Remote Design of Spare Parts for Local Manufacturing in Rural Kenya

Abstract

This paper examines a solution for recording the dimensions of broken parts of hospital machinery to allow for 3D printable spares to be remotely designed but locally manufactured. This process is being implemented to combat the problem of the ineffective supply chains that many parts of the world struggle with. In cities such as Kisumu Kenya, high importation costs and long wait times are a serious problem for organizations such as hospitals that rely heavily on imported products, and localized manufacturing has been shown to be an effective strategy for addressing this problem. Currently most 3D printable replica parts are created through the use of scanning. However, since this is an expensive and often unreliable technology, the goal of this research was to develop a lower tech solution. This was done using an electronic form that could be used on a smartphone or tablet that would guide the user through the process of recording all the necessary information to redesign a part for 3D printing. This process included sections for recording material and part use as well as a process meant to collect the dimensions of each feature on the part. Unfortunately, the conclusion of this study was that a feature based approach to dimensioning parts is unreliable and ineffective for complex parts, and though it works for simple geometries is not a more efficient approach than dimensioning from a sketch. This result has led to the examination of other options, and indicates that future work should either experiment with a different more localized design process or revisit the possibility of applying scanning in areas like Kisumu.