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Car Wash for Hands – Aaron

The “Car Wash for Hands” is a product that attempts to help impaired individuals, who only have one usable arm, be able to wash their single hand. Hand washing is something that we often overlook, and is a task that is made easy because each hand is able to wash the other. With access to only one hand, getting a sanitary all-around wash can be pretty difficult. As seen in the photos, the prototype is a sort of washing box. You get your soap in your hands from a dispenser, and then place the hand in the box. Moving your hand back and forth, you’re able to get a full scrub that reaches all areas of the hand that would normally only be possible with two hands. The prototype demonstrates the products modular design, as the main components are made to be easily taken apart for cleaning (dishwasher safe!). To keep the product sturdy we’ve added a gripping material to the bottom. In the future, the product would have more weight to it which would further help with the problem of keeping it in place.

Spray Bottle with Cloth – Rahul

The “Cloth Bottle” is a cloth and spray bottle combination product that lets a person with one hand clean their countertops with ease. Instead of having to handle both a spray bottle and a rag or towel, there is a fitted Swiffer pad that goes on the bottom of the bottle. The pad is attached by a magnet for easy removal and replacement.

Loofah on a Stick – Jay

This is a side view and a view from back. The second picture shows that people can fill body wash into the stick and thus can use it while bathing conveniently. This product can solve the problem that Frey cannot clean his body thoroughly and the difficulty of squeezing body wash.

Dustpan Shoe Attachment – Logan

“Slide”-style shoe with a [cardboard] dustpan attached to the front of the shoe.

The dustpan slopes in toward the toe of the shoe to keep debris in while walking. Held together using tape, for now. This idea will (in theory) solve the problem of using both a broom and dustpan simultaneously (requiring two hands typically)

New Idea Generation

Car Wash for Hands – Aaron

This design works similar to the previous one, however it’s key difference is its minimal use of moving parts. Instead of having rotating wipers like you see in an actual car wash, this design utilizes nylon fibers (like in toothbrushes) combined with water jets to both wash and scrub your hand. The soap dispenser mixes into a water solution that is propelled from both the top and bottom. With bristles also on both top and bottom, the user simply moves hand side to side then pulls out slowly when the heated blow dryer on the outside dries the hand upon exit.

Bottle with Cloth – Rahul

This will work like a normal spray bottle, but instead of using a cloth in your other hand, you can just use the bottom of the bottle on the surface you are cleaning. The cloth can easily be detached and washed when necessary and then reattached to the bottle.

Loofah on a Stick – Jay

There are products of Loofah on a stick, but this one we designed is especially for people with only one hand. Consider the situation that it is difficult for people with hand to clean every corner of their body and easy task like putting body wash on the loofah, this loofah on a stick can solve both these two problems easily. As long as they push the button, the body wash in the stick will be squeezed into the loofah for use.

Dustpan Shoe Attachment – Logan

“Slide”-style shoe made from recycled plastics with a plastic dustpan attached to the front of the shoe. Both the shoe and dustpan are one piece rather than separate pieces that need assembly. The dustpan slopes in toward the toe of the shoe to keep debris in while walking.

Reflection

At first, we had a difficult time finding eight new ideas and variations to build on. Since during our preliminary brainstorming stage, we came up with a lot of ideas (some good, some bad) but we were able to narrow it down to our four best ideas. After looking at the feedback we were given, we made a few changes to our designs and made them better. We also had to come up with new ideas which was difficult for us as well. However, we knew that we needed new ideas because unfortunately during our research phase we did not see that one of our ideas was already invented. In the end, we put our heads together and thought of another few ideas and built on them by bouncing ideas off each other and narrowing it down to what we thought were the best ideas.

So far our final concepts look promising, some of them seem difficult to prototype (the car wash for hands) but if we get creative enough it won’t be too much of a problem. The other ideas seem easy enough to prototype and it will be interesting to see how they turn out.

As mentioned earlier, the main concern we have is prototyping the car wash for hands. It is a complicated idea that has a lot of moving parts in it (water, soap, dryer, etc.) and each part needs to be timed out to be used at the right time. Obviously it would be hard to implement all of these parts in the prototype, but at least having the dispensers ready (without the timing component of course) is something that we would like to work towards. Overall, we have some good ideas going and hopefully, we end up in the right place and continue making improvements on our ideas.

Team Concept Generation

Here are some of our ideas. The ones we circled are the 5 ideas we chose to move forward with for our presentation.

Individual Concept Generation

We each came up with three ideas during our individual brainstorming section. We tried to come up with one solution from each problem area.

Step 1: Create a Persona

Step 2: Create a Mindmap of problems

Step 3: Identify Problem Areas and Solution Goals

1. House
   1. Problem Area: Cleaning the house with one arm.
   2. User Needs: The user has to keep his house clean while being efficient with his time.
   3. Solution Goal: All in One house cleaning tool that can be used with just one arm.
2. Body
   1. Problem Area: Cleaning the body with one arm
   2. User Needs: Being able to take care of his body, from putting in contacts to bathing
   3. Solution Goal: Sanitary cleaning of the body and personal hygiene.
3. Clothing
   1. Problem Area: Cleaning your clothes/getting dressed with one arm.
   2. User Needs: Being able to get dressed appropriately with clean clothes.
   3. Solution Goal: efficient and sanitary cleaning of clothes/ efficient dressing in clothes.
4. Appliances
   1. Problem Area: Washing the dishes with only one arm
   2. User Needs: Being able to wash all of the dishes in the sink
   3. Solution Goal: Efficient and effective dish-cleaning

Step 4: Problem Statements

1. House: With one hand, it is nearly impossible to clean around the house, and when it is done, it takes way too long to clean well.
2. Body: Doing a shower with only one hand is possible, but very difficult to clean every corner of the body. Besides, it would be time-consuming as well.
3. Clothing: It is difficult to manage dirty laundry/ dressing in clothing with only one arm.
4. Appliances: It is next-to-imposible to wash a sink-full of dirty dishes with only one arm.

Step 5: Reflection Statement

At times, it was difficult to empathize with someone that has just one arm since we all have two, but that is some of the challenges most designers face when coming up with ideas on how to improve the lives of others. As a team, we have decided to focus more on the hygiene aspect and how it may be difficult to clean certain areas with one arm. Our four areas within hygiene are the house, body, clothing, and appliances. Each has something to do with how we live and carry out our day-to-day lives. A lot of the time, taking care of these four areas is done without thinking. We shower every day, do laundry, clean the house and its appliances frequently.

However, it is considerably more challenging for individuals with just one arm. Think about it, of those four problem areas, how often are you using both hands to clean? It’s likely that all four of these tasks require the use of both hands quite frequently, some tasks may even be impossible with just one arm. As we move forward, we hope to learn more about what one-armed people can do well, and how they go about accomplishing tasks that would normally require two hands.

Getting feedback from the rest of the class was very helpful as well. At first, we had two main ideas that we wanted to focus on: hygiene and video games. After receiving this feedback, it was clear that we needed to focus on just one topic. We ended up going with hygiene because we thought it would be more relatable to the average person, and we would have more to talk about (the four problem areas mentioned above). Overall, this is has been a good experience learning about the challenges that one-armed people have to deal with on a daily basis and what we can do to help make their lives a little easier.

This picture shows how I folded a t-shirt with one hand. As you can see, it is not folded well as it has wrinkles and creases and is uneven in general.

This time I folded the shirt with both hands and it looks much better.

I tried putting on a hoodie with one hand but had a hard time fitting my large head into the small head hole with one hand.

In this picture, I attempted to sweep the floor of my kitchen. As you can see, I tried to be a little creative and use my foot to hold the dustpan in place, but it was not ideal and I spilled dust and crumbs everywhere. 🙁

In these pictures, I took two typing tests to understand how losing a hand would impact my typing speed. My initial two-handed speed was 87 words a minute, where with only one hand my speed was cut by more than half to only 27 words a minute.

One of our tasks was one-handed gaming. For this task, I used a controller and attempted a claw grip style, something that physically impaired gamers often use. The change was so drastic that it was virtually impossible for me to play like I would with both hands.

In this photo, I tried putting in contact lenses. The hardest part about doing it with one hand was opening the container and getting the contact out. Actually putting it in my eye with only one hand was relatively easy.

I found it extremely difficult to wash my hands with only one. The only easy part was using the faucet- applying soap and lathering all with one hand was really tough and took quite a bit of time. I do not think I did a good job.

I also found it tough to get a new trash bag liner wrapped around the lid of the bin. I ended up having to actually get in the trash can in order to get it placed around the lid.

But I’ll tell ya, nothing was more infuriating than trying to open a jar one-handed. I couldn’t even do it.

In this photo, I was trying to tie my shoes with only one hand. But it is literally impossible to do that.

Cutting vegetables with one hand was easier than I thought, though the vegetables were everywhere cause I couldn’t hold it. But at least it is possible.

Folding toilet paper with one hand is pretty easy. To be honest, I sometime would do that if one of my hands is holding my cell phone.

Our team consists of Logan Wolfe, Aaron Auerbach, Jay Peng, and Rahul Mansukhani.

Our Team Members:

Jay Peng:

Hi everyone, I am a junior, major in philosophy and minor in astronomy and entrepreneur. My hometown is Sichuan, the city where cute pandas are! But I grow up in Shanghai, China and I love both cities. I am really glad to meet my teammates and I believe we can create something amazing together!

Logan Wolfe:

I am a business finance major in my fourth year, minoring in entrepreneurship and innovation. I am from Dublin, Ohio.

Rahul Mansukhani:

I am a senior majoring in finance, with a specific interest in investment banking, with minors in business analytics and entrepreneurship. I am from Lewis Center, Ohio.

Aaron Auerbach:

I am also a senior finance major, minoring in entrepreneurship from Dublin, OH.