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Whenever I come across an article about walking robots for the military, I am asking myself: What about walking-chairs as a replacement for wheelchairs? Could t

Whenever I come across an article about walking robots for the military, I am asking myself: What about walking-chairs as a replacement for wheelchairs? Could that be a realistic solution to the access problematic? I am an absolute layperson regarding robotics. Can perhaps anybody with some background explain, what to expect here in the next few years?

ska 5y ago
It's not exactly my area but I have some related experience. I suspect the big problem with this is power use. A standard issue wheelchair is very efficient on reasonably smooth and flat surfaces. Beyond the obvious problems with e.g. stairs, you can get around ok using just arm muscle power in lots of places. This efficiency helps also if you can't use your arms or the slopes are more challenging. Reasonably sized and weighted batteries can extend your scope a huge amount in very practical ways. As soon as you get away from wheeled locomotion though, the power needs become much more problematic. Not to mention the system complexity is orders of magnitude higher than a basic chair, with all that entails. So short story, I wouldn't expect any significant impact in the next few years. It's possible that for some very specific use cases you'll see a bit more robotics in assistive technology. It's also possible that we'll learn some good tricks from robots about negotiating particular obstacles (e.g. curbs) which can be retrofitted to "dumb" conveyances and improve things...
paledot 5y ago
No. My wife is paraplegic and we did in fact test a rudimentary exoskeleton at one point. The reason they don't work is because the mobility she misses the most is the ability to transport a cup of coffee from the coffee maker to her desk, or the ability to go for a jog. It's the little things that have the biggest impact, and no one is going to don an exoskeleton to wear around the house. Furthermore, the drive to overengineer mobility solutions crashes headlong into the world of manual wheelchairs. Manual wheelchairs are like road bikes: the best ones are the smallest, lightest-weight ones (often made from the same parts and materials). They have as few parts as possible, can turn on a dime, and can be lifted one-handed into the passenger seat of a car. A walking device of some sort might be a better equivalent to an electric wheelchair for someone with quadriplegia, hemiplegia, muscle spasms, or generalized weakness, but here you have the problem that many electric wheelchair users are at high risk of pressure sores. There's a reason that electric wheelchairs have all sorts of fancy recliner features: sit in any chair for 16 hours a day without the ability to shift around and you're going to do some pretty serious damage to whatever your weight is resting on. An exoskeleton necessarily holds you in a more upright position, putting more weight on fewer body parts. The solution to the access problem is to build ramps and lifts.
- ddingus 5y ago
  Anything more than a couple PSI over a couple hours comes with tissue damage risk. That is not very much. People who are not limited in some way are very unlikely to appreciate those hard facts. I didn't, until some professional work brought me into awareness.

ska 5y ago

It's not exactly my area but I have some related experience. I suspect the big problem with this is power use. A standard issue wheelchair is very efficient on reasonably smooth and flat surfaces. Beyond the obvious problems with e.g. stairs, you can get around ok using just arm muscle power in lots of places. This efficiency helps also if you can't use your arms or the slopes are more challenging. Reasonably sized and weighted batteries can extend your scope a huge amount in very practical ways. As soon as you get away from wheeled locomotion though, the power needs become much more problematic. Not to mention the system complexity is orders of magnitude higher than a basic chair, with all that entails. So short story, I wouldn't expect any significant impact in the next few years. It's possible that for some very specific use cases you'll see a bit more robotics in assistive technology. It's also possible that we'll learn some good tricks from robots about negotiating particular obstacles (e.g. curbs) which can be retrofitted to "dumb" conveyances and improve things...

paledot 5y ago

No. My wife is paraplegic and we did in fact test a rudimentary exoskeleton at one point. The reason they don't work is because the mobility she misses the most is the ability to transport a cup of coffee from the coffee maker to her desk, or the ability to go for a jog. It's the little things that have the biggest impact, and no one is going to don an exoskeleton to wear around the house. Furthermore, the drive to overengineer mobility solutions crashes headlong into the world of manual wheelchairs. Manual wheelchairs are like road bikes: the best ones are the smallest, lightest-weight ones (often made from the same parts and materials). They have as few parts as possible, can turn on a dime, and can be lifted one-handed into the passenger seat of a car. A walking device of some sort might be a better equivalent to an electric wheelchair for someone with quadriplegia, hemiplegia, muscle spasms, or generalized weakness, but here you have the problem that many electric wheelchair users are at high risk of pressure sores. There's a reason that electric wheelchairs have all sorts of fancy recliner features: sit in any chair for 16 hours a day without the ability to shift around and you're going to do some pretty serious damage to whatever your weight is resting on. An exoskeleton necessarily holds you in a more upright position, putting more weight on fewer body parts. The solution to the access problem is to build ramps and lifts.

ddingus 5y ago
Anything more than a couple PSI over a couple hours comes with tissue damage risk. That is not very much. People who are not limited in some way are very unlikely to appreciate those hard facts. I didn't, until some professional work brought me into awareness.