D4E1: Mounted Binder Storage for Walker

I feel like it is important to take a moment and explain how

we’ve come to this point and why we have made this product. During one of our projects we worked with a very energetic lady , Ms. L, who uses a walker. She was, however, a bit too energetic for her own good. This was evident in the fact that she all but destroyed the metal wireframe basket, that comes standard issue with the walker, in a crash.

Because of this, her occupational therapist has asked us to come up with an alternative for this basket that prevents Ms. L. from overfilling it, for her own safety.

For our models we have mainly used Polypropylene (PP). This is a pliable plastic that is easy in upkeep and easy to clean. It also acts somewhat like a spring. This keeps the whole of the basket under some tension, so it keeps its shape better. We used a 4mm thick sheet that was 60cm by 50cm for the standard design. The standard will fit 2 binders snugly and can be mounted on the hooks of the walker if they are between 32cm and 24cm apart. If this is not the case, or your walker does not have hooks, you may need to adapt the design. Besides PP, we also used about 2m of strong rope and a small patch of padding around the connection holes to make the basket last longer.

For tools we used a ruler and pencil to mark the template, a knife and metal guide for cutting, and a hole punch for creating all the holes. Alternative you can use a series of regular punches for creating the holes. We used 5mm and 10mm holes. If you wish to use the printable template you may want to use some adhesive spray or tape to stick the template to the PP sheet.

Checklist

o  PP sheet (60cm*50cm, 4mm thick)

o  Hole punch (5mm and 10mm)

o  (Optional: Padding)

o  2m of cord

o  Ruler

o  Pencil

o  Knife

o  Cutting guide

o  Printable template

o  Adhesive spray or tape

When you have glued the template or marked out the design, you can cut out all of the pieces and punch out all the holes.

When you have the 3 pieces, position 2 of the sheets so the edge and the holes align. 

Thread the string through the first hole and tie a knot. Make sure the pieces lie flat against each other.

To ensure a strong bond between the plates, I recommend using the following stitch.

1.     Thread the string trough the next hole.

2.     Take the thread, pass it underneath itself and pull it tight.

3.     Repeat steps 1 and 2.

4.     Tie a knot at the final hole.

This stitch ensures a tight connection between the two sheets. 

Then, fold the PP-sheets and stitch the other side while keeping the PP-sheets flat against each other.

It might help to have someone else hold the sheets together while you make the first knot.

The finished product should look like this.

If the template, or the design I have provided does not fit your needs exactly, I recommend experimenting with it. PP is a pretty diverse material that can be implemented in various ways. Some additions we found useful where straps, to connect the basket to walkers that don't have hooks.

We also experimented with the orientation of the sheets. This made the opening a lot wider, making it easier to put books and binders in the basket. It did lose out on a bit of it's strength and the books where not fixed in place while they where in the basket.

We where also thinking of using these as a wall mounted storage system.

I wanted to give a special thanks to my teammates:

Jorunn Gadeyne, an occupetional therapie student, who helped a lot with analising ergonomics and body positions.

Maxime De Rammelaere, a fellow IPO student, who worked a lot on a related walker hack, wich you can find here: https://www.instructables.com/Modular-Folding-Table-to-Increase-the-Surface-Area/#discuss

And our teachers, Lieven & Matthias, for their honest feedback and guidence. Finally, because Lieven was curious how much strain the connection could take, I did a test especially for him. It can take 6kg of weights pulling directly down (wich strains the PP worse than the lateral forces in real world scenarios) before recieving any damage at all. It took a total of 9kg before the holes started to rip and would have taken another couple kilos befor dramatic failure.

You can find more like this project on: designforeveryone.howest.be