W3-3.0 CSU Home Modifications Resource

OCC204
Enabling Strategies: Working with Assistive Technologies
Introduction
Home modifications are an integral skill for occupational therapists and a rewarding area of
practice. This resource provides an overview of home modification processes including roles
and responsibilities, technical drawing conventions based on Australian Standards
(AS1100.101-1992 (R2014) - Technical drawing - General principles and AS1100.301-1992
(R2018) - Technical drawing - Architectural drawing), and information about using and
calculating scale.
This document has been prepared for use by Charles Sturt University occupational therapy
students as an adjunct to subject content. Please do not alter, distribute or copy without
permission.
Contents
Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 1
Definitions and terminology ...................................................................................................... 1
Drawing your own plans ............................................................................................................ 2
Tips when surveying and drawing ............................................................................................. 2
Technical Drawing ...................................................................................................................... 3
Dimensions................................................................................................................................. 4
Scale ........................................................................................................................................... 5
Calculating scale ......................................................................................................................... 6
Using a Scale Ruler ..................................................................................................................... 7
Making decisions about modifications ...................................................................................... 8
Definitions and terminology

Modifications
 A modification is an alteration to a property which enables the occupant/s to engage
more efficiently and/or independently. This may involve the removal of physical
barriers or additions to the original structure.
Minor Modifications
 Generally, these are lower-cost, non-structural works such as floor-fixing a toilet frame,
fixing grab rails or installing a threshold ramp.
Major Modifications
 These are more complex, high costing schemes such as the installation of ramps,
level-access shower facilities, installation of a through-floor lift/stairlift or the addition of
an extension to the property.
 Funding for major adaptations may be available through a range of agencies, depending
on the person’s situation and eligibility. A quality report from an occupational therapist
with clear, well-justified recommendations is often vital for successful funding
allocation.
Content based on notes originally prepared by Cath Doman, Senior Occupational Therapist, Ferndown Social Services.
Revision and additional content by Trina Phuah Page 1 of 9
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Drawing your own plans

The purpose of technical drawing is two-fold:
1. As a tool to gather information on the available space and to determine what will fit
where.
2. As a means of communicating your recommendations to service-users, contractors,
funding bodies and other professionals.
You do not need to gather detailed structural information on a building. That is the
responsibility of the contractor/s who complete the job. It is useful to be able to make notes
about general structural features (e.g. brick vs weatherboard exterior, internal wall and
floor surfaces). It is also possible to add predictions about additional detail using the best
evidence you have around you. For example:
Walls: tapping them will tell you if a wall is solid or hollow. Hollow sounds will indicate a dry
lined wall or stud partitioning. If you knock along a wall, you may note a change in
sound. This is where the solid parts of the structure are. The thickness of the wall at
door and window opening can also give an indication of its structure. It is also
important to include wall thickness in your plan.
Floors: again, tapping is a good indication as to construction. A hollow sound indicates a

wooden 'suspended' floor. A solid noise will indicate a concrete ‘slab’ floor. Visually,
in the case of new properties, it is more difficult to determine - floorboards can be
used above concrete floors for cosmetic reasons.
Important: Your role is to assess the environmental and functional needs of the person and
provide advice to that effect. It is not your role or responsibility to specify the type of screw
used, determine whether a grab-rail is fitted securely or if there is an electrical cable or
water main under a wall or floor surface. That is the professional responsibility of the
contractor completing the work. Always remain within the boundaries of your role and
expertise and if you are not certain, always seek advice.
Tips when surveying and drawing

Points to remember when measuring:
 Be clear about what you need to measure (don't survey an entire house if the
problem area is the bathroom).
 Be clear where you are measuring to and from.
 Keep to the same unit of measurement: the building industry uses metric, so it is
useful to talk the same language.
 Keep your tape measure taut and straight. Use a long, (at least 5m) metal tape
measure and measure as accurately as possible.
 Put the date, name and address of the service-user on every piece of paper.
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 Before you put pencil to paper, decide whether you need to draw a plan,
elevation(s) or both to show all the necessary information - only draw as much as
you need.
 Keep your drawing in proportion: squared paper will help with this. Do not attempt
to do a scale drawing on site. Proportion and noted dimensions will be adequate.
 Start the drawing with the corner of the room and on the corner of the paper.
 Keep enough room on the paper around the drawing to add the dimensions and
think about where the dimensions are going to go. Avoid crossing dimension lines.
 Photographs can provide a useful record (particularly 'before' and 'after' shots).
 Generally avoid 3-D drawings. They are difficult to draw correctly and can be hard to
read. Contractors are used to reading 'flat' (2D) drawings. A 3D computer-aided
design (CAD) image may be useful to convey the planned works and discuss options
with your client.
 Only show detail in your drawing that is absolutely necessary: e.g. a tap head can be
indicated by a cross and there is no need to show the actual shower head: the
position of the riser rail will do.
 Before you leave, check that you have all the required measurements. It is better to
have too many measurements than not enough. You do not need to include all of
the measurements in your final drawing.
 When you have finished your drawing, try to look at it as if you have never seen the
actual room, area or building - do you have all the information you need to
undertake the work?
Technical drawing
There are several components to a drawing:
Perspective
i. Elevations: The view from directly in front of a wall, generally outside, but also inside
to indicate heights (e.g. basin, grabrails), the appearance of kitchen units etc.
ii. Floor plans: Horizontal, ‘birdseye’, or ‘top view’ to show the layout (at each level if a
multistory building). Typically drawn at 1200mm above floor level. Details may be
superimposed e.g. ceiling lights.
iii. Sections: Vertical slices through a building or structure, to show construction details
and also the relationship of different levels.
Title block
This is usually located in the bottom right-hand corner of the drawing, with a margin of at
least 10mm from the corner of the page. The following information should be included:
Address/Location: Identifies the property and may also include the client’s name.
Drawing title: Conveys the perspective used and other details e.g. ‘Original bathroom
floorplan’; ‘Proposed bathroom floorplan’; ‘Elevation of front door’.
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Date and signature/initials: To identify when the drawing was prepared and who it was
prepared by.
Scale: The mathematical relationship between the drawing and the real thing. Include the
statement ‘Do not scale from drawing’.
Drawing number: To clearly indicate how many drawings are provided for the project.
Sheet size: Specifies the size of the page used and is important to include to ensure scale is
retained if the drawing is copied.
Technical notes: Should be used to provide additional information e.g. ‘all measurements in
millimetres’; ‘do not scale from drawing’; type of floor surfaces; any additional explanatory
notes.
An architect's plans will also have their own practice name and address, and may include
revision dates to identify when the plan was altered during the design process.
Example title block:
TECHNICAL NOTES: CLIENT: Betty and Geoff Parsons

- All measurements in mm LOCATION: 68 Round St
- Do not scale from drawing PARKDALE VIC 3721
- [additional notes as needed e.g. TITLE: Main bathroom: Proposed floorplan
flooring etc] DRAWN BY: DATE:
SCALE: 1:20 O
DRAWING N : 2/4 SHEET SIZE: A4
Dimensions
Any drawing, whether to scale or not, must have clear and accurate dimensions shown on it.
These are the indicative measurements the contractor will work to.
In the field of environmental adaptations, measurements are particularly important. A

centimetre in the wrong direction could render the adaptation useless for the person.
e.g. a wall-hung shower seat incorrectly fixed to the wall: too low could mean that the
person is unable to independently transfer on/off the seat and fixed too high could
mean that they are at risk of falling off as their feet will not be placed securely on the
floor.
It is very easy to make a drawing unreadable and confusing by poor dimensioning. The
following guidelines should prevent this:
 The written dimension should be on top of the dimension line, preferably in a central
position.
 The dimension should be expressed in millimetres (or metres for very large areas,
e.g. outdoor environments). Use a consistent unit of measurement within each
drawing and not mix metric and imperial measurements.
 Indicate the unit of measurement in the title box e.g. ‘all measurements in
milimetres (mm)’ – this means that you do not need to write the unit for each
measurement on your drawing.
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 Keep the dimension lines away from the drawing – start at least 15mm away if
possible.
 Try to position dimension lines on the side closest to the object in the drawing.
 Plan your drawing in pencil first, to ensure you have space for the dimension lines.
 Use lighter projection lines to clearly relate sections of the drawing to the
dimensions.
 Generally have shorter dimensions labelled closer to the drawing.
 Avoid overlapping dimension lines: separate them by at least 10mm.
Example
600
1300
500
200 Not to scale
500 750 600
All measurements in millimetres
1850
 Use the same format for indicating the beginning and end of the dimension.
Note: do not use filled arrowheads when drawing by hand as they can
be inconsistent and inaccurate. They are acceptable in digital drawings.
The options in the first examples (above) are preferred as they are clearer than the markings below
where the line beginning/endings are placed inaccurately and/or obscure the points being measured
Scale
It is not possible or practical to draw architectural plans the same size as the real thing.
Images are therefore reproduced to scale, that is, as a fraction of life size. Scales are written
as a ratio. For example, a ratio of 1:20 conveys that every one unit on the page represents
20 units in real life. This means that the real life object is 20 times larger than the drawing.
Scales of 1:50 and 1:100 are typically used in the building industry. That is, the drawing is
one-fiftieth (1/50) or one hundredth (1/100) the size of the real thing. The other way to look
at it is that the real thing is one hundred or fifty times bigger than what is drawn on the
page.
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Occupational therapists often use a scale of 1:20 for individual rooms.
On occasions when it is necessary to provide more detailed information, larger scales may
be used e.g.: 1:20, 1:10 or 1:5. Sometimes a 1:1 scale is seen. This means that the drawing
and the actual part of the building shown, is exactly the same size. 1:20 is a useful scale to
use when looking at an individual room, rather than the whole layout of the building.
The higher the second number of the scale, (1:100; 1:1250 etc) the smaller the picture and
the less detail shown.
Any drawing that you produce should be labelled with a scale or 'not to scale' accordingly. If
there is a note saying 'not to scale', it means that the drawing was not drawn to any
particular scale. It is therefore not possible to determine approximate proportions,
circulation space or line lengths using a scale ruler.
Even if you have measured carefully and drawn an environment to scale, it is important to
include the note: ‘Do not scale from drawing’. Drawings by occupational therapists are
indicative and not intended to be 100% accurate. Actual ‘real life’ measurements will be
determined by the contractor.
Calculating scale
It is useful to understand how to calculate scale as you may not always have access to a
scale ruler or CAD software. Calculating scale does not involve mathematics beyond division
and multiplication. Like many mathematical things, there are different ways to perform the
calculations. Once you understand the principles, you can establish the method/s that you
are most comfortable using.
Scaling down: Shrinking the real world to fit on your page
To calculate a scaled measurement from a ‘real world’ dimension, divide the ‘real world’
dimension by the second number in the scale*.
This will give you the length of the line to draw.
e.g. room width = 3.2m
Important: the line length you have
scale = 1:20
just calculated to draw is in the same
calculation: 3.2 ÷ 20 = 0.16 (metres)
unit as your initial measurement.
Your technical drawing needs to be drawn in millimetres (mm) so it is necessary to convert

your answer (0.16m) into mm: 0.16 x 1000 = 160
OR
Convert the original measurements to mm before calculating the scaled line:
3200 ÷ 20 = 160
*Note: This method is only possible when using a 1:[insert number] ratio scale (e.g. 1:50; 1:20). Technical drawing only uses
these scales so you will not need to do more complex calculations of ratio for this purpose.
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Scaling up: Working out the size of the real world from a scaled drawing
To calculate a ‘real world’ dimension from a scaled drawing, multiply the ‘real world’
dimension by the second number in the scale. This will give you the ‘real world’ size of the
object, expressed in the same unit as the unit of measurement on the page.
e.g. This line is 100mm long. If it were part of a 1:50 scale drawing, it would represent 5
metres in the real world.
In words, you can calculate this as follows:

1:50 scale means that every 1mm on the page represents 50mm in real life (or is 50 times
larger in real life).
Calculation: 100 x 50 = 5000 (mm)

To convert the answer from millimetres to metres (5000 ÷ 1000) = 5m
If a different scale is used, the same 100mm line would represent a different sized ‘real
world’ object.
e.g. if the scale was 1:100, the 100mm drawing would represent 10 metres in real life.
100 x 100 = 10000 (mm)
This line is 135mm long and it represents 13.5 metres at 1:100, or 6.75 metres at 1:50
Calculations: 135 x 100 = 13500mm (13.5m) 135 x 50 = 6750mm (6.75m)
Using a Scale Ruler
Scale rulers are available from stationery and/or hardware stores. They are usually multi-
sided so that there are a number of edges, each with one or two scales:
e.g. 1:10 and 1:100 1:20 and 1:200 1:5 and 1:50
Drawing with a scale ruler
 Identify the side with the scale you need to use (e.g. 1:20).
 Check the unit of measurement that the scale uses and make sure your ‘real life’
measurements are in the same unit.
 Use the numbers on the ruler to draw the length of the ‘real life’ measurement – e.g.
draw from 0-800 to measure an 800mm ‘real world’ height. The scale ruler will do
the conversion for you and your line will be drawn to represent the ‘real world’
measurement at the selected scale.
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Using a scale ruler to find out a length on a scaled drawing
 Find out the scale used in the drawing e.g. 1:50 and turn your ruler to the side
marked with that scale (1:50).
 Make sure you check the unit of measurement used. The number you read off the
ruler will be in this unit of measurement – convert if needed.
 Line up the 0 on the ruler with the part of the drawing you want to measure.
 Read off the number on the ruler – this is the ‘real world’ length.
 You may also need to establish the value of individual increments on the ruler – on
the 1:50 example below, each metre is equally divided into four main sections.
1 ÷ 4 = 0.25 – this means each of the sections is 0.25m (25cm, 250mm). These are
further divided into 5 which makes the individual increments 0.05m (5cm, 50mm).
e.g.: Scale 1:50m Answer = 7.75m (7750mm)
Note: These images are provided as examples and not presented using an accurate scale.
Making decisions about modifications

When your assessment of a person has indicated that some part of their home environment
is causing functional problems that could be addressed with modification, you need to work
out how to change it.
By undertaking a careful survey on site and taking detailed measurements (of the
environment and the person), you can reproduce the environment with the proposed
changes on paper. By drawing it to scale, you know that you have an accurate
representation in proportion to the real thing.
A scale drawing is a tool, just like your tape measure or camera. Any proposals for change
can be drawn on a scaled plan. It is then possible to use a paper cut-out of a wheelchair
footprint made to the same scale as the drawing to check to see, for example, if the
wheelchair will be able to turn around in the proposed space or whether there is room for
both a shower and a bath.
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It is not always necessary to draw something to scale when it is apparent that what you are
proposing will have no difficulty being accommodated e.g. a 450mm grab rail on a wall
adjacent to a doorway, toilet or bath (see Figure 1 below). Using a photograph can assist to
convey and check this information. Your drawing or photograph needs to be clear, accurate,
dimensioned and readable to the contractor. This will ensure that the final result is suitable
for the person and what you intended.
Representative image: Proposed location of

vertical grab rail at internal laundry door.
Rail length: 450mm
Height from floor to centre of bottom rail flange:
700mm
Distance from room corner to centre of rail flange:
250mm
Builder: please contact occupational therapist if
structural limitations prevent installation as
specified.
Image not to scale.
Figure 1: Example of an annotated photograph and associated information.
Once you are used to drawing to scale, it is no more time consuming or difficult than not
drawing to scale. An accurate technical drawing is also a good tool to assist your client to
understand your ideas. It can also be used to establish and show them what isn't possible.
The use of CAD software is a skill worth developing if you do frequent work in this area.
Some examples are SketchUp (online free version/s) and OTDraw (free trial available).
Where possible, endeavour to trial your proposal/s. You may be able to do this using a
similar space (e.g. a clinic bathroom) or by triailing equipment in a simulated ‘mock up’ area,
supplier showroom etc. Careful planning; a thorough task/activity analysis; understanding
the person, their situation and preferences; considering a range of options and working
within your scope of experience/practice can go a long way to avoiding costly errors. In
some instances, even with preparation, planning and trials, you may not know for sure if
your proposal is the correct solution until the change is made and the person can use it. It is
therefore essential to review the person and the environment after any modifications have
taken place.

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OCC204

Enabling Strategies: Working with Assistive Technologies

Definitions and terminology

Drawing your own plans

Floors: again, tapping is a good indication as to construction. A hollow sound indicates a

Tips when surveying and drawing

Example title block:

TECHNICAL NOTES: CLIENT: Betty and Geoff Parsons

In the field of environmental adaptations, measurements are particularly important. A

Occupational therapists often use a scale of 1:20 for individual rooms.

Scaling down: Shrinking the real world to fit on your page

Your technical drawing needs to be drawn in millimetres (mm) so it is necessary to convert

In words, you can calculate this as follows:

Calculation: 100 x 50 = 5000 (mm)

Calculations: 135 x 100 = 13500mm (13.5m) 135 x 50 = 6750mm (6.75m)

Using a Scale Ruler

Drawing with a scale ruler

Using a scale ruler to find out a length on a scaled drawing

e.g.: Scale 1:50m Answer = 7.75m (7750mm)

Making decisions about modifications

Representative image: Proposed location of

Figure 1: Example of an annotated photograph and associated information.

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