Week 7 Working with IcFEM

In this week we started with building of the handbike. Our objective for the handbike is that it’s adaptable to the area of Mount Elgon and also for other area’s in Kenya. The second goal is making the handbike of fewer and cheaper materials as possible. A must is that the materials are available in this area. This makes it possible for the user when something is broken, that they can repair it easily.

We thought that we could finish the handbike in one week, but we didn’t. There where a lot of difficult things. Like the drive is very difficult to make. This part of the handbike takes a lot of time to make. Also with fewer tools, it makes it very hard to make things fast and easy. It means that you have to search for alternatives for some solutions because you don’t have the tools to make it like the way you would like. But the handbike is almost finished. Only the drive needs to be finished. After that the handbike get a painting color to protect them against the weather and for the look. The painting will be done by someone in town.

In the same time that we worked at the handbike we wrote a manual about how we are making this handbike. We make a description of every part we fit together. With pictures and text we hope that we can give a clear mind about building the handbike.

Next week we will finish the first handbike and completely evaluate the handbike. After that we write our manual and than we will start with building of the second one.