2020 has shown us how we can work together across city & state lines to meet the expansive needs faced by a country fighting crisis & disasters. The onset of the global COVID-19 pandemic, and the resulting halt in production and thin inventory margins, led to a shortage of critical personal protective equipment (PPE) across the United States. In early 2020, IC3D began coordinating the selfless and generous volunteer makers across the Midwest to support the medical industry with the production and assembly of the 3D printed IC3D Budmen Face Shield.
We were trying to get ahead of it and organize the full community by serving as an organizing hub in our sphere of influence. We figured out 3D printer capacity in our area, determined what groups and organizations have 3D printers and are able to help, and worked to get everyone together as one to push out these materials.
Meeting the Demand
The demand for production-grade material that could stand up to all-day wear and the many sterilization processes was immense. IC3D quickly triaged the healthcare frontline shortages and rapidly pivoted filament production. As makers around the world scrambled to obtain 3D printing filament, IC3D expanded the team by 40%, bringing on staff displaced by pandemic-affected industries to keep filament and face shield operations running 24/7. IC3D ramped up production tenfold, peaking at over 13 thousand pounds (6.6 tons or 600 kilograms) of filament.
Having a clear direction and goal was one of the most unifying experiences for this team and business. Everyone quickly rose to the occasion with no time for doubt & worry. We felt confident and called for a purpose. We were ready for this.
The opportunity to put our supply capability to the test for a good cause was exhilarating from the standpoint of a small manufacturing company. Maxing out, isn’t that just what any weight lifter wants to do? It shows us our potential and causes growth.
Reflecting on our experiences this year, and reliving the emotions of what this means on a human level has been humbling.
Being able to help in a time when many others are home and not able to contribute, being able to hire people who were unemployed to help us scale appropriately and really quickly has been really incredible.
Bridging the Gap
With mission-critical PPE production underway, IC3D turned to area partners to bring the 3D printed Budmen design to the attention of the Veterans Health Administration of Central Ohio. After consulting with pulmonary experts, IC3D engineers modified the original Budmen design based on their feedback and submitted the updated design to the National Institutes of Health. The design was accepted as a viable option for emergency PPE after a brief review by the NIH and was pushed out to the IC3D distributed additive manufacturing network for immediate, large scale production. The IC3D Budmen Face Shield 3D model was shared publicly through the IC3D website & the NIH 3D Print Exchange.
Armed with the knowledge gleaned from a decade of injection molding & additive manufacturing experience, IC3D leveraged our manufacturing network to develop tooling for injection molded versions. The emergency response of the IC3D distributed additive manufacturing network ensured that production started immediately, reducing the time between tooling development and delivery of critical PPE.
You can create at home, but if you don’t put that together with the other pieces of the supply chain it’s not helpful. What we could do in a short time frame was assemble that supply chain, get everyone organized, and do it in a charitable way.
3D printing has certainly been doing this before much of the nation could really understand what was happening. In 2020, we’ve moved a variety of objects into tens of thousands in a matter of three weeks. No matter what business you’re in, that is scaling.
Assembled, Packaged, & Fulfilled
As the bridge manufacturing army continued to 3D print PPE, TS Tech ramped up production of injected molded face shield frames by the thousands. These injected molded frames were moved to the IC3D factory, where an assembly team worked around the clock to build and package shields for delivery.
As a person in manufacturing who’s used to really getting things done and fighting hard, I don’t see 3D printing going away or being irrelevant in future crises. We are guiding the industry conversations about the long-term viability of additive manufacturing for this kind of thing, to find our unique place inside of this. The heaviest question being: What are the policies we need to put in place at a national and local level to make sure all of us are ready — and that additive manufacturing is ready?
We at IC3D are proud to have been part of the solution and look forward to further helping lay the groundwork for an agile and responsive distributed manufacturing platform. This network has affirmed my faith in our community. While we cannot measure the amount of lives saved by this emergency manufacturing network, we can quantify their contribution during this response.
The ability of distributed manufacturing to scale up to meet sudden and immediate needs is now capturing the attention of regulators and organizations nationwide. As an America Makes ambassador, Kimberly Gibson is bringing IC3D’s manufacturing experience to the Advanced Manufacturing Crisis Production Response (AMCPR) platform to help lay the foundation for critical manufacturing infrastructure to meet the many demands of the next national-scale crisis.
Our Partners & Volunteers
Over 60 thousand IC3D Budmen face shields were produced, with 37.5 thousand sent to support the Ohio healthcare frontlines & 12.5 thousand donated to additional organizations.
- TS Tech produced over 44 thousand injection molded IC3D Budmen face shields
- The IC3D team used our 3D printer fleet to create over 6 thousand face shields
- The Beehex team 3D printed almost 3.6 thousand face shields using 224 pounds of IC3D filament, with Mark H. contributing almost 1.1 thousand
- An amazing 275 additional makers donated over 4 thousand face shield frames, with Bill S. contributing almost 1.3 thousand
- Will Nickley and volunteers with Local Tech Heroes contributed an army of volunteer home-based assemblers
- American Foam supplied the padding needed for comfortable long-term wear
- Nexeo provided a significant amount of the plastic resin used in the production of IC3D 3D printer filament
- Patrick Castro Jr. with Electro-General Plastics provided the cutting services for the transparent PETG material used on the each face shield.
