Tank Chair, the off-road wheelchair that goes anywhere

14 hrs.

John Roach

For anyone who loves the outdoors and relies on a wheelchair to get around, there?s a new ride in town: the?Tank Chair, which uses rubber tracks and a high-torque electric motor to go where few wheelchairs have gone before.

The Tank Chair was invented by Brad Soden, who was driven to get his nature-loving wife back outdoors after an accident limited her mobility.

The chair looks like something you might find on a battlefield, which isn?t too far off given that Soden spent time with the U.S. Army in Desert Storm, the 1991 Gulf War, and drew on his experience with tanks there to help build the device.

Only, the Tank Chair is fossil-fuel free and low noise, making it compliant with most campground rules, Soden notes?on his website. But that doesn?t mean it?s a wimp. The chair easily rolls over sand, mud, gravel and snow and even fords streams up to two-feet deep. You can even control it with your head. See below.

Soden?s wife is now able to enjoy family camping trips, even go on hikes with her children. Other customers have found use for the chair as a working machine in wheelchair unfriendly environments including ranches and farms. The video below shows one customer using a Tank Chair to do farm chores.

For more information, check out TC Mobility.?

? via Technabob?

John Roach is a contributing writer for NBC News Digital. To learn more about him, check out his website. For more of our Future of Technology series, watch the featured video below.

Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/futureoftech/tank-chair-road-wheelchair-goes-anywhere-1B5941634

lakers news rachel crow rachel crow steelers browns va tech dan gilbert david stern