This is https://jim-quinn41.blogspot.com/ Supporting the Disabled
also https://jim-quinn.blogspot.com/ World Stories
also https://jim-quinn0.blogspot.com/ Education
The following shows some of the help Ron Crumpler and I have given to disabled Individuals (over 150 helped so far, since 1999) with "designed for that specific one individual only" equipment. We do not charge for our work, and do not patent either, so anyone can use the designs for free.
RemapGlos.org.uk pay expenses, and allow each of us Engineers a choice of jobs to help needy individuals - every job becomes allocated after discussion at our monthly meeting.
I want you to know that I can design, but often/sometimes find manufacture impossible, so Ron Crumpler, a local ten year older friend in the same charity, helps enormously. His finish is always professionally very good - he has won awards with his own prepared and painted Concourse 175c MV Agusta, kept in his lounge these days, and with a Professional photo on his wall of his last Concours WIN !
Given that you now know that, he is good at making my mechanical structure better (all below are my design drawings, which we then discuss before manufacture). My software and aerothermodynamics background is not mechanical manufacture and I do not have the tools Ron has in his workshop. Mine are simple DIY with drills at tiny diameter differences and metric taps and dies in a rack, an Axminster pillar drill, and a side table in my car/motorbike garage! Ron has far more - MIG welder, Lathe, proper workshop.....
I am very person oriented, by thinking myself into the vulnerable individual's shoes, so I am the one of us to visit clients (all ages from 3 to ...... oh!) and discuss their needs, several times finding the paperwork description is nowhere near as good as the discussion finds!
This client had suffered a severe tendon damaging accident and needed help with pushing his invalid mother in her wheelchair. I decided that the horizontal handlebar was difficult for him to use, and suggested he try a vertical grip instead, which I then designed and asked Ron Crumpler to make, for me to fit. They did the trick for the client, by fitting these to the ends of the horizontal grip as shown in the picture, He was able to easily push the wheelchair up and down hills now, and kerbs too.
We agreed that wheelchair handles should always be set this way, for it made pushing easier for ALL of us - me too!
When you think about it, your hands are not naturally horizontal when "pushing straight ahead", while what we did here gave a much better natural grip, and corners so much easier, with a person onboard even more so.
Bicycle grips are horizontal sideways, and tho' your hand easily fits that "side to side" grip, there is not the big manoeuvring force available as needed for a heavy wheelchair. The bicycle handlebar is lightly pushed on one side by the rider to turn, but not much help with a heavy wheelchair because there is only sideways "sliding" really. The naturally easy "near vertical" grip helped give the strength required to turn a corner with a heavy wheelchair and occupant by pushing on that VERTICAL bar.
Hold your hands in front of you and rotate/push/pull - what is more natural for an imagined wheelchair needing force to turn a corner with a heavy person on board? Near vertical for most of us? JimQ thinks so! And horizontal? Not so good for turning strength for your hand has a tendency to "slide" away from you with no Good Grip.
Wheelchair designers NOTE please. Everybody should complain at the crude wheelchair "horizontal straight ahead" handlebar fit they all produce today!
She suffered from MS and her physiotherapist asked if I could come up with a solution for a transportable (to various locations for companionship and competition with others) set of steps for her to mount and to ride a horse, which the physio thought would help her. I discussed the case with the client and worked out the dimensions and agreed the design with Ron Crumpler for such a device, as shown below. Ron added an adjustable foot to my design, and we bought and cut up the steel and aluminium footplates, and welded it in Ron's empty garage (more space than his workshop), and took it to the client on a trailer. The original designed stand was tried, but she found she needed extra support nearer to the horse. Thus the extra frame was welded near to, but with designed clearance from, the horse's head as shown in the finally completed stand in the photograph.
I wanted to help the elderly woman with Alzheimer's, to stop blocking her lavatory with plastic nappy liners. Her son wanted something to stop the liners being washed deeply/much further into the distant (from the lavatory) squeeze pipework, requiring expensive drain clearing operations. I thought that a metal grid would be the solution. Secured below the surface (to stop the defecant from becoming dry hard and thus difficult to remove) it would help to ease the grid cleaning needed by carers, after lifting it out. I had to put my hand into the lavatory water to determine how to secure the grid and was surprised to find the rear wall was quite thin as shown. It was inserted into the bowl quite easily, and seemed to be secure. The woman's son told me a couple of weeks later that it worked well, and no blockages had subsequently occurred.
Could I join the two window handles together because her short client was unable to reach the top handle to open her window. I designed and with Ron made this bent aluminium tube and the connection strips which joined the two handles together. It was powder painted by a Nailsworth business who gave us a discount for it was for charity. The client was very happy to be able to open her window now, especially during summer she said.
The 30 stone client was unable to lift herself out of her chair without help, so her OT asked if I could help, so I designed and made this plinth on my own! on which the chair sat, and inserted 2 x 2 inch blocks to hold the chair legs in place and thus to avoid slipping off the plinth. The client was now happy that she could get out of the chair on her own, and the carer, who had previously helped her, no longer had to help.
To adapt the bike for one handed braking, I designed and Ron made the 6 inch right hand handlebar extension to match her very short arm, and I bought a double brake single brake lever off the internet, and fitted it to the left hand handlebar. It had an adjuster on one line so that the front and back brakes would actually come on and work together. The teenager was very happy and went to join her friends on rides around the hilly area.
This next photo shows a young lady who wanted to be more independent when her visitors arrived. Her carers dispensed a cup of tea or coffee to her visitors each time they came, but this young woman wanted to do it herself, and the carers thought a pump pot would do it if we could fix it for her. Ron had the idea of fixing it half way up (rare for him to join me with a client), so that the spout of the pump pot was close to the cup, and therefore would avoid hot splashes. I designed and Ron made the really splendid looking polished frame that attached the pump pot to the table. The young lady was pleased to be able to give her visitors a cuppa, and the carers only had to fill the pump pot at long intervals.
The disabled man's wife had difficulty
getting his wheelchair out of the back
of the car. I thought that a ramp would
do the job, and made it so that it could be easily lifted to put the shopping
underneath. The wheelchair slid out of
the car easily, the top of the ramp being
designed to line up with the top of the
boot sill. Unfortunately nothing could be
done about lifting it into the back of the
car, but his wife found that easier than
trying to reach into the car to lift it out
with the car boot lid in the way. The
difficult half of the lifting job was solved at least!
The elderly woman was in a care home, and was unable to reach the floor sockets which were connected to her TV, video and radio, so a carer had to switch equipment's for her. I designed and made this triple socket set which she could have on her knees, and with specifically purchased big switches she could easily turn things on and off for herself, which she did with gay abandon - excessively at first for she so enjoyed her new freedom! A carer was saved from being called at all, having been previously called at shortish intervals away from other inmates!
The client was unable to put her cup under the spout of the kettle for her hand was so unsteady, so I designed and made this board which secured her kettle in a given orientation, since the electrical connector was fitted in only one position, and the cup was slid into a positively safe position along a Vee shape at the front. The client now happily uses her kettle and cup without scalding herself!
Her scooter had been designed to use her (now arthritic) thumbs to push the levers on the right (forwards scooter motion) and her left (backwards). A single paddle was used for both left and right thumbs - her thumbs were only used to push, so the other side of the paddle obviously moved oppositely. I established that she could use her fingers in a group together, so decided bicycle brake levers would do the job, but they needed links to the thumb paddle control. So I outline designed as above, and Ron after a discussion because it was significantly 3D not the drawing simple 2D, made the adjustable threaded link and drop down bars, and I fitted the whole ensemble as shown. To make the right brake lever trigger forward motion, and the left backwards (logic for the client to be as original), the head of the scooter had to be removed and the high current connections soldered the other way around, for the paddle movement was now reversed from original by the bicycle brake lever operation. A local scooter company did that for me without charge. Local businesses were often so generous when helping the disabled....... and Brenda loved it, with a joyful shout skirmish around the car park.
The
old woman's ashcan was difficult to lift from the ground so I designed and Ron Crumpler made this
frame that clipped onto her ashes tray. The frame height was
restricted by the need to
lift the whole assembly above the refuse bin lip, for she could not lift the assembly too high, but she could not stoop far either. The client was happy,
and was photographed in the local newspaper with it!
This disabled one handed man's cooking pans were sliding around on his electric hot plates when stirring the contents. So I measured up and produced a design which was manufactured for him with Ron's welding help to my bent frame - a later pot was slightly larger as you can see from the not straight crosspiece - adjustment? what adjustment! Finished. It was held in place on the hob by short legs - see the photo - rubber protects the leg and hob.
I was able to help with a 25 year old's very poor grip, which we agreed would be tried by putting his whole fingers and thumb into tubes as shown. I obtained and cut the tubes, diameter as for finger or thumb, bent one spoon for a trial, and Ron soldered - one is shown coated with a rubbery solution obtained by Ron, which he thought would give good grip - and so it did.
Food was now easily lifted, without a carer spoon feeding! Great news.....and a second set ordered!
The young mother was prone to epileptic fits, and was scared the pram below would run away from her, so I fitted a strap to the pram, with an arm loop tube, so that if she fell, the pram would not escape. She now has more freedom, for she had been scared to walk much before.
Jim
