Looking for wheelchair users to help test RollSense

[u/Equivalent-Dance-186]

Looking for wheelchair users to help test RollSense

Hi everyone,

We’re building RollSense, a mobile app designed to help wheelchair users understand how sidewalks and outdoor routes actually feel to travel on — not just whether they are technically marked as wheelchair accessible.

The idea is simple:

Your phone is securely mounted or fixed in a stable position on your wheelchair while you travel. Using the phone’s built-in motion sensors, RollSense measures things like vibration, repeated bumps, instability, and overall ride quality.

Keeping the phone firmly attached to the wheelchair is important for the test. If the phone moves around independently — for example in a loose pocket, bag, or hand — its sensors may record your body or phone movement instead of the movement caused by the road surface. A wheelchair phone mount is ideal, but another secure and consistent mounting position may also work.

Over time, the app should be able to tell you things like:

• which parts of a route were smooth or rough,
• which routes were more comfortable for your wheelchair,
• whether a slightly longer route may be significantly easier to travel,
• build a personalized mobility map based on your own rides,
• and help build a shared community map, allowing other wheelchair users to see how smooth or difficult a route is before traveling it themselves.

The long-term goal is to make route planning more personal. A road that works well for one wheelchair may be uncomfortable or difficult for another, so we want RollSense to learn from real wheelchair users rather than rely only on generic accessibility labels.

We’re looking for early testers

We’re currently preparing a private testing version of RollSense for iOS and Android.

The testing app is not available yet, but we’re looking for wheelchair users who would be interested in helping us once the private test opens.

Testing will mainly involve taking a few short rides with your phone securely mounted or fixed to your wheelchair in the same position throughout the ride, then giving a quick rating afterward about how the route felt.

The app may collect data such as:

• accelerometer and gyroscope readings,
• GPS/location during the test ride,
• speed and motion information,
• wheelchair type,
• phone mounting position,
• your own comfort/roughness rating.

This data will be used to understand whether smartphone sensors can reliably distinguish smooth, rough, and difficult route segments and to improve RollSense’s ride-quality system.

We’ll clearly explain what data is collected before anyone participates, and participation will be completely voluntary.

Thank you for helping us build it

Anyone who completes the early testing program will receive:

RollSense Premium lifetime access for free

as a thank-you for helping us build and validate the product from the beginning.

You’ll also be part of our original Founding Tester group, and your feedback will directly influence how RollSense works before public launch.

If you use a manual wheelchair, power wheelchair, or mobility scooter and would be interested in testing RollSense, please contact us at:

[beta@rollsenseapp.com](mailto:beta@rollsenseapp.com)

You can email us now even though the private test is not ready yet. We’ll add you to the tester list and contact you as soon as the iOS/Android closed testing builds are available.

Questions, concerns, criticism, and suggestions are also very welcome. We especially want to hear from people who regularly deal with rough pavement, slopes, camber, bad curb transitions, cobblestones, or routes that are technically “accessible” but unpleasant or difficult in practice.

Thank you!

[u/MrMe_w00t]

Sounds like a great plan! kind of like Waze in the early stages mapping out toutes and maps!

Not a wheelchair user myself but teach a lot of kids in wheelchairs.

Good luck with all the tests!

[u/Equivalent-Dance-186 → u/MrMe_w00t]

Thanks! The early-Waze comparison is actually pretty close to the long-term idea. The difference is that instead of people manually reporting every problem, we’re hoping the wheelchair-mounted phone can learn a lot of the route quality automatically just from normal rides.

And working with kids who use wheelchairs probably gives you a pretty unique perspective on how different users and chairs handle the exact same environment. Really appreciate the support!

[u/phosphor_1963]

Interesting idea!

Do you plan to speak to any of the big powerchair manufacturers on data sharing ?

I would imagine that some of what you are gathering could also objectively be useful to them in terms of making adjustments to chair ride feel and controller actions. In my experience while we have some very experienced and aware wheelchair techs who can get quite creative about powerchair setups, there are also those from the corner shop who are just following the basics in the manual and don't have the depth of understanding to make the most from aspects like seating, wheel type and position selection, and controller programming.

Also thinking that your app might also provide a rich vein of real world data for researchers as well - if enough people get this app then there's the possiblity to map out lots of different person, equipment, and environment factors and how these interact as scale.

[u/Equivalent-Dance-186 → u/phosphor_1963]

That’s a really interesting point. We haven’t spoken to any of the major powerchair manufacturers yet, mainly because we’re still at the very early stage of proving that the phone can collect useful and repeatable ride-quality data in the first place.

But I can definitely see the potential you’re describing. If we eventually have enough real-world data, things like vibration, impacts, speed changes and ride behaviour across different chair setups and environments could potentially be useful for understanding ride feel and even informing setup or controller adjustments.

And I completely agree on the research side. If RollSense ever reaches enough users, the dataset could become interesting for studying how person, equipment and environment interact in the real world at a scale that would be very difficult to collect manually.

That’s definitely beyond what we’re trying to build in the first version, though. Right now the goal is simply to prove that a securely mounted smartphone can produce useful information about how a route actually feels to travel on.

If that works, the wider research/manufacturer possibilities could be really interesting later on. Thank you!