When Matt’s brother Ryan lost both of his hands in an oil rig accident, Matt sent out a post on Reddit asking for workout ideas to keep Ryan in shape and in good spirits. Ryan, who loves working out, was afraid that, with the loss of his hands, he might never be able to lift again.
Reddit users were called into action, and two of the first companies to respond began designing prosthesis for Ryan.Wevolver, an open source web platform for sharing open hardware, teamed up with one of their featured products creators, exiii known for their HACKberry robotic hand. The HACKberry is a 3D printed myoelectric prosthetic arm that is capable of being highly customizable according to the needs of the amputee. For Ryan, exiii and Wevolver planned to print with RepRapper Tech’s new PLA, containing 30% aluminum, in order to get a light, but strong and durable prosthetic. But, when the issue of weight lifting came up, the summer intern team at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee stepped up to the plate.
The team tested different additive manufacturing materials to see which ones would be able to handle the demands of weightlifting the best. First, the team identified which areas of the hand and forearm have the highest amount of stress put on them when lifting. Next, they chose materials to reinforce and strengthen in those particular areas. By the end of their research and experiments, they came up with at least three additively manufactured parts designed to reinforce a HACKberry prosthetic. But, the leader of the team at the Oak Ridge Manufacturing Demo facility never got clearance to research, build, and test the products there, so Wevolver took over where Oak Ridge had left off.
Cameron from Wevolver writes on the Wevolver blog,“I barely slept for a week (it took me seven days to build it) – in fact, on the final night, I didn’t sleep at all. But, by Wednesday morning on 8th July, I’d hacked together a working bionic arm. Exiii even emailed me to say they had seen a video of my new HACKberry on Facebook – it was the first time in the world that someone had actually built one from their designs and they were as excited about it as I was.”
This was great news for Ryan…but wait: The same week that Cameron finished the customized HACKberry prosthetic, doctors treating Ryan decided not to remove his whole hand at the wrist and he only went through a partial amputation. The weight-lifting, reinforced HACKberry prosthetic wouldn’t fit Ryan anymore.
So, now what? Cameron posted the problem on Reddit and asked for help from designers and engineers in constructing a new prosthetic for Ryan. The response was overwhelming.
There were so many qualified people that offered to help that the project just continued to grow. A few notable contributions were offered, including: Andrew Sourk’s knowledge of Kevlar molding and Carbon Fiber, Matt Miller’s SLS printing suggestions, and Maxwell Emerald Perham’s mechanical engineering and design knowledge. David Worley has also been a key contributor in the project. He lost his bilateral upper limb in an accident and has been using prosthetics ever since. He was able to not only provide valuable insight into prosthetics from the perspective of the user, but he also offered much needed support to Ryan.
With a village of researchers, engineers, supporters and designers hard at work, the team decided to 3D print a Kevlar and carbon fiber HACKberry that includes a built in rep counter linking to Ryan’s smartphone. They decided to go in this direction when they decided that the medical industry’s smartphone operated bionic arm, the i-limb ultra revolution and its digits would be the optimal prosthetic for Ryan despite its $38,000 to $120,000 price tag. Obviously, buying two of these is not only out of the question for Ryan, but for most people.
The project is ongoing, but, based on the progress so far, the outcome is a promising one, especially if you’ve got any ideas on how to help. The method of crowdsourcing ideas and collaborating to bring much needed prosthetics to someone at a fraction of the cost is a project worth repeating. Hopefully, this isn’t the last time Reddit will bring people together for a good cause.
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