Friday, May 29, 2009

Go Alan!

Watch video

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

iBOT article released today

Read it!

Sunday, May 24, 2009

About the iBOT test flight incident...

I'd just like to say that I do not believe the iBOT malfunctioned when it when down my porch steps. I believe it was 100% user error. On top of that, I was very impressed that the iBOT did not tip over, and was in no way damaged.

I'd also like to say that although my wrist still hurts at times, I would take my iBOT and a wrist that hurts for the rest of my life over a painfree wrist and no iBOT.

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Getting the iBOT back on the market

Dean Kamen and others are working to get the iBOT back in production.

From Alan T Brown's blog:

I met with Dean Kamen and we discussed our game plan for getting the iBOT wheelchair made again. We know that we are both totally committed to make sure our goverment understand how the iBOT changes peoples lives who use the chair and the people around them.

For more, see his blog here: http://alantbrown.blogspot.com/

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Two weeks after my iBOT flight

The bruise is mostly gone. I still have some wrist pain though. Strangely, the pain seems to be getting worse. I think I've been using it too much lately.

I talked to IT today and they said that they came up with nothing conclusive about what happened. Things get recorded in the black box only when in Balance, 4WD, or Stair Climbing. I was in Standard when it happened, therefore there wasn't anything in the black box about the incident.

I guess I'll never know for sure, but I'm 99% sure that when I got stuck on the threshold, I pushed the joystick forward thinking it would give it more power to get over the bump. When it suddenly became unstuck, it had that command stored up and it carried out what I had told it to do. I'll have to look in the manual to see if there is any warning about this. If there isn't, there should be.

The other possibility is that the dog leash got stuck on the joystick and pulled it forward. This is highly unlikely, especially considering the fact that I didn't run into my dog at all during the incident. She was on my left side, I went to the right. Had her leash been caught, it would have gone to the left, not right. I'm certain she was on my left side because had she been on the right side, I most definitely would have run into her.

Live and learn. I do not plan on anymore flights in my current iBOT. Maybe the next generation of the iBOT will have flying capabilities! :D