3D printing molds to cast silicone respirators: it's harder than I expected
YouTube Viewers YouTube Viewers
400K subscribers
31,353 views
0

 Published On Apr 17, 2020

For the past month this has been my white whale: rapid prototyping a reusable, autoclavable respirator design which accepts standard commercial bayonet filters. The mask is cast out of heat resistant urethane and skin-safe silicone, allowing reuse and sterilization. I fell down the rabbit hole hard and learned all about RTV molding, casting urethane and silicone, multi-part 3D printed mold design and more. This video is more of an exploration of my last month rather than a tutorial or highly-focused project video... but hopefully people find it interesting.

📢 Twitter:   / breakingtaps  

I also purchased a quantitative mask fit tester to validate my design. Tl;dr: I have not passed the fit test yet (fit factor of 67, minimum is 100) but I think the design holds promise. It also illustrates why many of the popular 3D printed masks will not pass a fit test in my opinion.

Apologies for the missed focus and cropepd shots, I rushed collection of some footage and didn't notice until too late.

In case it isn't immediately obvious: this is not approved for any medical use and I make no claims to the efficiency of any similar designs that might be subsequently based on my work :)

Files for the final 3D mold and urethane part are online here: https://grabcad.com/library/3d-printe...

show more

Share/Embed