Jeff: You know, I was one of the naysayers, and have found that the suspension thing taking away from power is such a myth – I’ve always been so hard core about performance that I thought that anything that took away from putting power into the wheels would be a bad thing. One of the first things that I insisted on in the design phase was the ability to lock out the suspension, either with a solid link or a shock with a lockout. Christian incorporated that into the design, humouring me, but to be honest with you, I almost never lock my shock out now. It helps so much with my lower back pain and spasms that I’m a total convert. The only time I lock it out is when I go to the gym to lift weights or when I have to lift something heavy in real life. Even going up hills I leave it on, because with the adjustable damp and rebound, I’ve got it set so that it only fully engages when I go off curbs or other drops; otherwise, it only gives me a little bit of relief from everyday bumps and so on – just enough so that my back isn’t freaking out all day.

Christian: I told you so.

Jeff: I’m going to be polite because we’re being interviewed.

Honestly though – can you think of another vehicle that doesn’t have suspension? I mean, even skateboards have suspension, and there’s a reason for that – suspension makes everything more efficient.

Christian Bagg: Well, first of all, if it’s a “game”, then we should all play by the same rules, right?

The thing that bugs me the most about it is the lack of consistency – some of the weights are with wheels, some without, some with accessories, some not, so it’s really almost impossible to compare different products on the market. And at the end of the day, every industry where weight is an issue is the same – everyone exaggerates to try to make their product look lighter.

Look at the bike industry, where 10 grams makes a difference in people’s minds – they actually have web sites likes weightweenies and slowtwitch that debunk the advertised weights of bike frames and components.

Jeff Adams: When we went through the initial concept design phase, we identified three areas that we wanted to attack with a mind to be the best in the business – adjustability, modularity, and suspension. Weight wasn’t even on the radar in any real way. We knew that by using custom extrusions and an overarching minimalist concept that we would get to where we needed to be comparable to the other chairs on the market, simply because the tubing that they use isn’t butted or optimized for weight – this proved to be true, because a completely stock MARVEL M1 without wheels comes in at just under 13 pounds.

Christian: Going back to my point about comparing weights in a consistent way, remember that a Marvel MARVEL M1 comes stock with a solid seat and a solid back AND suspension. I double dog dare you to find another chair on the market with those three things that weighs in at anywhere close to that.

Jeff: We’re really trying to not play the “weight game”, but we did go through a bit of a gut-check exercise. We weighed the last chair I bought before we started manufacturing, around a year and a half ago – it was a TiLite ZR, which I ordered with a solid seat from their factory, and outfitted it with a solid Jay back. I modified the back to reduce weight by taking out the angle adjustability.

Christian: Sorry to interrupt, but this is a great example of what we accomplished with the MARVEL M1 – in the past, you would have to choose between adjustability or light weight – that’s why Jeff modified the back – the benefit of the adjustability just couldn’t be justified at the cost of two or three pounds of brackets and clamps. With the MARVEL M1, you can have your cake and eat it too – we’re hitting weights that are comparable to the lightest chairs on the market, but we’re fully adjustable over a dozen key measurements. You don’t have to choose between either a light chair or an adjustable one – the MARVEL M1 is both.

Jeff: That’s exactly right, and that ties in to our philosophy of letting the rider choose, and giving them the luxury of changing their mind about measurements at any point, and for any reason – going back to the weight comparison that we did, I also ordered carbon side-guards, again installed at the TiLite factory – the only other component that I installed was that I added a pair of Rogue fenders. So the TiLite ZR was totally factory spec, but for a Jay back and the Rogue fenders.

We put my TiLite on the scale, and it weighed in at 14.35 pounds.

I now ride a totally stock MARVEL M1, which comes with a solid seat, back, and side-guards. I added Rogue fenders, and my MARVEL M1 tips the scales at 14.95 pounds. So apples to apples, we’re a little over half a pound heavier than what is seen to be one of the lightest chairs on the market, and one that is sold heavily on the benefits of it being light-weight.

Christian: Except that the ZR is their least adjustable model, and your MARVEL M1 is fully adjustable, has suspension, and when you take your chair apart for loading into a car, the component parts weigh less than the total – so the wing weighs just under four pounds, leaving you with just over ten pounds for the frame and seat.

Jeff: Right, except for that. Why do we always have to end these things in an argument?

Christian: I mostly blame you. You’re very difficult to get along with.

Stock Marvel M1 without sideguards or wheels weighs in under 13 lbs

Jeff’s old Ti-Lite ZR with a TiLite solid seat, TiLite sideguards, Rogue Fenders, a Jay Backrest, and a custom weight reduction (Jeff removed the back angle adjustability to reduce weight)

Jeff’s TiLite ZR as described weighed in at 14.35lbs

Jeff’s Marvel wheelchair with solid seat, sideguards, Rogue Fenders, a Jay Backrest…… AND its fully adjustable, AND includes adjustable rear suspension… AND includes independent front suspension… AND quick-release dis-assembles into 4 ultra-light pieces… AND MORE TO COME!

All this and yet Jeff’s Marvel chair weighs only about a half of a pound more.

Christian Bagg: Titanium is a really interesting material, and one that I considered in the design phase; one of the first things we did though was a survey of the bike industry – the reason we did that was because there has been a hundred years and millions of dollars of investment put into bikes, and the industry is so competitive that the technology that survives has been well vetted and proven in testing and in real world use.

What we found was that titanium had its fifteen minutes of fame in the mid-nineties in the bike industry, but faded as better aluminum processes and carbon technology came to the forefront.

We build our aluminum frames using custom extrusions and profiles, and heat-treat the weldments – that is both our frame and the castor wing assembly – to aerospace standards, which makes them incredibly strong.

The problem with the way other manufacturers are building their titanium frames is that the tubes aren’t butted – butting is a process where the tube is made to be thinner in some sections and thicker in others, like near the welds. None of the titanium frames on the market currently use that technology, which is why if you compare titanium frames and aluminum ones from the same manufacturer, the weights are often the same.

Christian Bagg: You’re right – a lot of people have tried to make suspension work, with varying degrees of success. We’ve hit it on a new level, using some existing bicycle technology, and applying it to the wheelchair scenario in a unique way. We took a DT Swiss shock (and more recently a an X-Fusion Shock), which is the top shelf of bicycle shock technology, and fit it to our wheelchair geometry just right – it has adjustable damp and rebound, as well as being fully adjustable for rider weight. This set of configurable elements is a first in the wheelchair world. We also suspend the seat, not the wheels and frame – a big problem with suspension in the past has been that as the suspension engages, the front castors are pulled out of alignment, so as soon as the user sits in the chair, the geometry of the front wheels is out. The other thing that we made sure of is that the suspension doesn’t add any weight to the chair.

Jeff Adams: And we added a torsion bushing to provide independent front suspension. This dampens vibrations, keeps all four wheels grounded except in the craziest of terrain, and makes the chair “bomb-proof”. There is a great video clip of our chair in our test lab that illustrates the independent front and rear suspension:

Christian Bagg: We really tried to make the Marvel Wheelchair different than the other chairs available – and believe me, it was hard to do that! We looked at the other offerings on the market, and saw a lot of similar design – Kuschall was the last real innovation in the industry, and they came out in the mid 80’s – right now, everyone is building essentially the same thing, some of them using aluminum, some using titanium, but really, it’s the same thing.

The Marvel Wheelchair brings a bunch of new elements – the idea that the chair should be modular and adjustable, and that a custom fit is possible within the modularity and adjustability, and most of all that delivery should be possible in a reasonable time frame – not months or weeks, but days. If someone is sitting and waiting for a wheelchair, they should be able to get what they want and need in a very short period of time.

Jeff Adams: I’m most excited about the way that we’re going to be able to provide equipment to kids – I feel really empathetic to the prescribing authorities and the sales people who are genuinely trying to do their best, and get people into the kind of equipment that will let them live their lives to the utmost potential. Those people are in a really difficult position, because the reality of the funding equation is that the chair that they prescribe and sell has to work for a number of years – when you’re talking about a pediatric population, that means giving them a chair that they’re going to “grow into”, which usually means a chair that’s too big for the user for a number of years. The Marvel Wheelchair eliminates that issue, because it’s adjustable – which means that it will always fit perfectly.

Christian: The Marvel Wheelchair also has a removable front end that uses a torsion bushing to give it dynamic suspension, and also gives the user the option of switching the front end for another one. We have an off-road front end in development and testing right now, and we’ll be offering a carbon fiber front end.