Changing the height of your footplate is kind of a hassle. On most wheelchairs chairs, you have to torque on some small Allen bolts and then get to whacking on it with a hammer if it hasn’t been moved in a while. Then you have to hope you can get both sides even and the bolts tight enough that nothing slips when you start wheeling over rough ground.

But what if your wardrobe contains different kinds of shoes, with different heights of soles and/or heels, and you want to maintain a comfortable seating position? Recently, we got this question from our reader, Cyndy McLean:

“Have you heard of a chair hack to assist with adjusting a chair foot plate? I have a lightweight chair and it is ridiculously difficult to adjust the foot plate height. I, like many ladies, have a good shoe collection and each has a different heel height. Wheeling without the height appropriate isn’t great. Any ideas? Perhaps adjustability for three sizes — flat, small heel, 1-1.5 inch heel.”

We hadn’t heard of anything, but what about you? Do you know of a good gear hack for easily adjusting a footplate to fit a variety of shoes? If so, maybe it will appear here.

If you have any brilliant ideas or solutions, please comment them below, or email me at smcbride@unitedspinal.org The world of fashion-forward wheelers thanks you!