This is the early stages of an idea. The general idea is to apply techniques used in the dairy industry for going on the past century to the lacklustre human equivalents available today. Motivated by my wife's present frustrations with the technology and my own frustrations with the profiteering in the local maternity market.

It is not too disimilar to current products available. The addition of a one-way valve on the end of the collection tube, using the vacuum inlet on the shield side, leaving the other open as a vent and it would function the same.

Rather than simply applying a pulsating vacuum to a rigid cup, which will tend to engorge tissue and cause discomfort over time, the goal is to apply a more natural alternating mechanical compression and suction. In a contemporary milking machine, this is achieved by the use of a flexible teat cup liner and two sources of vacuum, one constant and the other pulsating.

Another notable advantage of a printable design is the possibility of customization. I suspect many problems experienced would reduce to a poor fitting device. There is also a myriad of bottle thread sizes even from the same brand. Most parameters affecting the size and shape are now customizable.

Custom Delta

No

Added some extra support to reduce the worst of the overhang when printing shield side down

The plan is to use a flexible tube liner such as surgical latex tubing to act as the teat cup liner. The tube would be stretched around the internal spout of the collection tube and fastened by a suitable hose clamp or a cable tie. The other end will pass through the collection tube and hopefully stretch out and around the breast shield and be held in place by its own elasticity or another cable tie if required. The use of a liner also prevents the collected milk coming into contact with whatever low grade plastic is used for printing.

To achieve an air tight container, a suitable coating may be required. Wax comes to mind as I've used it to seal prints before, but would probably wash off during sterilisation. I'm currently looking for a food safe epoxy which will also allow for sterilization.

For the first attempt, I plan to use a commercial pulsating vacuum pump which will be split two ways. The port leading to inside the breast cup will pass the pulsating vacuum directly through, while the other will traverse a one-way valve en route to the closed collection container such that vacuum will accumulate up to the peak negative pressure provided by the pump.

First draft model made in SketchUp.

Parametrized version in OpenSCAD.