Important for night time safety and visibility, and lots of fun!
There are so many ways to do this, but let me start with these guys. I made sleeves for my wheelchair’s arms and attached LEDs encased in ribbon to them (for both of my chairs). This makes the LEDs soft, protect and removable in seconds!
My Instructible with step-by-step instructions on how to make these is here.
You can of course also use zip ties and glue to attach lights to your chair. Black zip ties are cleaner and easier to remove if they work with your chair while glue leaves a residue. I used glue on my old chair but I’m not going to use any glue on my new chair.
The picture to the right is with a single string of LEDs. I later added a second string (top picture). The daylight picture lets you better see the actual sleeves themselves.
Below is my old everyday chair. You can see that I used zip ties to attach 2 different strips of LED tape around the base of the chair, leaving it loose in the back. The sizing and the construction makes it seems like it was designed for this. It also has the same sleeve lights as the chair above with the batteries and some extra LEDs in the under-arm pouch.
In the picture below you can see where I have the batteries for the light strips that go around the bottom of the chair as well as the little ones for the footrests. The bottom parts of the big ones (the battery case lids) are strapped with velcro around each one to hold them in place. When I need to change the battery I take off the velcro, slide the case open and replace them. I could also have run the lights differently and just put them in a bag in the back, but this way I have easy access to the controls. The little coin LED strings for the feet are glued down. I used to glue down the whole strip, but these die so easily it’s not worth it and the glue looks terrible after a while.
These smaller lights with coin style batteries around the footrests of my chair help stop people from running into my feet when they are raised (constant hazard). They are attached with E6000 glue. These really don’t last long but people crash into my feet so often otherwise that it’s worth it.
I attached the same smaller strings of lights on each wheel (again with E6000). The glue looks less neat in daylight, but with everything lit up it does look nice with the wheels spinning. *I wouldn’t do this again because they come off easily and the glue looks terrible later.
Note– always use E6000 outside, preferably when the wind is moving. It is toxic and for people with higher sensitivities may not even be an option. *I am getting a new chair and I won’t use ANY glue on it. It comes off and looks bad when it gets old/dirty. The base done with zip ties and velcro and the sleeves are plenty.
There we go! One well lit chair!
My Wandering Wheels 