His
name is Mike but Mike seems like a Larry to me.
For
the past week or so my charity but making weird noises and they
become louder and louder and sometimes scaring me like something
horrible is going to happen to my power chair at any moment. I just
had the chair worked on so I couldn't figure out what could be the
problem. So when my brother came over to actually work on my backup
power chair I had him look at my current chair he eventually found
that my right rear caster did not seem to be turning. I had been
making plans the back of my mind for a couple weeks to get over to U
A T F which used to be the CreATE(The program from Utah State
University which are utilizes disability equipment and makes it
available to the public.) I had somehow flattened one section of my
front caster so that every time the wheel spun around I was subjected
to a “clunk”. This really jarred my teeth and actually were me
out. I'd spoken with Tom the guy who runs the joint and he said he
would or could replace the caster for $15. I figured well why not
replace the one caster find out what was wrong with the other
Monday
was a nice day for me, I'd had a fairly good experience with my home
health person was showering etc. and I was set to start the day..
When I got to UATF I was initially disappointed because Tom was on
extended Fourth of July holiday. I really wanted to change that
caster if nothing else. Skinny dude older not as old as I got older,
I thought was a volunteer, was all by himself listening to rock 'n
roll in Tom's stead.. He informed me Tom is gone but he be willing to
work with me what I needed. Almost immediately we had some kind of a
bond. We spent a good 20 minutes trying to figure out what the noise
was on my chair until he finally realized the back caster had seized.
At last the Off the housing and the bearings had seized and no longer
turned and each time I forced the wheel to spin there is a giant
cracking sound from the ball bearings being forced to move. I didn't
understand this exactly I thought it was the wheel that was not
spinning around and around of what is actually was it was the axle
that held the wheel onto the chair perpendicular, that's what it
seized up. There is no way for me get out of my chair and I sure
didn't want Mike to try to lift me but we figured out a system and a
way to lift the chair up to one side and put bracing under the frame
allowing Mike to change out the one caster and then work for an hour
to not only free the other caster from it seized condition but then
have to manufacture materials to get the bearings functional again. I
don't know what Tom would've done had he been there but I don't think
he would've put the work into the project that Mike did so I was
really fortunate Mike was on the job today and Thomas gone.
We
talked for some time it was fun I enjoyed visiting with Mike. He
should charge me $15 at least for the caster he replaced. However,
Mike said he did not how to do this and that I could take this up
with Tom when Tom got back from vacation and I plan to do just that..
It felt wonderful driving my power chair out the door and out to the
bus stop with no “thump thump thump”. I was really pleased to
have the horrible screeching noise gone as well best of all I enjoyed
powered my chair top speed with the wind blowing through my hair –
– what little there is – – and thinking of my new friend Mike
hope that he really works out with UATF…
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