Adafruit deemed an essential service to make Personal Protection Equipment | Hacker News Reader

Adafruit deemed an essential service to make Personal Protection Equipment

blog.adafruit.com

79 pointsjonbaer17 comments

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.

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

> 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/

Interesting perspective!

Great list of equipment and their roles in production!

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

Cool

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.

I don't know, lots of their electronics stuff is pretty cheap for a hobbyist, even at retail prices. Unfortunately shipping from NYC to the west coast is either slow or expensive. It would be nice if they had a good west coast distributor.

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.

I often have to make that tradeoff, too.

The protocol I've settled on is to always buy the first one or two parts of a new type from Adafruit. This may also has the advantage of higher quality than no-name eBay sellers. That way, I know how a part is supposed to work, before trying cheaper sources. Then later, if I want a bunch of them for stock, or just messing around with (and maybe using up or breaking), I would buy from eBay.

Also, if I'm placing an order from them (and already having to pay for shipping), I'm willing to pay a slight premium for any other things I might want to include at the same time.

(This is the same tradeoff I make between buying from the more-expensive local hardware store that has fantastic people working there who have been in the trades and know everything versus Home Depot. Five 8 foot long 2x4's? Home Depot. Some specialized part that I want to get right one? The local store, even though it might be cheaper at the big-box place.)

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.

> 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.

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

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)

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

I printed these 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.

Prusa designed a face shield which was verified by the Czech Ministry of Health. There's an assembly guide for making your own, too: https://www.prusaprinters.org/prints/25857-prusa-protective-...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com