Breathe Year 1
When the pandemic hit, I found myself bored and scared. To regain a modicum of agency, I decided to challenge myself with a new project: building a vending machine for medical oxygen cylinders. I knew a thing or two about software, but nothing about hardware, so I felt that it would be a good learning experience.
I was not disappointed.
Our project started on May 4, 2019, paced by weekly sprints. Not much happened during the first two weeks. The rest of the year was documented with weekly reviews sprinkled with a few dozen pictures every week. Here are the best pictures taken at every sprint:
On sprint #3, we installed some additional electrical circuits in our new workshop:
On sprint #4, we received our CNC mill:
On sprint #5, we started the installation of our air compressor:
On sprint #6, we prepared our metrology workstation:
On sprint #7, we completed the installation of our air compressor:
On sprint #8, we organized our tools:
On sprint #9, we assembled our PLC:
On sprint #10, we assembled our frame:
On sprint #11, we cut our first chips:
On sprint #12, we designed our first CNC part:
On sprint #13, we machined our first CNC part:
On sprint #14, we completed our first mechanical assembly:
On sprint #15, we designed our robotic cell:
On sprint #16, we designed the doors of our vending machine:
On sprint #17, we designed the Breathe Dragon firefighting drone:
On sprint #18, we designed the Breathe Technik telescopic arm:
On sprint #19, we assembled our gantry:
On sprint #20, we received our industrial robotic arm:
On sprint #21, we installed our robotic arm:
On sprint #22, we installed our cable chains:
On sprint #23, we received our gas analyzer:
On sprint #24, we commissioned our robotic arm:
On sprint #25, we started the installation of cables:
On sprint #26, we mounted the controller of our robotic arm onto the frame:
On sprint #27, we started the commissioning of our gantry:
On sprint #28, we created the Breathe Technik modular system:
On sprint #29, we surveyed the future home of Breathe Labs:
On sprint #30, we continued the installation of cables:
On sprint #31, we installed our EPC:
No work was done during sprints #32, #33, #34, and #35 because STOIC took precedence.
Lessons Learned
Here are the main lessons that we learned this past year:
- Hardware development is nothing like software development.
- CNC machining is highly addictive.
- PLC programming cannot be improvised.
- Cabling is much more time consuming than it might appear.
- Everything takes longer and costs more money than originally expected.
- Breathe Technik is probably our most valuable technical innovation.
- Working alone on such an ambitious project is not easy.
- During this time of social distancing and societal upheaval, this project was a lifesaver.
- I love hardware as much as I love software.
- We are forever grateful to our investors who are making this project possible.
Happy new year!
Be safe, be kind, take care.
—Ismael
Senior Software Engineering Manager, Data Products
3 年Wow - super cool! This put a big smile on my face. Seems like you haven’t changed one bit, your side projects just get a little bit bigger. ??
Senior Manager and Director - IT, Sourcing, Operations, Risk management
3 年Impressive!! I would never think it was possible to go that fast with weekly sprints, each one having such tangible output.
Statistical Analyst, Entrepreneur.
3 年Wow this is huge! All the best with this project my friend.