window weatherstripping. Taking that as a starting point, I developed a design incorporating that into the forehead rest. I even designed integrated clips that would attach the foam to the plastic since no glues would do well with sanitizing alcohol and cleaners.
But in the end these were complex solutions to the issue. At the same time Apple launched their face shields with a goal of making 1 million per week. Apple made some great design simplifications. I won't have access to all their knowhow and custom manufacturing but damn it, I will see if I can design something to rival it.
So I started with a clean slate. Going off their idea of a forehead strap that forms the curve of the shield. In my opinion, the Apple design has a couple week spots, mainly the adjustment, you need to release and rethread the strap to adjust it and the connection of the shield to strap. My prototypes showed me that flex at the joint makes for a unstable shield. So it bounces around when you move your head. That point is key to making it solid.
So my final solution was to integrate an interlock so the shield and forehead rest were solidly locked together and the elastic gives it a final pinning. I added laser cut breather holes to the forehead rest and made it taller then the thin silicon strap used by Apple. This keeps it from getting moist or clammy. And I kept our simple cinch clip at the back of the elastic for quick adjustments.
The final result is a shield that is 25% lighter,
cheaper to produce and way way more comfortable. While maintaining the simple materials and critical ability to be sanitized and reused.
This is an all-day face shield that is reusable and cheap.
Now, we find out if anyone will buy it...
Face shield info page
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-PDXer