Wheelchair design in developing countries

This MIT OpenCourseWare offers selected lecture notes, examples of projects, a reading list, and links to external websites and image galleries taken from the Wheelchair design in developing countries undergraduate course taught in the spring of 2009. Also provided are manufacturing videos showing how various African workshops produce their wheelchairs and promotional and demonstration videos highlighting the designs of various wheelchairs.

According to the United States Agency for International Development, 20 million people in developing countries require wheelchairs, and the United Nations Development Programme estimates below 1% of their need is being met in Africa by local production. This course gives students the chance to better the lives of others by improving wheelchairs and tricycles made in the developing world. Lectures will focus on understanding local factors, such as operating environments, social stigmas against the disabled, and manufacturing constraints, and then applying sound scientific/engineering knowledge to develop appropriate technical solutions. Multidisciplinary student teams will conduct term-long projects on topics such as hardware design, manufacturing optimization, biomechanics modeling, and business plan development. Theory will further be connected to real-world implementation during guest lectures by MIT faculty, Third-World community partners, and U.S. wheelchair organisations.

Topics covered during the course includes wheelchair biomechanics and ergonomics, design for human use, manufacturing processes and strategies, product design, material science, mechanics of materials and welding, human-powered machines, hand-cycle designs and racing.

Special software is required to use some of the files in this course: .xls, .mp4 and .rm.

[Description and screenshot taken from MIT OCW page for this course.
(c) MIT used under the terms of their CC-NC-SA license.]

Link: http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/special-programs/sp-784-wheelchair-design-in-developing-countries-spring-2009/
Author: Amos G. Winter; Amy Smith
Publication Date: 2009-05
Source: http://ocw.mit.edu/
License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/us/
Rights: Copyright MIT. Use subject to a Creative Commons non-commercial share-alike License and other terms of use. For full details see http://ocw.mit.edu/terms/