Swindon-Based 3D Printing Business, SED Developments gets involved in printing faceshields for the NHS.
SED Developments Shielding NHS Staff: Responding to a nationwide call for help from people with 3D printers, Swindon-based small business, SED Developments is using some of its printing capacity to make face shields.
They’re part of the 3D Crowd UK group who are delivering 39,000+ Face Shields to 90 NHS Trusts this Easter weekend from their Sheffield distribution centre.
To donate to this scheme go here: https://www.gofundme.com/f/3dcrowd-emergency-3d-printed-face-shields
At the time of writing, funds stand at £93,680.
The 3D crowd need 500,000 face shields – they’ve already despatched 39,000.
Says Jo: ‘I’m not the only one in Swindon, there are at least 4 others in my regional Slack group.’
This whole thing is a huge joint effort between many people in the 3D printing community to support the NHS during this Covid19 crisis.
We’re thankful we can help, in our own small way, this amazing initiative.
Jo goes on to say: ‘We print in PETG because it’s stronger.
It takes around 5 hours for one shield to print. We’re printing 12 hour days – but I know others are going around the clock. Sadly we can’t do that as we sleep next door to one of our printers. We did that one New Year’s Eve to finish a remote control snowmobile and it was blooming painful!
We’re instructed to print in a clean area, wear gloves and a face shield to move the parts around. We then bag them, label them with the date packaged. Now they’ve learnt that the virus lives for 3 days they need the date so as to know not to open it for 3 days.
Once we’ve printed over 20, we’ll post them to either Frome or Sheffield – depending on where they’re needed.
The printer in action:
About SED Developments
When not printing face shields, Jo and her husband Richard, print and sell a vast array of stuff from biscuit cutters to parts for vintage cars. You can read more about SED Developments here on the blog. And in this piece about additive manufacturing and how it all began.
Visit the SED website here: https://www.sed-developments.co.uk/home/
Get in touch with them
As it says on their website, they’re approachable tinkerers so you can:
Email us: jo@sed-developments.co.uk
Telephone us: 01793 705380
Plus, we’re also rather sociable. Follow us on: Follow us: Instagram Facebook, Pinterest
