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Category: repair

Love Your Ride – wheelchair maintenance and repair workshop

Published February 6, 2025 by Liz Henry

GOAT is running another free workshop in San Francisco, at the Independent Living
Resource Center SF! In honor of Valentine’s Day we are calling it “Love Your Ride”. At this event we will test out our pilot Fix-It-Kits, which are small pouches of tools and materials, along with a pocket sized zine.

The zine has a workbook page to record useful information about your mobility device, and then goes through inspection, cleaning, checking vulnerable points like all bolts, screws, wheels, folding parts, and attachments. Collecting that info will help us construct a custom kit, with replacement bolts, tools for tightening bolts and screws, and so on.

a colorful zine and some tools coming out of a zippered pencil pouch

Free workshop to learn maintenance for your mobility gear
Wheelchairs, powerchairs, scooters, walkers, rollators, etc.

Time: Saturday, Feb. 22, 2:00pm – 4:00pm
Location: ILRCSF, 825 Howard Street – San Francisco

FREE TOOLKIT AND INSTRUCTION MANUAL

We will work with you to make a custom maintenance and emergency repair kit!
You will get to take home a small, portable bag with tools and materials customized for you.

There is also a workbook to fill out with information about your mobility device or devices.

We will look for service manuals and other information to give you as well!

Please register by emailing Brianna@ilrcsf.org with your name, phone number, and any particular access needs you have. Or you can call or text Vincent @ 415-609-2555 if you prefer that to email. We’d love to see you there!

A joint workshop by Grassroots Open Assistive Tech and ILRCSF
Liz Henry, liz@openassistivetech.org, https://openassistivetech.org
Vincent Lopez, vincent@ilrcsf.org, https://ilrcsf.org
Marisol Ferrante, marisol@ilrcsf.org, Nick Feldman Assistive Tech Lending Library

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Prototyping a free wheelchair repair kit and zine

Published January 4, 2025 by Liz Henry

I am working on a zine for GOAT “fix-it-kits”. The zine encourages people to maintain and be prepared for emergency repairs on their mobility devices. It’s a lot of fun, and I can’t wait to show the prototype to people for feedback before I make the first batch for our next workshop!

The zine has space for writing down the specifics of your device; a toolbag checklist; then tips on inspecting, cleaning wheelchairs and other gear, as well as checking all its fasteners and accessories. I wrap it up with some thoughts on Right-to-Repair and a list of local resources and communities.

The “Fix-it-Kit” is a sturdy vinyl zipper pouch with grommets that will be useful to attach the kit to the frame of a chair. It is fairly small and thin but not flat; it has space for mini tools.

small zipper bag with tools and a pocket sized zine visible inside

a couple of pages of a zine with an intro and table of contents

There aren’t really standards for wheelchair bolts, screws, and so on. So we can’t pick one basic set of tools to include in each bag. Instead, the “motherkit” messenger bag has an assortment of tools and parts, like hex keys and bolts in metric and standard sizes. These have to be individually picked out for a person and for their chair.

This motherkit will also have specific tools for manual chairs, like mini tire pumps and patches. The tiny pieces like stickers, rubber bands, washers and bolts will go into (donated) small metal tins (like Altoids tins) inside the pouch.

For the things we’re buying, I’ll be fundraising to support giving these free kits to any wheelchair user who comes to our repair, build, and hacking events!

I’ll have a list of specific tool donations we’re looking for, and will set up an Amazon wish list so people can donate new items to GOAT.

The most expensive part of this kit will likely be a small but decent quality crescent wrench, which I think is critical. Another expensive but great thing for the kit – mini rolls of gaffer or duct tape. And if people have dexterity or hand pain issues and need or want T-handle drivers for sockets, screws, and hex bolts, we want to be able to offer them.

I’ll be posting again soon with a full draft of the zine, and the parts list for the fix-it-kits.

Please donate to support our Fix it Kit and zine project!

What tools do you carry for your wheelchair, powerchair, or scooter maintenance or emergency repair? I would love to hear and to get suggestions for the zine or the fix-it-kits.

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