Impacting Designs For All!

In my Design and Engineering course, we have been learning how to be empathetic towards people with difficulties. Some examples include the elderly, people with disabilities and overall just making something even more effective. In our class, we were put to the task of being paired with a partner and challenged to pick a tool that we could possibly make better. We decided to choose a transfer shovel. It was simple but a cool tool too. Now we decided to make the shovel more comfortable towards people with back problems and also more natural at the same time. Brainstorming this design was pretty easy we just had to put ourselves in other people's shoes. Below is our design, enjoy!

 
Our research process for this project came from thinking outside the box mostly. We also did quite a bit of online research on elderly people and how gardening helps them feel better. It can be a coping mechanism to pass the time so we wanted to bring all those memories back by making a product that suits their needs. A setback that we faced was deciding on the size of the shovel itself. Since everyone is built a different way the tool may not be comfortable to someone really tall or short. So we added an extendable attachment to fit each individual consumer of our product.

Other shovels can't compare to the Transformer Shovel because we took multiple viewpoints and positions to make it. We considered people with disabilities, and also people who are getting to that older stage of life. Our product is safe and also very versatile, its blade can turn 360°. Our design provides extra grip comfort and wrist strap support. This stabilizes the use of the product and makes it even more effective. Our handle is contoured to the user's palm and fits almost perfectly. Also, our product is made out of the lightest and most durable wood, redwood.

The Transformer shovel has a simple machine of a lever. The shovel becomes a lever when you move out of the dirt. The resistance is the dirt on the head of the shovel, the end of the handle is the fulcrum, and the hand near the center is the effort. Also, the shovel is kinda making a seesaw motion as you go up and down.

Overall this project was used to make us think more broadly and engage more than one opinion when it comes to making and designing something. This wasn't a difficult task to complete but was challenging when trying to make something new off the top of our heads in little time. We eventually decided on a prototype and went with it, now I kind of want to make this revolutionary shovel.