“We understand the severity of the epidemic situation, and we want to provide products. This is a real cooperation,” Ji Lan said later, who contributed to the “Maintenance Area Plan.
“I have already lived a wonderful life by leaving the ventilator to young people”-this is the entrustment of a 90-year-old Belgian who was infected with covid-19 to doctors before his death.
“It’s really going to collapse. Pull out the breathing machine for the elderly by yourself, in order to be used by young people”-this is a difficult choice faced by Spanish doctors to implement the “wartime triage principle” when treating patients with covid-19.
Under the widespread global epidemic, the shortage of medical resources in Italy, Britain, Spain and other countries has been exposed.
In Britain, in order to alleviate this dilemma, seven F1 teams, including MCLUNE, RedBull and Mercedes, were diverted to production of breathing machines. A story of “Speed of Life and Death” was staged on the anti-epidemic front.
The shortage of resources and the gap of about 20000 ventilators
on April 4, Beijing time, Michael Goff, Minister of General Office of Cabinet of the United Kingdom, introduced at the epidemic conference, on that day, 300 new ventilators have arrived in Britain from China. “I would like to thank the Chinese government for its support in this regard.”
Imported 300 respirators from China, and then counted more than 8,000 respirators in the National Health Administration. Compared with the plan previously called by the British government to deal with the spread of the epidemic and prepare 30000 respirators, the gap of about 20000 ventilators is still missing……
A ventilator may mean a life. According to BBC reports, the Penlon company in Oxford, one of the few ventilator manufacturers in Britain, produces only 750 units per year, and the maximum output will double if the time is sufficient; boyiya, the only professional manufacturer of ventilator in intensive care unit in Britain, has only 150 employees all over the world. Now it works at full power 7 days a week and its supply is very limited.
In the world, Britain cannot purchase enough ventilator support from abroad at present. The primary reason is that the global production capacity of the ventilator industry is only about 11000 units per week, and the average annual output of top ventilator manufacturers such as Hamilton is only about 15000 units.
Especially after the outbreak of the global epidemic, the ventilator production in each country is limited to meet the domestic demand, and even Siare, a ventilator manufacturer such as Italy, has been banned from export by the authorities, the government also dispatched military personnel to help expand production.
In the case of insufficient production capacity and limited overseas procurement, if Britain wants to make up for the gap of ventilator, it can only find a way to expand production alone.
Suspended the competition, and seven F1 teams launched the “maintenance zone plan”
As a result, many enterprises from the fields of British aerospace, automobile and medical industry, technology and engineering formed the ventilator alliance, in response to the government’s demand for 10000 ventilators, the pressure of ventilator shortage in the country was relieved.
In This ventilator alliance, there are seven F1 teams based in Britain, including MCLUNE, RedBull, Mercedes, Renault, Williams, RacingPoint and Haas, the equipment production lines of the factories of these fleets can help produce breathing machines as soon as possible, cooperate with experts in the medical field, and pursue the “Speed of Life and Death” in the aspects of design, manufacturing, testing, etc.
In fact, there is still a little story about seven fleets making breathing machines.
Two hours before the start of the Australian Grand Prix this season, all teams had gathered in Melbourne, but F1 officials suddenly announced that the event was canceled and the whole 2020 season was suspended.
On that day, Pat Simons, chief technology officer of F1, received a phone call from British engineer Mark Guilan. The two had an exchange of “research and development of new projects”, and just two days later, simons and Guillain had a more detailed discussion in the office.
Then, the heads of seven F1 teams, including RedBull and McLaren, held an online meeting, and everyone reached a consensus-it was time to temporarily stop competition and start cooperation, the maintenance area plan was established.
The so-called “maintenance Area Plan” is to assemble the engineering and mechanical teams of the fleet, taking advantage of the core skills such as rapid design, prototype manufacturing, testing and skilled assembly in F1 industry, assist the British national medical service system to urgently produce respiratory equipment that can be used for treatment.
“We understand the severity of the epidemic situation, and we want to provide products. This is a real cooperation”, Ji Lan said later, who contributed to the “Maintenance Area Plan.
“They are used to working in a fast-paced dynamic environment. Their ability to create digital models of devices is unmatched. They have become accustomed to this roller coaster-like development. This is why F1 personnel are very suitable for this task.”
From research and development to production, the “Speed of Life and Death” in less than 100 hours
from manufacturing racing cars to manufacturing breathing machines seems to be two completely different fields, but Gilland is very confident, f1 team “may have the best reverse engineering capability of rapid prototype manufacturing in Britain”.
It turns out that it is also true.
Since March 18, Mercedes engine production Department has joined with professionals from University College London and University College London Hospital to treat continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) widely used in intensive care patients in China and Italy. The ventilator completed the research of reverse engineering and was finally put into production.
Originally, according to the conventional situation in the past, it took 4.7 years for the new respiratory device to enter the market on average, while the cooperation between Mercedes and experts from research to production, the whole process took less than 100 hours……
With such high efficiency, Tim Baker, a professor of mechanical engineering at University College London, couldn’t help marveling, “starting from a brief introduction, we work around the clock, dismantling and analyzing non-patented equipment, through computer simulation, we further improved the device to create the latest version suitable for mass production. In view of the urgent need, we are very glad to be able to reduce the process that may take several years to complete to several days.”
And Michael Goff, the secretary of Office of Cabinet of the United Kingdom, confirmed at the outbreak conference on the 4th that a team from University College London worked with Mercedes Benz to produce a new noninvasive ventilator.
“They produced 250 units yesterday, and they also produced so much today and tomorrow, which will increase to 1,000 units per day next week.”
Currently, the new noninvasive ventilator has been approved clinically and will be produced in batches. For the seven teams in the “maintenance zone plan”, their “Speed of Life and Death” on the anti-epidemic front is still going on. Special protective masks may be the next target.
On the anti-virus track, F1 still represents the speed of human beings.