Frontier X5 -- New Chair Trial 1 of 3
Friday, August 7th, 2009 05:10 pmYesterday I met Mary from the durable medical equipment company. I was dreading yet another clueless salesperson, but Mary is expert. She clearly knows all the equipment and gets the kind of life I lead and what will work for me. I was expecting her to come gab and show pix and measure me, but she delighted me with a trial chair, too! It's an Australian-made all-terrain marvel called the Frontier X5. It's basically the world's most maneuverable and comfortable one-person dune buggy. I just got back from a walk in the rain. I'm blessed to have four of the world's very worst curb ramps within a two block radius of my house (oh yes, I've complained), including one where I overturned in my first chair on the second day I had it. Not only did the Frontier handle all these without a sweat, it climbed a 4 inch curb as well as tooling through a mess of mud and gravel (there's some sewer reconstruction under way). Users who spend a lot of time outdoors love this chair, and I can see why. It's reputed to handle deep snow as well as gravel and mud and rainy grass, which could mean the end to my feeling stuck in my house when there's more than 5 inches on the ground. ( Watch this Flash video in slack-jawed awe, and learn details about wheelchair economics in the USA ) I'm gonna try the "can I take it on a bus?" test tomorrow, but it's mainly for curiosity's sake: this chair doesn't make sense for me.