Goose Peg-Leg Prosthetic

A local animal sanctuary has a goose named Blue with mobility issues due to a fused knee joint, and a cockeyed right leg. The right leg simply cannot reach the ground, as the joint had fused to such a degree.

This prosthetic is made so that the knee joint can rest seated in a TPU sleeve, and that TPU sleeve can be seated in a printed foot made of another plastic (I used PETG, I'd like to try Nylon soon). Because the goose was growing, there are multiple cutouts in the PETG foot and TPU leg to slide and fasten a metal pin into and make some rough height adjustments for growth until a better version can be designed for him when he is full grown.

The knee is wrapped in medical bandage to pad and protect it. This eventually erodes the TPU, as abrasion resistant a material as it may be. Bandage should be taken off and reapplied frequently, and kept sanitary. I've tried to round and fillet all the edges that make contact with the bird, but if there is any rubbing that causes a break in the skin, we don't want infections.

This is a work in progress that will require a variety of improvements (looking to imitate the typical range of goose-stepping motion). Input is appreciated.

You'll want a direct drive extruder for the TPU if you actually want to make one for a bird this size, unless you have legit tuned your bowden tube set-up perfectly for TPU. Any under-extrusion and low layer adhesion could potentially cause an injury risk.

I reverse engineered this item in Fusion360 to imitate an item from a company in America somewhere. Blue had their prosthetic, and it got ruined in the summer heat/added stress of his growth at the same time as that company was having technical issues hindering production. If you are that company, please get in touch with me for credit for the design that this imitates.

*please bear in mind that this is not only a work in progress, but this design will obviously not be suitable for all birds. Please remove it if you think the bird is experiencing any physical discomfort*

-