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Wmu 3d printing
WMU 3D printers producing face shields and masks for health care workers | WMU News
Contact: Joy Brown
Video of WMU using 3D printers to help healthcare workers fight COVID-19
Learn how WMU faculty and staff are using 3D printers to make face shields.
KALAMAZOO, Mich.—Western Michigan University’s 3D printers aren’t sitting idle during the pandemic. Instead, staff and professors from multiple campus departments are using them to produce personal protective equipment—specifically face shields—for health care workers who desperately need them during the COVID-19 patient surge.
Dylan Ledbetter, assistant director of Information Technology labs and the Help Desk at WMU, says his office is making face shields to go to the Sindecuse Health center as part of the ongoing WMU effort to provide materials to help protect health workers and share WMU resources. He and other staff members are using a 3D model created by 3DVerkstan, a 3D printing collective based in Sweden. The model is currently under review by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
To produce the shields, they are using plastic filament and transparency sheets similar to those used for overhead projectors. WMU's information technology unit has enough material to create 1,500 shields, with more material on the way. Each shield takes about 45 minutes to produce.
“With eight printers running simultaneously all day, we expect to make upward of at least 70 shields per day,” Ledbetter says.
Shield material was donated from Kalamazoo-based company Fabri-Kal, and the College of Engineering and Applied Sciences will assist with cutting the shields to size.
“We made our first shields yesterday and presented them to (WMU's) Sindecuse Health Center folks, who loved them,” says Thomas Wolf, WMU's chief information officer.
The team also has reached out to WMU Homer Stryker M.D. School of Medicine.
Faculty and staff at the College of Engineering and Applied Sciences are also working on a very similar face shield design; both groups began with the same design files. Engineering college Interim Dean Steven Butt says samples were recently presented to Sindecuse and WMed Health.
A WMU 3D printer making a face shield.
“Fabri-Kal recently donated transparent sheeting material to support both groups,” Butt says. “So, the shields are ready and being vetted.”
Machine shop specialist Allin Kahrl and faculty specialist Mike Konkel are doing the 3D printing, material preparation and assembly at the engineering college.
For more information about WMU's face shield 3D-printing project, visit the group's webpage.
Others involved in the production process include:
- Joshua Grant, IT associate director of faculty services
- Arnold Taylor, IT director of support services
- Travis Wendt, IT audio visual engineer
- Bill Feenstra, College of Aviation director of information technology and director of simulation technology
- Jeffery Nillson, College of Aviation chief aircraft inspector
- Jake Zoch, College of Aviation simulator and information technology technician
For more WMU news, arts and events, visit WMU News online.
Engineers invent 3D hybrid metal printer | College of Engineering and Applied Sciences
Make it in metal. Maybe soon, anyone can. That’s the hope of a group of WMU engineering graduates and their professor, who have applied for a provisional patent on a new 3D metal printing device and process.
Work on the device began in 2014 as part of a senior design project with then students Jake Ives, Jim McQueen, Dan Ziemer and Matt Ziemer – and associate professor Pavel Ikonomov of WMU’s engineering design, manufacturing and management systems department.
While 3D metal printers that create metal objects are available, the price tag for the machines can be upwards of $500,000.
“We saw a need for an affordable metal rapid prototype machine,” said Ikonomov. “Most complex metal parts require multiple secondary operations after their initial production, which add time and cost to the manufacturer.
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He said in addition to affordability, the team wanted to ensure the resulting machine could hold close tolerances and had a large build area.
The team built their machine from scratch, combining CNC machining and welding – both well-established technologies in the industry. Its original 3-axis design has since been modified to a 5-axis design for increased capabilities. “Jenny,” as the machine is called, can hold a tolerance of 0.001 of an inch and is capable of functioning as a 5-axis CNC or a CNC controlled welder. The process of building parts is similar to the most common 3D printing methods. The creating of a metal part is achieved using an additive (welding) and subtractive (CNC) machining process. A welder that is attached to the printer is guided by the CNC controller to place metal precisely on a predefined path on each layer. Next the CNC machining tool removes the steel material to create a precise shape. Then the welding and machining processes are repeated multiple times until the part is produced.
“Our goal was to build an accessible and affordable 3D metal printer that nearly anyone can operate with ease,” said Jim McQueen, now a quality engineer with Oliver-Tolas Healthcare Packaging in Grand Rapids.
“We envision many applications for this 3D metal printer – from a homeowner working in the garage to small job shops to virtually any industry,” he said. “Right now, making functional metal prototypes using 3D printers can be cost-prohibitive. Our device and process make it simple and inexpensive to make complex, fully assembled metal parts.”
The students received an undergraduate research award which was used to purchase all the major components. Some smaller items were donated or used from inventory – and the machine came in $4.93 under the $4,000 budget, of which more than $2,000 was the cost of the welder itself.
“We believe this is a patentable design for a machine that will greatly impact manufacturing and prototyping as we know it,” Ikonomov said.
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