Looking for any additional info on this 1968 design for an Army Emergency Respirator. There is an effort to design a new, low cost respirator to help in the COVID-19 response. This design is the basis of one of the proposals, little-to-no information has been uncovered thus far outside of this PDF. https://wartimes.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/AD680197.pdf Rare 1965 Prototype Harry Diamond Labs Respirator — AGENT GALLERY CHICAGO
Elegant. Thanks for posting. " Developed by Henrik H. Straub, an aeronautical engineer at HDL, the respirator is essentially a bistable fluid amplifier. It consists of a lucite block with machined channels and a cover plate screwed or cemented in place. Reportedly, it performs well on humans and animals. Breathing gases are supplied to the respirator through the power nozzle, forming a turbulent jet. Uneven gas entrainment from the two control nozzles, one connected to the face mask and the other open to atmosphere, causes the power jet to attach to one of the walls. When the jet is exhausting to the left receiver, the breathing gas is forced into the face mask and lungs of the patient. The face mask pressure increases, causing flow through the feedback line to the left control nozzle. At a predetermined mask pressure, the entrainment of the left side of the power jet is satisfied, and the jet is switched to the right wall. The power jet then exhausts to the atmosphere through the right receiver, allowing the patient to exhale. The pressure in the feedback line now decreases below atmosphere, due to entrainment of gas from the face mask, until the control pressures are sufficiently unbalanced to switch the jet from the right to left receiver. "
Clearly I'm no doctor. But it seems to me that when treating people with breathing difficulties, there is a range of equipment that could be useful depending upon the needs of the individual. e.g. from a simple mask attached to an oxygen tank, to a fully blown ventilator/life support system. So I think its a good idea to explore equipment designs that may provide help to moderate sufferers. I found an interesting project on GitHub that may be of interest to you: jcl5m1/ventilator
Yes, but for this virus specifically, which results in pneumonia in serious cases a ventilator is the mechanism that can mean life or death. There aren't very many of them at hospitals. This project (I'm sure there are others) is exploring a great number of designs and generating proposals. If you're interested in that aspect of it check out the link below. As this particular ventilator was a military design I thought I would reach out to these forums to see if there were any records of usage, or any additional information really that could qualify or disqualify the design. http://projectopenair.org
