Post by snowyh on Aug 15, 2012 17:05:22 GMT -7
Sun Jifa lost both his hands when a homemade blast-fishing bomb exploded prematurely. Unable to afford the prosthetic limbs offered by a hospital, he created his own. After the accident, Sun Jifa, 51, of Guanmashan, Jilin province, in northern China, desperately needed to work on his family farm, according to the Daily Mail. “I survived, but I had no hands,” he explained. “I couldn’t afford to buy the false hands the hospital wanted me to have, so I decided to make my own,” Jifa says.
He spent eight years handcrafting prototypes before finally creating metal hands that could grip and hold. The devices depend on a series of wires and pulleys inside, and are controlled by movements in his elbows, he said. “I made this from scrap metal for virtually nothing,” Jifa says. “There is no need to pay hospitals a fortune.” He says he will further develop the design for other disabled people. “The only drawback is that steel is quite heavy,” he concedes. “So they’re tiring to wear and get hot or cold in the extremes of summer and winter.”
Photos: news.yahoo.com/photos/man-builds-himself-bionic-hands-slideshow/#crsl=%252Fphotos%252Fman-builds-himself-bionic-hands-slideshow%252Fbionic-hands-photo-1345045308.html
He spent eight years handcrafting prototypes before finally creating metal hands that could grip and hold. The devices depend on a series of wires and pulleys inside, and are controlled by movements in his elbows, he said. “I made this from scrap metal for virtually nothing,” Jifa says. “There is no need to pay hospitals a fortune.” He says he will further develop the design for other disabled people. “The only drawback is that steel is quite heavy,” he concedes. “So they’re tiring to wear and get hot or cold in the extremes of summer and winter.”
Photos: news.yahoo.com/photos/man-builds-himself-bionic-hands-slideshow/#crsl=%252Fphotos%252Fman-builds-himself-bionic-hands-slideshow%252Fbionic-hands-photo-1345045308.html
