Toyota Donates Disinfecting Machine To University of Waterloo

Monday, 31 August 2020 05:35

Prototype disinfecting machine made by Toyota Motor Manufacturing Canada (photo submitted)

When Toyota Motor Manufacturing Canada stopped production during the pandemic, engineers start working on other projects. At the Cambridge plant they developed a disinfecting machine.

WOODSTOCK - Toyota Motor Manufacturing Canada has donated a prototype disinfecting machine to the University of Waterloo.

The machine was designed and built by engineers at TMMC in Cambridge. Medical Director at UW Dr. Clark Baldwin says developing new, effective ways to sterilize PPE is one way to control the spread of COVID-19 and we look forward to continuing the development of TMMC’s prototype.

"It looks like the application of this UV treatment for sterilization purposes is going to be quite safe, no residuals, no chemicals, but that it will be very effective in killing the coronavirus. I would say that we're looking at it from a health care perspective, but the implications are beyond that."

TMMC’s machine uses Ultraviolet C (UVC) light, an effective means of sterilizing PPE and other tools. A reflective chamber is equipped with several UVC lamps. Contaminated items can be loaded into a portable, wheeled rack and rolled inside. Once the door is secured using special safety-rated latches, the machine exposes items to UVC light for approximately five minutes to disinfect them.

Professor Bill Anderson from the Department of Chemical Engineering says the initial testing will help identify potential opportunities for modifications or improvements.

"These might involve changes to the rack materials or layout, to achieve specific purposes or to accommodate certain items."

TMMC engineers developed the machine in partnership with two area companies. Prescientx specializes in UVC technology for the medical industry, while JMP Solutions is a controls integrator with whom TMMC has enjoyed a long working relationship.

Senior Engineering Analyst Fred Huard says they started this project during the company layoff.

"When we suspended operations at our plants in March, our Assembly Engineering Group was tasked with developing a method to improve our ability to disinfect PPE and tools within the plants."

By the time the team was ready to move from prototype to mass production, TMMC’s plants had reopened with new, rigid infection control processes. Huard says these proved to be very effective and it was decided that the machines would no longer be required in the plant.

"That said, we had done all this work to create the prototype, and we felt that someone else might be interested in developing it further."

In December, 2019, TMMC made a $2.1 million investment to launch the Toyota Engineering Innovation Challenge at UW.