I have the privilege to present to you the Becker Phantom Bionic hand.

It is ultra fast, silent and adaptive.

It is more effective than any other currently sold bionic hand. And it is durable, stable, robust and extremely fashionable. It carries boxes, holds power tools, and allows me to vacuum and to iron. But ultimately it is the many little things that cause me to really fall in love with this hand.

Noise issues with other hands

The Becker Phantom Bionic hand almost completely silent and works without getting all the attention some sick loud gadgets try to snatch these days – so it really works in social settings such as meetings or parties.

Speed demo

Driving capability

From a more recent new post:

Pulling and releasing a handbrake:

Turning ignition key:

Flowers

Holding flowers with a terminal device that just cuts them in half is a no go. But now, with the Becker Phantom Bionic hand, I can finally give my partner some flowers and have that work out so well that she is happy about it. The Becker Phantom Bionic hand wraps nicely around the flowers as we can all see.

 

Camera

Holding a camera with a prosthetic arm was always a thing that many considered to be next to impossible. Not all, but many. – But now and finally, with the Becker Phantom Bionic hand, I can use my digital camera! I always liked to take photos, and now at last, I can get back to what I was always wanting to do – taking photos with my camera.

 

Reading book

Leaning back and turning the pages of a good book – and reading them – is a good feeling that I do not want to miss. Having two hands (again) with the Becker Phantom Bionic hand, things are working out for me really well. Finally, I can read a book!

 

Making coffee

With the Becker Phantom Bionic hand, making coffee becomes second nature.

And I am talking about actual coffee here – not the deplorable acid brown fluid often passed as “coffee” using coffee machines with minimalized parts. With the Becker Phantom Bionic hand, using a real Rocky grinder and conducting serious temperature surfing on a Rancilio Silvia, churing out espressos with thick cream using sticky oily almost Turkish coffee grade freshly ground beans of my choice of product, ah, there is no better. Adding milk – finally I can hold a milk bottle! – is as easy as it looks on the photos below. But enough words now.

Finally, I have my life back ; )

 

 

 

 

 

 

Driving car

At last, I can hold my keys and grip the steering wheel! Of course, holding car keys is a mandatory pre-requisite to unlocking a car and unlocking it is a mandatory pre-requisite to driving it.

The Becker Phantom Bionic hand wraps neatly around the steering wheel, grips it firmly and allows me to drive safely, and with that allows me to relax my left arm and hand. This is a great advantage that I do not want to miss any more.

Water bottle

Filling water bottles is essential. You will not live well without a filled (not empty!) water bottle if you leave the house. Depending on your health, season and climate, water may even be critical for your survival when hiking, biking or running outdoors. So lo and behold, here I am demonstrating another one of the frequently shown “little things” that “bionic” hands are so “important” to have for – filling (as the title implies) a water bottle.

The Becker Phant0m Bionic hand neatly wraps around the bottle`s bottle neck. It is now very easy to fill it with tap water, which is what I usually do. The hand does look like a real tiger though, even though I just grabbed the next best cheap plastic bottle to show you how it is filled.

So off I go, out into the heat, ready to have some water with me!

 

Summary

As I use to say, it is the many little things that make this hand stand out so much. It is also the repetitive very heavy things that keep my left arm out of harms way and away from too much overuse that are relevant over the next 5 to 10 years. But who wants to worry and think that far.  Ultimately, it is just the little things are what one can see every day.

Always remember – you read it here first. Always remember – others talk about bringing such “affordable” and “fashionable” prostheses to the public – we do it.

Hardware specifications

Becker Imperial hand by Becker Mechanical Hands.Weight -. Size -. Speed -. (specs to follow). Price around 600 USD.

Glove custom made by Centri. Semi-transparent colorless, thickness 1,5mm,  PVC, the usual specification to fit a Becker Imperial hand. Price around 100-200 USD.

Custom paint job

Acrylic paint, about 8 CHF per spray can. I spray coated the hand before getting it fitted with the glove.

History

After modifying my designs of both sockets and hands for years now (check Red Hand Series here for other design tests), I (again) had worn down another one of Centri PVC gloves a few weeks ago. No harm meant, that one had stood up for certainly 18 months or so. So I asked my prosthetic technician whether he could find a suitable semi-transparent glove for my Becker Imperial hand for me. Since summer 2011, Centri must be aware of me loving their custom made off-colors to death. And I do. So without delay it appears they agreed to make a custom 1,5mm thick (regular: 2mm thick) color-less glove. If you call Centri, just order the same I got. I am sure they can track my order – not so many people ask them for custom colors. Just for shits and giggles we also considered a Michelangelo semi transparent glove. But first of all, that glove cost 600 (rather than 100) CHF, secondly, Otto Bock may not be the company to sell sturdy material whereas I know first-hand (haha) that Centri PVC gloves fit Becker hands extremely well, they look good, and they last reasonably long. So we decided to go for the Centri glove and that is what this is. Before that, I applied a blue metallic acrylic spray coat to my Becker Imperial hand just because that was the color I wanted to be behind the semi transparent / white look.