Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!uwm.edu!cs.utexas.edu!sun-barr!oliveb!bunker!wtm From: stevev@chemstor.uoregon.edu (Steve VanDevender) Newsgroups: misc.handicap Subject: Re: BOTFOJ Message-ID: <10381@bunker.UUCP> Date: 25 Feb 90 04:55:42 GMT References: <10298@bunker.UUCP> Sender: news@bunker.UUCP Reply-To: stevev@chemstor.uoregon.edu (Steve VanDevender) Distribution: misc Organization: University of Oregon Chemistry Stores Lines: 130 Approved: wtm@bunker.UUCP Index Number: 6947 In article <10298@bunker.UUCP> Michael.Merrow@hnews.fidonet.org (Michael Merrow) writes: >Index Number: 6870 >After seeing the film "Born on the Fourth of July", if I didn't know any >better, I would have gotten the distinct impression that anybody in a >wheelchair with only lower body impairment can easily travel around >balanced only on the back two wheels. Well I just can't seem to get the >hang of it. Any suggestions (I'm using a relatively lightweight Invacare >Ride-Lite 5000 with tip-guards in the back)? Is there some trick to it, >or is it just a matter of practice? This is a serious question. I would >love to be able to get across our bumpy back yard easily this summer. It's a matter of practice. I had used an E&J tank for 13 years before buying a Quickie II, and then had the Quickie for a few months before deciding to learn to balance on the rear wheels. I let a bipedal friend play with it one day and he promptly started balancing on the rear wheels, which made me resolve that I wouldn't be outdone in my own 'chair by a biped. Now I coax my bipedal friends into my 'chair so I can teach them to balance. I pretty much taught myself to balance on the rear wheels, going only from what I knew about how to raise the front wheels temporarily. I was rather lucky in that I learned to balance without falling over backwards until a couple of months after I started practicing. Since you have tip guards, you probably don't have too much to worry about but you may want to have a spotter in case you get too far overbalanced. Make sure that your tip guards do not prevent you from balancing at all--if they are too low you may not be able to reach the balance point on your 'chair. Once you have more practice with balancing you may want to do away with the tip guards entirely, since you should find that it is very difficult to fall over once you understand how your 'chair balances. Here's a haphazard list of balancing tips from my own experience: If you're teaching yourself, try working up to balancing by pushing forward sharply to raise the front wheels until you have reached the balance point for your chair. If you have some trunk control, you can make it easier to balance by leaning backwards or bumping your torso against the backrest as you push forward. If you have enough you can even initiate balancing with a torso motion without having to push on the wheels at all except to maintain balance. You will also learn the most important safety technique for balancing--if you feel that you are going to tip over backwards, pull backwards on the wheels _hard_. That will allow you to recover from all but the most severe overbalancing. If you spend a while just getting to the balance point and then panicking and coming back down, that will ingrain this most important recovery habit. Next you will have to become comfortable with being at the balance point and even being slightly overbalanced. Knowing that you can recover, you will then have to get used to being at a point where you feel like you're going to fall over backwards, and even be able to move voluntarily to that point. The primary rule of balancing on the back wheels is that pushing forward makes you tip farther backwards, and pulling back makes you tip forwards. The very first time I practiced I started on a smooth floor, which gives you maximum responsiveness, but once you are at the point that you are trying to maintain balance for a time you may find it easier to practice on carpeting, which adds a little resistance and lets you stay balanced with less effort if you are close enough to the balance point. I would practice balancing while watching TV so that the feeling of being balanced would become ingrained to the point where I wouldn't have to think about it. It is also very important that you try to relax as much as possible--I haven't yet met a beginner who wasn't extremely tense and who would jerk back and forth past the balance point. It doesn't take much practice to find the balance point and if you concentrate on relaxing and making smooth adjustments you will soon find that it takes very little effort to remain balanced. Being able to rock smoothly back and forth past the balance point is also a good exercise. Once you have mastered these basics of balancing, it's time to learn how to move while balanced on the back wheels. An excellent test of how comfortable you are with balancing is trying to move backwards while balanced. This requires that you cycle through these steps: 1. Allowing yourself to tip backwards past the balance point (but not too much). 2. Pullling back on the wheels to right yourself, which will also inch you backwards. 3. Moving both of your hands forward on the rims. If you can move backwards like this uphill, you are a pro. Moving fowards while balanced is slightly easier since you only have to overbalance in the safe forward direction. Once you are fully confident of your ability to balance and recover from overbalancing, you should practice balancing with only one hand, or with taking your hands off the wheels (briefly) and replacing them while balanced. You should also practice turning in place while balanced. At this point you won't have a whole lot more to learn. Perhaps the last important balancing skill is being able to descend a slope while remaining balanced the whole time. This is actually not especially hard, and often feels more stable than balancing and moving on the flat because you can remain in a slightly overbalanced positon and use the drag from the wheels to keep yourself in a stable position. I find that I am much more comfortable descending steep slopes while balanced, partly because I am in a more normal sitting position, but mostly because my front wheels are off the ground and cannot become caught on rocks or cracks. Highly advanced topics for wheelchair balancers include curb hopping and dancing, but I'll leave those for a later tutorial. Next: aerodynamic streamlining techniques that can allow you to exceed 20 mph in your everyday 'chair or 30 mph in your racing 'chair :-). >Michael >-- >Uucp: ..!{decvax,oliveb}!bunker!hcap!hnews!Michael.Merrow >Internet: Michael.Merrow@hnews.fidonet.org -- Steve VanDevender stevev@chemstor.uoregon.edu "Bipedalism--an unrecognized disease affecting over 99% of the population. Symptoms include lack of traffic sense, slow rate of travel, and the classic, easily recognized behavior known as walking."