Protection for Fractures

Observation:

You are back from the hospital with a fractured wrist, arm, ankle or leg and a plaster cast. The cast has to stay on for several weeks and you must not get it wet! Problem : how do you keep yourself clean? Have you ever tried showering with one arm /leg out of the way of the water jet? Its almost impossible, and too much trouble.

Suggestion:

The easiest solution is to have a protection similar to that of a shower cap, so that the plaster does not get wet. However, that is easier said than done. A simple contraption that can be made at home would involve wearing a plastic bag with a rubber band to hold it in place. However, there are chances that some water will still seep through. Brown Medicals have thus come out with a product called "Active seal-tight waterproof cast covers". It works by stretching elasticated material over the plaster cast ensuring that a watertight seal is formed over the cast allowing people to have a normal shower. The only drawback: PRICE ! (The Active seals are priced at approximately $30)

Given that most people have at least one fracture in their lives, we can establish that there is enough demand and hence market for these waterproof covers. Manufacturing them cheap (in places such as India / China), could be an easy way to flood the markets with the product not only ensuring it is a big success, but also helping people live a normal life even with a cast on !!!

Plastic Bags as Garbage Bins

An easy way to maintain a clean environment is to ensure that garbage is dropped in their respective bins and not on the streets. This may seem obvious, but sadly, is not so, for lack of civic sense sometimes stems from lack of garbage bins in the city itself.

Observation:

Garbage disposal has always been a problem, not only at an individual level, but also at the level of governments. Ensuring that people do not litter the streets is possible only when sufficient grabage disposal units are provided at every other corner. But providing these big bins alone does not solve the problem. Collecting the garbage from the bins / emptying them into larger containers and more importantly, handling the potential issue of the bin itself being stolen overnight is something that requires lot of thinking. Paris (France) has done a beautiful job in tackling this problem. This post details how this has been done.

Suggestion:

The solution to the problem of garbage disposal is quite simple:

1. Instead of garbage bins, shift to garbage bags hanging from circular holders (see picture). These would be large transparent polythene bags, that are sturdy enough to hold few kilograms of garbage.

2. Ensure that the city is liberally sprinkled with garbage bags, one every 50 mts.

3. Garbage collection is made extremely simple with this design, for the bags simply need to be dumped in the trucks without the added task of emptying the bins. A new garbage bag can then be placed in the holder. This also reduces the accidental spillage of garbage from the bins that may take place when the bin is being emptied.

4. Transparent bags provide easy visibility to the contents inside. Apparently, this model was adopted in Paris after a bomb scare in the garbage cans. Transparent garbage bags also overcome the potential problem of bombs / undesirable objects being hidden inside.

5. Last, but not the least, these garbage bags hardly require much investment or infrastructure. Placing them liberally all across the town / city would instead bring down the additional cost that would otherwise be incurred in keeping the city clean.

Garbage bags thus seem a sure-shot way to clean up the city automatically, develop civic sense in people, make garbage collection a far easier job and also bring down the cost of keeping the city clean. So, go ahead and spread this idea in your own city and make it clean!

Log and Garden-Spade Benches

This post is inspired by my recent visit to the "Tulip Gardens - Keukenhof" in The Netherlands, and motivation by a dear friend who suggested that I re-start my blog after a long hiatus. So, here is a design for a seating facility that is simple, yet so creative, and blends really well with the surroundings.

Who doesn't like to sit in the garden and bask in the Sun? Not many of us have that kind of luxury. But for those who do have, this design is really simple, very friendly (no use of plastics), innovative and at the same time, blends very well with the backdrop of a nice, small garden / park. The log of the bench can be that of an old tree that has practically reached the end of its life cycle, and the back-rest of the bench can be made out of the three-pronged garden spades, with the prongs fixed to the log, and the handle serving as the back-rest (see picture) . The spades sticking on to the log gives a rustic, rural feel to the entire design. The seats are not only easy to make but as the spade handles are well rounded, they are safe for children as well.

To sum, small gardens / parks can easily be equipped with log benches that not only serve the purpose well, but employ a design that is creative, stylish, simple and also extremely practical.

Reusable Cloth Bags To Replace Polythene Bags

The credit for this post goes solely to my good friend Nandini Paniker. She wrote to me about the reusable cloth bags in response to an earlier post of mine titled "Multi-compartment Shopping Bags". Her idea is as follows:

Observation:

Vegetables and fruits when bought from the daily vegetable market, or even the supermarket, need to sorted later. This not only is an added burden on time and energy, but is also quite a monotonous task. The other alternative is to use 'Plastic / Nylon Covers' which again is not advisable from an environmental point of view.

Suggestion:

Nandini suggested carrying cloth bags to the markets, which would be extremely helpful in segregating the groceries right from the point they are picked up. The cloth for these bags need to be really thin, so that they can be directly put into the refrigerator, and the vegetables can have ample ventilation to breath.

Citing example of her mother, Nandini also suggested that these cloth bags can be readily made at home from old saris. My mother, too, on hearing this idea has made many such bags, and is having a much simpler time sorting vegetables every week. (A photograph of the bags that she stitched is uploaded above) A sample bag can be given to the local tailor, who can then churn out such small bags out of the surplus cloth left after stitching. It would not only lead to an increase in his revenue, but will also help people become more aware of the environmental issues related to use of plastic.

Thanks Nandini for a brilliant idea!

Increasing the efficiency of Pedi-Cabs

The "Cycle Rickshaw" or the "Pedi Cabs" is a very important and basic means of transportation for the common man, especially in developing countries. Not only does it provide pollution free means of conveyance, but also one that is affordable. The only place that it may really lag when compared to other means of transportation is the speed.

It is estimated that close to 2 million cycle rickshaws ply on Indian roads, carrying about 6–8 billion passenger / year. The exact number could be even greater, since there are no reliable records available. In some cities and small towns, they are the major means of transport. They provide employment to more than two million rickshaw pullers, are maneuverable, completely non-polluting and hence an environment-friendly means of transport.

Observation:

A normal pedi cab, as shown in picture, would have a speed of about 10 km/hr. The driver sweats it out in the Sun, gets tired due to the laborious nature of his work, but is still not able to earn enough since the rickshaw does not achieve the desired efficiency.

If I understand correctly, the height of the rickshaw body has a direct effect on the speed and efficiency of a vehicle. If the height is decreased, the torque decreases, the stability increases, and hence the speed increases. Bases on these observations, there are a few suggestions.

Suggestion:
In an attempt to bring back the glory days of the Cycle rickshaw, the structure of cycle rickshaw needs to be changed.

1. The early models used to weigh over 120 kgs, but this can be reduced to 90 kgs by means of an integral tubular frame that has excellent structural qualities. The weight can be further reduced by a fiber glass body which is so popular in VELO TAXIS (Germany).
2. The provision of a multi gear system specifically designed for rickshaws will give the rickshaw driver a tremendous advantage. He will gets less stressed and can ply more in a day without harming his health.
3. Most importantly, reducing the center of gravity by lowering the seating area of rickshaw or peddy cab would not only improve the stability of vehicle, but also increase efficiency. Independent studies on the rickshaw drivers plying these modern rickshaws have shown that they can ply them for a third longer and average earnings have gone up by close to 60%. Not only this, the speed of these rickshaws would greatly increase from 10kmph to 15-20 kmph.
   

A live example of the disparity in designs of Rickshaws can be seen in the pedi cabs of Delhi and that of Nanital. The ones in Delhi are built much higher off the ground, and hence are much slower. On the other hand, the ones playing on the roads of Nanital are faster due to a minor change in design.

A lot many variations have already been proposed for Pedi cabs, right from having a small motor, to solar powered ones. A lot of work is already being done to improve the Pedi Cabs. However, until the time VELO TAXIS or its equivalent is introduced in India, steps can definitely be taken to improve the efficiency of Rickshaws by a simple lowering of the foot board and the seat , making the lives of drivers much easier and better!

Multi-Compatment Shopping Bags

An idea that my sister came up with while shopping for vegetables in a weekly market :

Observation:

The only reason why I use plastic:

When I buy vegetables like okra, beans, green chilies etc., plastic bags come in very handy ensuring an ease of putting things away without first having to go through the painstaking task of separating each type. I recall the time when I newly returned from Germany, and after seeing their care with reusing plastic, I made my mother go to the market with just a cloth bag. We came back with a week’s worth of green veggies and to my mortification the greens were so well mixed together that it looked as if they were meant to be that way. My sister couldn't help chuckling at my musings and commented that it is the law of physics, entropy of the universe…dodging the potato that I threw at her. It took me larger part of an hour to separate and stock our refrigerator.

I wanted to apply methods that have worked somewhere else, without realizing that each problem has to be tackled individually. What worked for me in Germany did not work in India. My brain working in overdrive, I wanted to prove it to my mother that there had to be a better way of doing this. She had laughingly handed me the bag after getting home to organize the mess that I had inadvertently created.

Suggestion:

Necessity is the mother of all invention. I hit upon the idea that we could at least reuse the plastic bags. No sooner than I had said it , the idea seemed like a halfway attempt. It was then suddenly seeing my mom sitting at the sewing machine that I hit upon a better solution. We see plastic everywhere and reusing them also is not going to reverse a trend. What needs to be done is designing specific shopping bags with various compartments ( made out of cloth !! eureka!!) that can handle all the veggies but still make sure that nothing gets mixed up. The vendors can be given these free or at nominal costs to promote the use of such "Multi compartment Bags". Over a period of time, plastic needs to be completely banned. I wish it happens soon because I crave a country without plastic bags littered over its landscape.

A Light Source With Insect Repellent

Observation:

The light source in modern world is synonymous with a "Tubelight" or a "Bulb". However, one might have noticed how insects and moths tend to agglomerate near any light source, and that too during specific time of the year, such as fall and spring.

When the light source is inside a house, it can get very difficult to ward off small moths during specific seasons. Also, one never know if each species of these insects is harmless.

Suggestion:

The idea is to combine a tubelight with an insect repellent. This can be done as 2 devices in a combination pack, operated separately, so that the insect repellent can be switched on only when necessary. Moreover, if the insect repellent has a refill option, it provides even more flexibility.

There is already a device with a purpose as the above, wherein the light source is generally inside a cage that has electical curents passing through it. Insects such as flies that come close are electrocuted. However, this device is large and bulky, and is generally kept at entrances / lobbies. Moreover, the electrolution produces loud crackling noises. These are definitely not appropriate for the comforts of a bedroom or study area.

Thus, a light source with an insect repellent would be quite useful in areas that have high vegetation, and insect population especially during certain seasons of the year!