BUILDING A BETTER HOCKEY PUCK FOR THE BLIND C
omedian Mike Simmonds is not joking when he says that designing a better hockey puck for the blind is like solving a Rubik’s Cube. “It’s a puzzle, for sure,” says the Saskatoon resident. Simmonds, 49, played goal until his early 30s, when diabetes took his sight first in one eye, then the other, and he switched to playing hockey with other blind and visually impaired individuals. The key to “blind hockey” is the puck, which is larger and moves more slowly than a traditional hockey puck and— most importantly—emits noise.
and identifying potential problems” says Anthony Voykin, who heads up the project team. “Once we have [developed] a prototype, he comes over and we all go down to the gym and shoot the puck around. He gives us some very good feedback.” The team has also involved second-year students in the project, having them experiment with designing circuit boards for inside the puck. By January 2015 the team had a promising prototype. Made using a custom-built mould, the puck has a rubber shell, with a metal tube inside to house the electronics. “It has the same feel that an NHL hockey puck has,” says Voykin, but it emits noise. “If someone takes a shot at it, the noise changes,” he says. “It will beep a little bit faster, enabling goalies to pick it out as it’s flying towards the net. As well, when it’s stationary, it still makes noise so the players can find it.” The team soon made a set of seven prototypes, in time for a test run at Ryerson University in Toronto in February. There, at the former Maple Leaf Gardens site, Simmonds and 75 other athletes, aged 14 to 82, competed in the third annual Courage Canada National Blind Hockey Tournament. “There’s a lot riding on this,” says Simmonds. “It’s definitely worth waiting for.”
Simmonds has played with three different pucks for the blind over the years, including one fashioned from a plastic barbecue wheel with piano pins inside. With the assistance of an auto body specialist, he even helped develop a steel puck containing ball bearings. None of the pucks was ideal so, convinced there was room for improvement, he approached Saskatchewan Polytechnic in 2014. Six faculty and staff from the Electronic Systems Engineering Technology program took up the challenge, supported by $23,000 in funding from Sask Polytech’s Office of Applied Research and Innovation. In their experiments, they’ve used everything from oscilloscopes and CAD software to a reflow oven (for soldering), sheet metal sheers, a 3D printer and a vacuum pump.
Faculty member Michael Lasante is part of a six-person team in the Electronics Systems Engineering Technology program that is designing an audible hockey puck for visually impaired players.
“Mike has been a mentor to us, helping us with our prototypes
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