Last month, we mentioned the clinicians and global health experts who generously donated their time and expertise to Project Otter background research. This month, we’re recognizing the technical experts who have answered countless questions and provided invaluable guidance as we raced through the Otter prototype fabrication.
For starters, a quick thank you to the library staff at Stanford University for helping us track down the elusive (and expensive) IEC specifications for conductive warming devices.
Kevin Abraham, the Engineering Manager at Janco Thermoforming in Dover, NH had some great general design critiques on the Otter bassinet and heater design. The Janco team fabricated the Firefly beta prototype bassinet mold in 2011. The Janco mold, which they recovered for us from their cavernous storage facility, served as an excellent reference for how to successfully vacu-form a complex shape in thick polycarbonate.
The Autodesk BUILD Space team in Boston have been superlative hosts, and they’ve repeatedly gone out of their way to help even as they simultaneously juggle the BUILD Space launch. Senior Director Rick Rundell and Programs Manager Bevin Lin helped us get set up in the space, and Rick even moonlighted as IT Support for the BUILD Space intranet.
Thank you to Operations Manager Adam Allard and his team for throwing down railroad tracks ahead of the Otter train, getting a bunch of fabrication machines set up and commissioned just as we needed them. We must recognize Adam’s superhuman patience as we generated piles of polycarbonate scraps, MDF sawdust and an assorted trail of wreckage across the formerly pristine workshop. Thank you to Tim Brinkerhoff and Athena Moore for getting us quickly through all safety trainings and for reminding us to wear our safety goggles and not to eat pizza inside the laser cutter. Thank you to Joe Aronis for the 3D printer training, and to Taylor Tobin for his help setting up the vacuum former and glass oven for heating polycarbonate sheets.
Thank you especially to Shop Supervisor Joshua Aigen for patiently guiding us on our journey through the CAD/CAM wilderness, and for helping us babysit the ShopBot while fabricating the Otter bassinet molds!
