This page contains information for researchers that wannt to build their own HotWire apparatus to conduct user studies. We will therefore describe in detail how the apparatus is constructed and what parts are needed to build it.

The HotWire apparatus was designed to meet the requirements discussed above. It allows for simulating a real world physical task in a controlled laboratory environment and is easy to learn. The idea of the apparatus is inspired by a children's game used to train their motor skills and is known as "The hot wire". It consists of an intricately bent metallic wire mounted on a base plate, and a hand-held tool with a metallic ring. The idea of the game is that a person has to pass the ring from one end of the wire to the other without touching the wire.

The figure above shows the very first prototype of the HotWire apparatus as well as all needed parts to build it. To start the task the user has to touch a special metallic object attached to the base plate (start object). Then, the user has to pass the ring from the open end of the metallic wire to the other end that is attached to the base plate. At the very end of the wire the apparatus features another metallic object that indicates the end of the game when being touched (end object). The wire itself is constructed out of di®erently shaped smaller metallic segments. Each of the segments is connected via special screws to another segment and allows the di±culty or characteristic of the primary task to be varied by replacing or changing the sequence of connected segments.