My Professional Portfolio

The list below are a few specific examples of projects/skills that I have completed while being professionally employed.  In the highly regulated medical industry it can sometimes take multiple years before my efforts are publically disclosed.  The examples shown below are the result of hundreds (sometimes thousands) of engineering hours to ensure that they will be safe and effective when used during orthopedic surgeries.
I was responsible for making a series of knee instruments more minimally invasive friendly.  I worked to gather feedback on how to make the instruments better and then updated the CAD models and prints.  I then worked with the prototype shop to make metal parts for evaluation.  All of these changes culminated into the LPI (Low Profile Instrumentation) instrument set.  All of the instruments in this instrument set are used for a Primary Total Knee Arthroplasty (TKA).  I became very familiar with familiarizing myself with knee joint anatomy and biomechanics.

The key aspects of the project were:
  • Ease of use -- the easier the instrument was to use, the quicker that step of the surgery could be performed.  The best example of this was the "Mauldin tool".  It was a simple and easily manufactured design that wouldn't be susceptible to wear over time.
  • Lightweight, but robust -- the previous versions of instruments were significantly heavier and larger in size.  This was causing problems for the people that had to sterilize the instruments inside the instrument trays and they were just simply over-engineered.  A massive part of the project was identifying opportunities to reduce significant weight while still being able to hold up to the repeated beatings and impactions during a typical surgery.
  • Cost of manufacturing -- in the orthopedic market, instrument sets typically do not have any increased revenue benefits and are usually given away free.  This continues to put increasing pressure on reducing the cost of instrument manufacturing.  A major component of this redesign was to lower the cost of manufacturing as much as possible.  Design for Manufacturing (DFM) techniques were heavily utilized to achieve lower costs.
This hip cup was made by the additive manufacturing process.  I was a major contributor on the team to learn and implement the technology that made this implant.  I was also involved in designing and creating the porous structure that makes up the implant.  This is the first of a series of releases of the implants in this system.  The link above goes into further detail about the technology and the development of the implant.

The key aspects of this project were:
  • Implementation of disruptive technology --
I was the lead engineer on a complete mechanism redesign of a group of shoulder implant instruments.  I helped redesign the existing instruments to make them more "US friendly" since they were originally designed for the European market.  I did everything from concept design and conceptualization, generated all of the 3D CAD models, engineering prints, tolerance analyses, FEA, building metal prototypes, conducting tests, transferring the design to production manufacturing, and more.  These instruments are currently being utilized in the field today.
As the lead engineer on evaluating the hip implant system I conducted FEA analyses on the implants to help determine worst case.  I also created a comprehensive test plan that gave specific details as to which implants to test and the quantities needed.  In addition, I oversaw the fabrication of prototype samples.  I wrote testing protocols to detail out how to perform the test.  I conducted the mechanical tests (including programming the MTS machine), analyzed and organized the data, and wrote the final testing report to summarize the conclusions.  The results from the prototype testing were used to make final adjustment to the implant system before going into final verification testing.  Tests that I performed on the MTS machine included push-out of the liner from the shell, torque-out, and lever-out of the liner from the shell.
I was the lead design and development engineer for a leading German orthopedic OEM on their extramedullary tibia cutting guide.  The assembly was a truly unique design to create because the assembly does not have any coil sprints of any kind.  Cleanability was a huge concern by the customer so I had to come up with more creative solutions to meet the objectives.  All of the components come completely apart and only assemble back together one way.  The construct also has 12 degrees of freedom that had to be accounted for.  This was a fun engineering problem to solve!
Direct Metal Laser Sintering (DMLS) and Electron Beam Melting (EBM) are the leading technologies for metal additive manufacturing (AM).  AM is defined as the process of joining materials to make objects from 3D model data, usually layer upon layer, as opposed to subtractive manufacturing methodologies such as milling.  I’ve had the opportunity to gain a deep understanding of these two technologies over the last 8 years including preparing the virtual models to be made, operating and maintaining the machines.  More importantly, I’ve taken a more strategic role of making the technology profitable.  This includes creating quoting templates, process flow diagrams, and identifying resource requirements to achieve a sustainable process.