32
R. K. Gupta et al.
are having disability in movement, 19% are with disability in seeing and other 19%
are with disability in hearing. 8% of the population has multiple disabilities [1].
Disabled persons who are physically incapacitated always face difficulty when it
comes for a driving. For a conventional car, control by legs such as accelerator,
clutch and brake cannot be operated by persons having lower disability. Today, there
are many commercial manufacturers in the market who modify vehicles for people
with double leg amputees. The vehicles with automatic gear control are available
which do not require clutch operation but these vehicles with automatic gear control
are very expensive and cannot be adopted to exiting vehicles and manual gear control
cars. Hence, when it comes to provide mobility solutions, it is necessary that driving
assistant mechanism(s) for disabled persons should be provided. There are some
serious safety concerns when the driver leaves the steering wheel unmanned. The
main safety concerns that need to be investigated are emergency manoeuvres, defensive driving and operating the vehicle in a panic situation. Disabled drivers are put
into trial by forcing them to drive with one hand, which is quite dangerous in present
day congested roads and especially during cornering.
The work presented in this paper is intended to give a mobility solution to paraplegic persons. The conventional clutch operating system (in exist car—Maruti
Suzuki 800) is modified using mechanical linkages and steel wire. The major components of mechanism include force lever, pulleys, bearings and flexible wire. The
developed mechanism has two points control of clutch by hand instead of leg so that
the driver (person with one leg disability) can easily steer with both the hands and
can control clutch with one hand (left hand with the left-hand drive cars) at same
time. Out of two controls for the clutch one is at the gear knob and other is under
the steering column. The amount of force required to press the clutch pedal has been
reduced in order to be operated by hand. This mechanism is cost-effective and can
be used in most of the cars with very little modification.
2 State of the Art
Ferro Equip and Alfred Bekker are some of the commercial manufacturers who
modify cards for paraplegic persons [2, 3]. But the designs available in the market
for hand control pedals have some shortcomings. For example, the design of Alfred
Bekker has single lever mounted on either side of steering wheel which is used for
engagement and disengagement of clutch. For changing the gear, the driver needs
to (i) release the accelerator lever, (ii) disengage the clutch, (iii) shift to the required
gear, (iv) engage the clutch and (v) again press the accelerator. All these five tasks to
be carried out with at least one hand on steering wheel [4] which is not possible by
the design of Alfred Bekker. Abdullah et al. [5] present a design of steering control of
a vehicle for disabled driver as shown in Fig. 1. A degree of rotation is measured by
the potentiometer and input to the microcontroller. The motor amplifies the rotation
to the lower steering shaft to transfer the movement to the rack and pinion directly
to the tires. The arrangement of the steering wheel, potentiometer, DC motor, rack
R. K. Gupta et al.
are having disability in movement, 19% are with disability in seeing and other 19%
are with disability in hearing. 8% of the population has multiple disabilities [1].
Disabled persons who are physically incapacitated always face difficulty when it
comes for a driving. For a conventional car, control by legs such as accelerator,
clutch and brake cannot be operated by persons having lower disability. Today, there
are many commercial manufacturers in the market who modify vehicles for people
with double leg amputees. The vehicles with automatic gear control are available
which do not require clutch operation but these vehicles with automatic gear control
are very expensive and cannot be adopted to exiting vehicles and manual gear control
cars. Hence, when it comes to provide mobility solutions, it is necessary that driving
assistant mechanism(s) for disabled persons should be provided. There are some
serious safety concerns when the driver leaves the steering wheel unmanned. The
main safety concerns that need to be investigated are emergency manoeuvres, defensive driving and operating the vehicle in a panic situation. Disabled drivers are put
into trial by forcing them to drive with one hand, which is quite dangerous in present
day congested roads and especially during cornering.
The work presented in this paper is intended to give a mobility solution to paraplegic persons. The conventional clutch operating system (in exist car—Maruti
Suzuki 800) is modified using mechanical linkages and steel wire. The major components of mechanism include force lever, pulleys, bearings and flexible wire. The
developed mechanism has two points control of clutch by hand instead of leg so that
the driver (person with one leg disability) can easily steer with both the hands and
can control clutch with one hand (left hand with the left-hand drive cars) at same
time. Out of two controls for the clutch one is at the gear knob and other is under
the steering column. The amount of force required to press the clutch pedal has been
reduced in order to be operated by hand. This mechanism is cost-effective and can
be used in most of the cars with very little modification.
2 State of the Art
Ferro Equip and Alfred Bekker are some of the commercial manufacturers who
modify cards for paraplegic persons [2, 3]. But the designs available in the market
for hand control pedals have some shortcomings. For example, the design of Alfred
Bekker has single lever mounted on either side of steering wheel which is used for
engagement and disengagement of clutch. For changing the gear, the driver needs
to (i) release the accelerator lever, (ii) disengage the clutch, (iii) shift to the required
gear, (iv) engage the clutch and (v) again press the accelerator. All these five tasks to
be carried out with at least one hand on steering wheel [4] which is not possible by
the design of Alfred Bekker. Abdullah et al. [5] present a design of steering control of
a vehicle for disabled driver as shown in Fig. 1. A degree of rotation is measured by
the potentiometer and input to the microcontroller. The motor amplifies the rotation
to the lower steering shaft to transfer the movement to the rack and pinion directly
to the tires. The arrangement of the steering wheel, potentiometer, DC motor, rack