The Mealtime Partner Control Panel

The Partner’s Control Panel is divided into three areas: Power/Pause control, the alphanumeric display, and the Control Buttons. The Control Panel is used to turn the power on and off, to pause and un-pause the operation, to alter any of the internal pause times and other control settings, and to display system information. Any changes made to the control settings using the Control Panel will be saved and will become the current settings.  

Power/Pause.  

POWER ON, POWER OFF, and PAUSE buttons are grouped in the top section of the control panel, above the display.  

POWER ON.  Depressing the POWER ON button turns the Partner on. Power will remain on until the POWER OFF button is pressed or 8 minutes has passed without any user activity. Power will also be turned off, if, in the automatic mode or one switch, the Bowls make 12 complete revolutions without any activity. (Depressing the POWER ON button more than once will have no further effect.)

When the power is on, the green power-on indicator is illuminated. The POWER ON button must be held for around ¼ second to give the Partner time to fully power up. If the first depression of the button does not keep the power-on indicator on, hold the button down a little longer. The following illustration shows the Control Panel and the Display when starting.

The starting operational mode will then be displayed. The unit will be placed in the Pause mode unless two adaptive switches are plugged into the phono jacks. The Pause mode will be indicated by “Pause” in the lower right corner of the display. For example, if no switches are plugged into the unit, the following display will appear:

PAUSE. If the PAUSE button is depressed, it halts all activity for the Partner, even when the device has not completed a rotation or is scooping food. The device remains inactive until the PAUSE button is pressed again, at which time the Partner resumes whatever it was doing when it was paused. When the Partner is paused, either by the user or automatically at power-on, there will be a Pause message in the lower right corner of the display. Once the device resumes operation (i.e., is Un-paused) the Pause message in the lower right corner will no longer be displayed.

POWER Off. The POWER OFF button turns the Partner off. When it is depressed, if the device is not in the ready to scoop position, the spoon will automatically be sequenced to this position and then the device will shut down. (There will be a short pause after depressing the POWER OFF button while the Partner stores the current control settings. “Turning Power Off” will be displayed during this time.)

DISPLAY UNIT. The alphanumeric display is only used for brief periods at startup, at power down, and when needed to change any settings, or to display device information. To preserve battery power, the display will go into a “sleep” mode when not in use. After 2 minutes without display activity, the display is turned off (or goes to sleep). To reactivate the display, depress any of the buttons on the Control Panel (except the On button which has no effect when power is already on). The Power-on Indicator will remain illuminated so that the user and caregiver are aware that the Partner is on even when the display is not illuminated.

Refer to the Mealtime Partner User's Manual for details on the user controls and how to alter them using the Control Panel.

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