17. Applications and implications

The purpose of answering the next questions will be to clarify the functionality of the final project.

What will it do?

Being a healthcare kit it will help people with quadriplegia, but not only, in the actions of daily life. Such as eating, reading and asking for help.

Who’s done what beforehand?

Of course projects like this have already been made in the field, especially regarding the act of eating. There are various types of devices that help the person to eat independently. In addition, there are also devices to ask for help, but at the moment not in such a simplified way.

What will you design?

A rubber thimble to facilitate the scrolling of the pages, a hand bracelet where you can fit cutlery, make-up tools or writing tools, and finally a device to ask for help, which thanks to a sensor positioned on the wheelchair will send a signal to an application in real time.

What materials and components will be used?

For the first project I will mainly use wax, silicone and PLA. For the second fabric, velcro and TPU. Finally for the third MDF, foil and the electronic part, so a board with its related components, various connectors and an external battery.

Where will come from?

All the materials I mentioned can be found in the lab already.

How much will they cost?

As for the materials and their cost, I mainly used waste materials already present in the lab, such as MDF, fabric, adhesive sheets, wax and so on. Let’s see specifically the cost of the other materials. A transparent acrylic sheet costs around 14€, but considering that I used less than half of it, the total cost amounts to a maximum of 6€. The silicone that I used Silplay 184 has a cost of about 30€ for a total of 500 g, so if I wanted I could have made 30 Deetos. The Ninjaflex TPU costs around 50€, but for my Bango pocket I have spent less than 5€ total. As for the electronics part, I used all components already present in the lab (except RGB LEDs), all purchased on Digi-Key, and I have reached a maximum figure of 20€.

What parts and systems will be made?

All parts will be created from start to finish except for pcb components.

What processes will be used?

The processes that will be used are molding and casting, 3D printing, laser cutting, electronic design and production, embedded, interface and network programming and computer-controlled machining.

What questions need to be answered?

The fundamental question is: will these items be really useful? Designing objects that you are not the user of, is always very complicated, as we are used to create things that reflect our aesthetic tastes, when in reality we should be at the complete disposal of the target to satisfy their desires.

How will it be evaluated?

The only way to answer the previous question is to EXPERIMENT, EXPERIMENT and EXPERIMENT again. There is no right or wrong way to do these projects, but the essential part is to keep trying until you arrive at a final object that is inclusive, complete, easy to use and aesthetically pleasing.