Home Made Automatic Ventilator system
A while ago we wrote about how to make your own home made Automatic Ventilator system given the COVID-19 pandemic (Coronavirus) era we are currently living through, where there was a clear shortage of such medical devices available. You can read that article here.
We decided to take it to the next level a build one to see exactly how well this would work using our theory of making it as simple and cheap as possible but still function the way it should.
Now we did buy a proper medical Ventilator bag from an online medical store, the rest was to see if Firgelli had all the components available to make it work.
Home Made Ventilator parts list
Lets start with the set up. Here are all the components we used
1. FA-35-12-2" ( 2" stroke Linear Actuator)
2. MB1 Bracket
3. MB6 Bracket
4. 12vdc Power supply - plugs into any wall socket and outputs 12vdc for the actuator
5. Timer Relay.
The wiring for the Timer relay may look complicated but its very simple if you follow the wiring diagram that we have on the product page for that device.
The principles behind this set-up is that the Linear Actuator goes back and forth to compress the Ventilator bag against a hard surface. The speed of the back and forth can be adjusted using the timer relay. The adjustment dial will change both the outward stroke and the retracting stroke and simple move back and forth whilst ever the system is plugged in.
The load on the Actuator is extremely low which means running a 100% Duty cycle is totally fine.
This entire set-up costs around $300. For the next level up project we would suggest using an Arduino micro controller that would allow you to set the timing and speed and allow for inputs and feedback. So lets say the speed of the ventilator Bag compression needs to be set based of a patients heart rate.
Using an Arduino would allow you to get to that level of complexity and allow for a number of inputs, but would require a program writing to develop such a working system. The setup we created here is about as simple as you could possibly get which was the point of the project to begin with.
Please watch the video below to see the Ventilator machine in action.
