Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by karthikb 2267 days ago
Not only are the files incomplete to actually go into production, they’ve picked a model where the components are not readily available on the open market in quantities large enough to have an impact corresponding to effort. IC4 is some variant of the ST10F27 (can’t make out the last digit from the low res pdf they’ve provided), and there are only a few thousand of all variants of that chip available online with quotes lead times of up to 30 weeks.

I was initially pleasantly surprised with this release but tweeted my disappointment pretty quickly. Even with a schematic it can take months to get the layout right and validated on a line, build and setup the test apparatus...
2 comments
karthikb 2267 days ago
[Follow up]. They just released gerbers, BOMs, and other documents. Some key parts are still unavailable in quantity, unfortunately.
link
dehrmann 2267 days ago
It looks like this family of ventilators is not new. It's not surprising that it uses ICs that are older and harder to source because there was never a need to upgrade them. Maybe this is on us, the tech industry, for doing a lousy job at supporting old technology and being so eager to move to the next version.
link
devy 2267 days ago
Medtronic should not be making such a big fuzz on media about "opening up design/open sourcing" their entry level ventilators consciously knowing their true intent was never meant to help others to mass produce their ventilators due to concealing mechanical drawings, software, and BOMs and no MCU for the model to support mass production.

If you know there is never a chance someone could mass produce your machine to threat your revenue, it's disingenuous at best to claim open sourcing your 15 year old modal could help for other to mass produce ventilators in the next few days or weeks (NOT YEARS!!!).

It just doesn't help in short time and in long term it doesn't matter because we need the ventilators NOW!

link
karthikb 2267 days ago
Exactly.

The press reads as if anyone with access to a factory capable of manufacturing electrical systems with custom enclosures could pull the files, place some orders, and start pumping units out as soon as their tooling was ready.

link