This afternoon, attendees and judges at the 2010 Greener Gadgets Conference in New York will pick the winners among a host of eco-friendly, prettily designed gadgets.
If Greener Gadgets’ online, public gadget poll is any indicator, Elephant Design’s Go Mechanical Charger for cellphones is going to be a formidable contender. It currently has 6152 votes — its closest competitor has 757.
Even allowing for an online ‘get out the vote’ effort, what is it that makes the Go Mechanical Charger so appealing? Three main answers come to mind: It’s cheap, it’s geared toward the developing world, and it lets you charge phones without any outside electrical power — all you need to do is turn a hand-powered wheel. And, of course, it’s environmentally friendly.
Elephant’s spec sheet gives some background on how the product works:
One of the key innovations in the product is a unique roll on wheel that lets the user start charging while using the phone with the other hand. This is a major user advantage as the single hand operation frees the other hand.
Other significant feature included clean concave and symmetrical form, enabling a comfortable and intuitive anti slip grip for both left hand and right operation.
Prototypes were tested with the potential users [construction workers, fruits vendors, rickshaw drivers, bus travelers] that helped the team refine the design.
The Go Mechanical Charger already available and popular in India: Elephant Design says it is “available at most popular mobile phone chains.” The charger costs $8 for the base product plus $1.50 for adapters.
(images via Greener Gadgets)
