Kreitler, a burly, bearded man, wears workboots and carries a sheathed pocket knife on his belt. His large hands bear the nicks that come from working with machinery. He gained his early experience working on automobiles, trucks and airplanes, and he earned a degree from Ranken Technical College. He joined Washington University in 1980, and he and his staff of six have been located at the medical school since 1992, when a number of university machine shops merged into a central facility. Each development process is unique.
Some researchers bring in a machine they have purchased and ask the shop to modify it.
One such device is a Cuisinart which Kreitler's team customized so that it can be used in spraying coatings onto the time-release particles to be packed into drug capsules. Other researchers bring in a plan or sketch of what they need. Often, they'll improve the design, changing it to make it easier to fabricate. Manager John Kreitler stands in front of the machine shop's stock rack holding a piece of the M6 Heart Valve Durability Tester, a device the shop produced in collaboration with the Hilltop's School of Engineering and Applied Science. The M6 is used to fatigue-test artificial heart valves and other devices.