[hwz]

What are the thoughts behind redesigning the pole itself, rather than designing a shoulder pad/attachment to better distribute the weight? It seems like an attachment would be better able to be reused with the poles they currently have, cheaper to create/transport, and allow for better one-shoulder usage.

A huge advantage of shoulder poles is that they can be carryed across one shoulder through narrower corridors, and only the second prototype seems to account for this. The first prototype does showan example of one-shoulder use, but it's clearly not meant for it (and looks a little bit like football shoulder pads worn the wrong way)