Future Work
Project Summary
The Tilt-In-Space Wheelchair successfully addresses the need for affordable, durable, and customizable mobility solutions for people with disabilities in Tanzania. The project highlights:
- Innovative slider design for tilt functionality keeping the center of gravity within 2.5 inches.
- Affordability with a total cost of $47.55. Easily reaching the goal of keeping the cost of the wheelchair under $70.
- Tiltability with user inside that reaches our reach goal of being able to tilt the user without dismounting the wheelchair.
Future Work
To further enhance the project, the following steps are recommended:
- Move the seat pivot forward to shift the center of gravity towards the front of the car, ensuring stability and preventing the wheelchair from tilting backward when reclined to a 45° angle with a user seated.
- Implementing a spring-loaded design to enhance the locking mechanism, currently a pin-based system. This improvement would simplify seat angle adjustments, eliminating the need to precisely align the pin to the correct angle. The current process is cumbersome and prone to challenges due to tight pin tolerances. A spring-loaded mechanism would significantly streamline adjustments and greatly improve the overall functionality of the locking and sliding system.
- Introduce damping for the transition from an angled to an upright wheelchair position to prevent the chair from slamming during this motion, which could pose a risk of injury to the user. Implementing a cost-effective solution, such as a spring or another damping mechanism, would ensure a smoother and safer adjustment.
- Adding a footrest that is attached to the chair. Simple to do, we just ran out of time to fabricate and attach the footrest mechanism that is already on the Kyaro design.
Acknowledgements
Special thanks to Kyaro Assistive Technologies for their support and collaboration.