US 7,328,080 B2 · Manufacturing methods and systems for rapid production of hearing-aid shells

Abstract

Methods, apparatus and computer program products provide efficient techniques for designing and printing shells of hearing-aid devices with a high degree of quality assurance and reliability and with a reduced number of manual and time consuming production steps and operations. These techniques also preferably provide hearing-aid shells having internal volumes that can approach a maximum allowable ratio of internal volume relative to external volume. These high internal volumes facilitate the inclusion of hearing-aid electrical components having higher degrees of functionality and/or the use of smaller and less conspicuous hearing-aid shells. A preferred method includes operations to generate a watertight digital model of a hearing-aid shell by thickening a three-dimensional digital model of a shell surface in a manner that eliminates self-intersections and results in a thickened model having an internal volume that is a high percentage of an external volume of the model. This thickening operation preferably includes nonuniformly thickening the digital model of a shell surface about a directed path that identifies a location of an undersurface hearing-aid vent. This directed path may be drawn on the shell surface by a technician (e.g., audiologist) or computer-aided design operator, for example. Operations are then preferably performed to generate a digital model of an undersurface hearing-aid vent in the thickened model of the shell surface, at a location proximate the directed path.

Claims36

Dependent claims

A method of manufacturing an in-the-ear shell, comprising the steps of:

automatically generating a first three-dimensional digital model of a surface that describes a shape of an ear canal of a subject as a 2-manifold surface having zero or nonzero functional boundary, from captured three-dimensional data;
generating a second three-dimensional digital model of a thickened in-the-ear shell from the first three-dimensional digital model;
printing the second three-dimensional digital model as an in-the-ear shell;
and
performing quality assurance by comparing at least two of the first three-dimensional digital model, the second three-dimensional digital model and a third three-dimensional digital model derived from the printed in-the-ear shell.

2 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Manufacturing methods and systems for rapid production of hearing-aid shells

Life of this patent

Manufacturing methods and systems for rapid production of hearing-aid shells

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims36