
Adafruit deemed an essential service to make Personal Protection Equipment - jonbaer
https://blog.adafruit.com/2020/03/22/covid/
======
devy
Adafruit make circuit boards and microelectronics in Manhattan. In that blog
post,

    
    
      Adafruit Industries located at 150 Varick Street, New York,
      NY 10013 by Executive Order 202.6, “Essential Business” by 
      New York State: https://esd.ny.gov/guidance-executive-order-2026
    

And Adafruit belongs to the "microelectronics/semi-conductor" category so they
are exempted in the "3\. Essential manufacturing including". This rule is
mostly designed to let the upstate NY's multiple multi-billion semi-conductor
industry's fabs (Cree Marcy fab, GlobalFoundries multiple fabs) remain open.

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bigapple1
Anyone in the NYC area/interested in helping NYC should read
[https://jakehlee.github.io/nyc-makers-vs-
covid/](https://jakehlee.github.io/nyc-makers-vs-covid/) or
[https://nycmakesppe.com/](https://nycmakesppe.com/) same site, different URL

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Abishek_Muthian
> We are also working with NYC to explore disposable open-source low-cost face
> shields.

That's interesting, is that supposed to be used on top of the face mask
(surgical, N95 etc.) or is that supposed to be used as standalone protection
equipment at low risk environment?

I wonder whether it would be put through thorough tests such as NIOSH ratings,
before being used?

I'm asking this because I have made a 'Qualitative Filter' based Facemask[1],
to be used as last resort when nothing better is available.

[1]DIY Qualitative filter face mask - [https://abishekmuthian.com/diy-
qualitative-filter-face-mask/](https://abishekmuthian.com/diy-qualitative-
filter-face-mask/)

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smokelegend
Interesting perspective!

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uberdog
Great list of equipment and their roles in production!

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thinkloop
> Adafruit is a 100% woman-owned, loan-free, VC-free, profitable, USA
> Manufacturing company.

Cool

~~~
inamberclad
Open hardware, gold standard tutorials, open source libraries.

But holy cow, they need to charge a premium to make it work. I'm always
conflicted between supporting them or just going to ebay or alibaba.

~~~
teh_infallible
They target hobbyists (like me) so if they mark things up, it’s worth it IMO.
The value add-on they provide is that they have s curated selection of items,
everything you buy from them has associated tutorials which help you
incorporate them into your projects.

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freepor
Adafruit is a great show-off business for New York City (tech, manufacturing,
woman-owned) so even though the PPE angle here is quite dubious the governor
and mayor are doing this as a favor.

~~~
knolax
> Adafruit is a great show-off business for New York City (tech,
> manufacturing, woman-owned)

They also make quality products and turn a profit, unlike most VC backed
"tech" startups like Uber and WeWork.

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person_of_color
3d printing janky masks.. is that really essential?

~~~
detaro
Faceshields != masks. Those lend themselves a bit better to printing than
proper masks (since it's mostly a sheet of transparent plastic + one plastic
piece to hold it)

~~~
person_of_color
Do you have the link to an STL so I can print one? I have an Ender 3 Pro

~~~
PatrickMDev
I printed these [https://budmen.com/](https://budmen.com/) until I ran out of
PLA. I don't honestly have any knowledge about their effectiveness, but while
my city is under shelter-in-place it seemed as good a way as any to pass the
time.

I saw a few different designs for 3D printed PPE out there - I went for this
one because the materials were all things I could source and they were one of
the only places I saw that would help coordinate matching you up with medical
professionals that want what you've printed.

