Invacare Power Wheelchair Review

welcome back to this live streaming
edition of power on we’re so glad you’re
joining us here thanks for tuning in on
this wonderful Saturday we’re joined
right now by Steve Haines
he is the sales manager retail sales
manager for 10 beginner care that’s
right
and so you are sitting in a very
high-tech NASA looking like device that
you have to walk us through it’s amazing
tell us about first of all Invacare
Invacare is a mobility senior mobility
company actually we have many many
divisions I’m in the rehab arena so I
focus on seating your mobility products
we make a lot of other products and have
many many different divisions but I’m
here today with our new TDX SP 2 that
I’m sitting in right now and this chair
has been out for about one year it’s
yeah maybe a little over a year actually
but it’s the next generation in our TDX
family we’ve got a lot of nice new
features on this chair if you want to go
through them we can talk about those or
I definitely we have to go through all
of these days okay well you were talking
about the predecessor to this model is
very popular yes that predecessor has
been around for years that’s correct
yeah and also this is the tbx SP – yeah
and the TDX SP was our original chair
actually even before that we had a TD X
3 4 & 5 which you don’t see a lot of
anymore I think I did see one earlier
today roaming around but I’ve seen
several TDX SPS and not so many of this
lease yet again because it’s a brand new
model but yeah we’re pretty excited
about it
so the SP 2 has what what what are some
of the main features that the SP 2 has
that the SP does not okay good question
first and foremost it looks a little bit
different namely that’s because the
chair is shrouded meaning you’ve got
this plastic shroud over the drive wheel
one back here over the lamps over the
taillights and the old frame was just
was painted
okay so this is black
yeah but you didn’t have these shrouds
over it he didn’t have the rear shroud
back here okay which are available in a
number of different colors but that was
based on consumer feedback we have
energy the shrouds are what it’s really
cosmetic it’s really cosmetic yeah
you can mix and match the shrouds which
is kind of cool you can get one color
here and another color on the rim insert
so we did a nice San Francisco Giants
color the other day bright orange with
the black and orange rim inserts but
again it was really kind of more
aesthetic it looks less clinical if you
will okay and so that’s kind of the
reason you’ll find most of the power
chairs today you see out there do have
some type of shroud over the over the
frame over the chassis frame interesting
and so alright so look walk us through
the features of this chair which are
going to be similar to the SB model yep
but walk us through some of the features
cuz it when I’m looking at it here it
just looks like there’s an amount of
stuff yeah which is great yeah right so
uh walk us through baby like the first
five or six really important things okay
we’re ten more minutes
come get your photos so I’m not sure is
this my microphone here that’s your bag
yeah we are lying those boards just a
little bit all right so we talked about
the shroud so that’s one thing that’s
different we have a new motor that we’re
using not just on this chair of it on
our original TDX SP which is still
available as well as our storm series
which are our rear wheel drive chairs
okay we have one called the torque
probably seen a few of those roaming
around here this morning as well so this
new motor is a sealed motor which is
different from any other motor that
we’ve had on a chair before this is
helpful in preventing water ingress when
it’s you know wet outside the old motors
had external brush caps okay these are
all internal so what that means in short
is less maintenance for
or the end user in the provider as well
there are also extremely quiet motor and
we’re pretty excited about it because of
these new advancements or these changes
it’s going to be cheaper in the long run
right I mean it’s obviously less
expensive in cost maintenance I’m sorry
and also time that it would be down yep
yeah yep
so all these small little things all add
up to something more positive for
reliability absolutely so you have that
going on is this an off-road type of
chair um that’s kind of a loaded
question offload off-road yes this chair
does very well on dirt tracks overcoming
obstacles it actually works very well
even in grass to some degree now that
said if you get in really wet grass with
some mud underneath yeah right you could
be spending you’re right yes exactly
exactly it’s it’s not gonna probably do
real well when you take it out on the
beach I mean it just doesn’t have those
big fat you know beach tires but yeah
yeah big knobby tires on it or something
like that but in terms of one’s everyday
driving yeah this chair is not designed
just for the indoors this chair is
designed to go wherever you need to go
so we have a lot of students that are
using both the T DX SP and now some of
the sp2 si here on campus and Cal and as
you know the campus is very hilly and
there are some rough spots big campus a
big campus and this chair is performed
really well up there how long is this
chair designed to last I mean with you
know regular use not something extreme
yeah it’s a good question most funding
agencies will provide new chairs every
five years that’s kind of been the norm
that’s not you know hard and fast with
every insurance government area yeah but
we have people that have been in our
chairs you’ll see
of the old rear-wheel drive chairs that
are from the mid nineties that people
are still driving now they probably had
motors replaced and maybe some other
electronics on it but it really kind of
depends on how one maintains a chair
just like a car you take good care of it
it’s gonna last a long time right that
makes sense there’s a lot electronics on
board here yes right yeah what are their
new technologies that you incorporated
into this model there are absolutely
good question
so this electronics is called links
electronics its proprietary Invacare
electronics we own a company called
dynamic controls they made all our
previous electronics the mark series
electronics if you will we also make
electronics for some of our competitors
chairs as well but the Lynx electronics
is pretty cool this particular remote
joystick and I have on here the rim 400
is a touchscreen which is pretty unique
out there in the industry as you can see
here it’s like an iPhone or an iPad so I
can swipe this between different Drive
functions ok I can name them whatever I
want this is a fast one that pretty much
tells you all you need to go there right
I’ve got my speed potentiometer right
here okay I can go into powered seating
modes this is a SL I’ve got a head array
on here as well so I can maybe drive
with a head array or drive with a
joystick in the morning maybe I’m
driving with a different alternate drive
control later in the day because I get
tired so you can have multiple drive
controls with this electronics I’ve got
lights on here here’s my
this is powered seating this is tilt
elevate you can see here so whatever you
see this I’m elevating elevating the
chair just by pushing on on this right
path my pad as you switch inside of this
pad it activates that which means you
could do it with your head if you didn’t
have access if you couldn’t use your
arms yeah absolutely so like this head
array it for someone to drive with her
head but obviously we want to be able to
activate all the functions on the chair
including our powered seating through
this is right if that’s your only option
yep
that’s incredible so the touchscreen
probably makes it easier for people that
have hand issues or you know they’re not
that they can’t push buttons or they
don’t have the dexterity but we still
swipe yeah yeah absolutely and some
people the swiping is not so easy but
you know they have better fine motor
control then there may be a gross motor
control where they can do this so I can
set this up for what’s called tap mode
as well so you’re no longer swiping I’m
using my finger to tap it I can I can
expand that tap zone if someone has a
hard time pushing on for instance this
icon right here in the lower corner yeah
I can expand that tap so as well I can
also use these buttons up here so
there’s a multitude of different ways
that you can access the same functions
that’s incredible and you guys will
offer to set it up yet for the person
well the provider so we’re the
manufacturer and we sell with my dealer
network or provider network so the
provider generally does that but a lot
of times we’ll come in and assist the
provider especially have more
complicated setups and educate them so
that they can pass that education on to
the user absolutely that’s incredible
one other feature that’s unique to the
Lynx electronics is something called my
links so now the consumer can actually
download an app called my links and be
able to access a lot of diagnostic
information through that app so in the
past they may have had a problem with
the wheelchair they had no idea what was
causing that problem they’re calling
their provider that provider comes out
and they may come
once twice or even three times because
they don’t have real good clear
diagnostic information as to what the
problem is with the chair so now the
end-user can see that information on
their app as well as the provider by
going into the cloud essentially and
seeing that same information it’s
incredible yeah again making it easier
more user-friendly for everyone yep
right the user in the chair and the
provider providing that and that’s wild
well you know what
this high-tech chair it’s great-looking
chair with everything all the new
additions in the sp2 model and are you
getting some good feedback over here
absolutely that we’re real excited about
it good we’re glad to have you here and
we’re looking forward to next year what
a spin around so you could say our
goodbyes that’s awesome and how can
people get some more information about
your company then you can go to our
website ok which is wwm you care calm
that’s our global site from there you
can go to the US home care you can
access all the invacare products not
just our power mobility but our seating
and positioning our beds or lifts all of
the products and invacare manufacturers
and the idea is to learn about it now
even if you don’t think you need it now
or you don’t have anyone in your life
who needs it now learn about it so that
you have it the back burner in case god
forbid something happens at least you
know where to go but this Expo is really
kind of a one-stop shop for all that
anyway yeah yeah great point yeah Steve
thanks for joining us yeah appreciate it
ok thank you
ah you know what we’re doing is we’re
gonna be right back with a preview of
power on episode six right after this
stick around