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Fifteen years ago, FIRST<\/em> Robotics Competition (FRC) Team Steampunk 1577<\/a> started the FRC revolution in Israel. One of the founding Israeli FIRST teams, they are now leaders in their region, with over 150 alumni. Steampunk 1577 hails from the city of Ra\u2019anana, and their mission is to impact people who were not previously interested in STEM, and help them grow. They are one of the most influential FIRST teams in Israel, both with their robots and their community outreach projects. One of those projects, of which the team is incredibly proud, is their creation of a low-cost electric wheelchair kit<\/a>, designed in SOLIDWORKS.<\/p>\n \u201cThe municipal Women\u2019s Wheelchair Basketball team trained in the sports hall at our high school, Avid High School,\u201d explained team member Eden Lip. \u201cThe team captain was the daughter of our mentor at the time. Through that relationship, we were able to build a physical and emotional connection with the basketball team.\u201d\u00a0 Expanding on their volunteer work with Yad Sarah<\/a>, the largest volunteer organization in Israel, Steampunk 1577 began volunteering with the wheelchair team. The high school students learned more about the women, what it felt like to use a wheelchair, and how they lived with different disabilities.<\/p>\n The students were surprised to discover how expensive a motorized wheelchair costs\u2014over \u20aa10,000, or around $2,800. For most people, particularly those with certain disabilities, the easier-to-use motorized wheelchair was simply unaffordable. But when a problem like that is presented to an enthusiastic and engaged robotics team like Steampunk 1577, a solution will soon be found. And that\u2019s exactly what they did.<\/p>\n \u201cThanks to the knowledge we gained through FIRST, our robotics studies, and SOLIDWORKS<\/a>, we developed a low-cost motorized wheelchair kit, which is accessible to everyone, everywhere,\u201d said Eden. The wheelchair kit is made of parts found in the standard FIRST Robotics Competition Kit of Parts (KOP), along with 3D printed parts. The kit connects to a standard, manual wheelchair, the type many people have to rent. But with Steampunk 1577\u2019s design, no harm is done to the chair, and it can still bend fully and maintain its locking system. Adding the parts to a standard wheelchair is a simple way to make the chair motorized and mobile. And the kit is a fraction of the cost of a motorized wheelchair\u2014only \u20aa500, or around $143, a nearly 85% price difference.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/blog-assets.solidworks.com\/uploads\/sites\/3\/28347696_Unknown-scaled.jpg\")
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