Ford goes to war: new partnerships with 3M, GE will have Ford workers building respirators and ventilators for covid-19 response

Ford Motor Company has gone to war before, pivoting their massive production capacity for building passenger cars and trucks to building jeeps, tanks and planes during World War 2. Now, with the Covid-19 epidemic bearing down on America’s most vulnerable people, Ford is there for America again, announcing innovative new partnerships with 3M, GE Healthcare and the United Auto Workers of America that will see Ford workers building respirators and plastic face shields to help protect our frontline healthcare workers, first-responders and store clerks, and ventilators to help save the
lives of the critically ill.

“This is such a critical time for America and the world. It is a time for action and cooperation,” said Bill Ford, executive chairman of Ford Motor Company. “By coming together across multiple industries, we can make a real difference for people in need and for those on the front lines of this crisis. At Ford, we feel a deep obligation to step up and contribute in times of need, just as we always have through the 117-year history of our company.”

Ford is currently gearing up to begin production on over 100,000 protective plastic face shields per week, and will turn the massive, high-speed 3D printing machinery the company has built up in rect years to produce components that will go into PPE, or Personal Protective Equipment, for doctors and nurses nationwide. The face shields fully protect the face and eyes from accidental contact with contaminated droplets if an infected person coughs or sneezes nearby. Paired with N95 respirators, the face shields limit the potential exposure to the disease better than an N95 respirator
alone. Roughly 75,000 of these shields are expected to be finished and delivered to Michigan hospitals in the first week, with 100,000 more produced for hospitals all over America in the weeks after that.

In addition, Ford engineering and design teams are working with 3M to ramp up the manufacturing capacity of the company’s Powered Air-Purifying Respirators (PAPR), which give healthcare workers a constant supply of fresh, micro-filtered air while they’re working with covid-19 patients or in contaminated areas. To help increase production quickly, Ford and 3M have developed designs that employ many off-the-shelf Ford parts that are ready to go, like seat-ventilation fans from the 2020 Ford F-150, paired with off-the-shelf 3M HEPA filter inserts and portable-tool battery packs that can
power the respirators for up to eight hours before they need to be recharged. Ford and the UAW are looking at moving to large-scale production of PAPR devices at one of Ford’s Michigan manufacturing plants in days, not weeks, a move that would help 3M increase production of the desperately-needed devices tenfold over current production numbers.

Meanwhile, Ford’s partnership with GE Healthcare is moving quickly to simplify the design of GE’s existing ventilators, which is used to help support patients sent into respiratory failure or severe difficulty breathing by the covid-19 virus. These ventilators will be produced at a Ford manufacturing site in coming weeks, with the goal to produce 50,000 units within 100 days and up to 30,000 per month thereafter until the crisis has passed.

“We are encouraged by how quickly companies from across industries have mobilized to address the growing challenge we collectively face from COVID-19,” said GE Healthcare President & CEO Kieran Murphy. “We are proud to bring our clinical and technical expertise to this collaboration with Ford, working together to serve unprecedented demand for this life-saving technology and urgently support customers as they meet patient needs.” Work on this initiative ties to a request for help from U.S. government officials.

At McLarty Daniel Ford of Bentonville, we’re proud to see the efforts Ford Motor Company is making in partnership with other companies to fight this disease, and we’re eager to see what else they come up with. Ford is doing their part to help America get through this, and we stand ready to do ours. McLarty Daniel Ford of Bentonville is offering a number of new shopping, service and test-drive experiences to help Northwest Arkansas and our local economy keep moving during this shutdown, including come-to-you test drives and pick-up-and-drop-off service appointments right at your home,
with strict sanitizing protocols of our vehicles developed by engineers and scientists at Ford. Check out our full selection online at our website, and then give us a call at (479) 250-0922 to set up an appointment today.