Not strange at all. Industrially made counterparts will have layer upon layer of strength, safety, and reliability requirements set down by law and the maker's liability insurer.
While for this sort of prosthetic is non-invasive so the human trial requirements will be a lot more slack than those that are, I also expect that a commercial of academic researcher will have more hassle arranging an ideal guinea pig or few (and testing requirements will include not just using a single subject).
To mass produce this, or even just to design it with mass production for general use in mind, there are many reasons why this would be much more expensive commercially. For small runs it wouldn't be commercially viable at all.
In this case I'm not surprised that an intelligent and committed amateur with a vested interest (his son) managed to produce something impressive for very little $ cost, where a non-DIY approach would be massively more expensive. Now he needs to make sure his design and process are properly registered so if someone makes millions from it he can have a cut (I'm sure he wouldn't mind individuals making them not-for-$, but a commercial entity making money after having him short-cut their design process would owe him a something).
Yes I know all this regulations, testing, security measure etc, etc..
I'm a bit wondering, in this kinds of regulated and dangerous (at least to the producer via lawsuits), how much quantity of production and consuming would start to beat DIY efficient pricing?
While for this sort of prosthetic is non-invasive so the human trial requirements will be a lot more slack than those that are, I also expect that a commercial of academic researcher will have more hassle arranging an ideal guinea pig or few (and testing requirements will include not just using a single subject).
To mass produce this, or even just to design it with mass production for general use in mind, there are many reasons why this would be much more expensive commercially. For small runs it wouldn't be commercially viable at all.
In this case I'm not surprised that an intelligent and committed amateur with a vested interest (his son) managed to produce something impressive for very little $ cost, where a non-DIY approach would be massively more expensive. Now he needs to make sure his design and process are properly registered so if someone makes millions from it he can have a cut (I'm sure he wouldn't mind individuals making them not-for-$, but a commercial entity making money after having him short-cut their design process would owe him a something).