Tuesday, June 30, 2015

Wheelchair Programming for Bowling Success (with Video)

As THIS post from October explains, I got a new chair last year and it has taken a fair amount of time to program/test/tweak settings that I like for bowling.

I bowl about twice a month with other local wheelchair users (we call ourselves the Central Florida Quad Squad) and I am also unable to change the programming for the different drive modes on my new Permobil C300 wheelchair. Long story short, my wheelchair guy and I set up two similar-but-different bowling modes that I thought I would like. But I have been blessed that my new chair has not had too many issues, so I have not had a lot of appointments with my wheelchair guy, and again, bowling just twice a month… that combination results in a slow process to fine-tune the programming for bowling.

But I think we finally have my chair set up to where I can drive/bowl well using my sip-and-puff controls to direct my chair.

The key is to be able to drive slowly, and make minor turns/adjustments as you approach the foul line with the bowling ball atop your IKAN Bowler®. More specifically, the forward speed and acceleration need to be slow, as do the turning speeds. I have tried accelerating and driving fast, and doing so does not add much speed to the ball (at most, users can increase the ball speed from roughly 6.0 mph to 7.0 mph) and it's not worth the loss in accuracy. Driving slowly and in control is best for bowling.


EDIT: here is a video of me bowling on July 11, at our Quad Squad outing…
 

If you have any questions, or would like to see my actual programming speeds for bowling, feel free to contact me.

Bill Miller :-)
C1-2 Quadriplegic with a 255 High Bowling Game
Co-founder of Manufacturing Genuine Thrills Inc. d/b/a MGT
Business website: http://www.ikanbowler.com
Personal website: http://www.lookmomnohands.net