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Solowheel Seattle!


SeattleAbarth

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22 minutes ago, Marty Backe said:

what Ando said - he gets much more range out of his battery when riding in soft mode. This seems to make sense since the motor is not making as many aggressive adjustments (consuming power) as would be nec

Yip, thats "normal"....and also one of the reasons why the new ACM/V3's are not that rock hard as the MCM2s ever was....

Hard riding mode just means that for a "none" micromovement of the pedals an massive amount of amps must be pushed, to NOT let the pedals move....if you have a softer ride mode, this values all go down, as there is some time to get into acceleration....and in the end that also means more range...

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3 hours ago, KingSong69 said:

Yip, thats "normal"....and also one of the reasons why the new ACM/V3's are not that rock hard as the MCM2s ever was....

Hard riding mode just means that for a "none" micromovement of the pedals an massive amount of amps must be pushed, to NOT let the pedals move....if you have a softer ride mode, this values all go down, as there is some time to get into acceleration....and in the end that also means more range...

Well, I sometimes go into medium mode on my RW GT16, it does give more range and is less tiring.

If the mode gets too soft though, I'm worried about breaking. That acceleration is slower, is something I'm prepared to live with - but when you need to stop now, you really need to stop NOW. Just today the snappy mode made sure I never even got close to the kiddo that decided holding mommy's hand was boring, and jumping out into the bicycle lane was a lot more fun. I went from maybe 16mph to 5mph in the time you can say what the f*ck, and could creep by without anyone ever being in danger.

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On 7/4/2017 at 10:28 AM, esaj said:

Curious, how different is it vs. the softest mode ("learning mode") of King Songs, for example? At a quick thought, it sounds just like the soft-modes available in many wheels, but I guess there are tiny differences that make or break the riding feel... personally not a fan of the really soft modes (the "comfortable mode" of Firewheel was horrible), but I've actually noticed that riding in the "middle" stiffness ("Riding mode") of KS16 I can accelerate far easier in steep uphills (calibrating the pedals to have a small lean backwards also helped) and it really isn't too soft for me, but then again, probably the rider weight also affects this, and many people say that Riding mode is too soft for them.

I can elaborate on this quite a bit! So I've spent a lot of time on two personal KS wheels and tested the latest 16s as well, GW and Ninebot - on all of these I have tried the different ride modes. The soft modes are all *very* different from what Solowheel is doing. What they call soft, I would call real-time pedal adjustment. The pedals actually remain quite rigid, but the angle adjusts very slowly as you lean forward or back. To me, this alone has little advantage except maybe a little bit of added confidence in braking hard.  

What Solowheel is doing is adding another layer on top of that. It adjusts the angle on the fly (to a smaller degree), and then also allows a certain amount of "spring". This means you can actually rock the pedals by wiggling your feet, and it actually feels like there is some kind of very stiff spring down there, but it's all numbers of course. The effect is almost like having digital shocks. Coming from another wheel, this will immediately feel strange and difficult to manage because it's so different. But when you allow your brain and body to get into sync with it, you can understand how effective (and fun) it can be. What you find is your legs start to stay more locked in with the body of the wheel because everything stays in line with you when you let it lean with you rather than entirely pivoting at the ankle. Combining this with stellar ergonomics makes the whole experience feel incredibly floaty and comfortable. The spring + pedal adjust is tuned so that it feels like you're swinging the wheel around beneath you like a pendulum and it's bouncing off of a predefined area. I don't really know how else to describe it, but everything else feels like you're trying to balance on top of something in comparison. Solowheel feels like it's catching you. 

Now there is also another huge dynamic that changes a bit between different eucs - not just pedal stiffness, but balancing sensitivity: AKA how much it lets you lean. I would say King Song and Inmotion have something in common here - they let you lean a bit but still maintain stiff pedals. Gotway feels a little more rigid with a bit less lean. The most rigid and sensitive balancing I've ever felt was Ninebot mode 0. You are pretty much stiff as a board on those. Personally, I like some lean, so I like what Solowheel, Inmotion, and King Song are doing here. Half of the fun is the feeling of really pushing the wheel around beneath you when you become a really seasoned rider.

What I'd like to see is Solowheel's existing unique riding style included as an option on future models so that riders can ride with stiff pedals when it's needed. Because, yes, sometimes that is an advantage. I can't say if that will happen or not, but that's my personal dream.

 

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  • 1 month later...

I'm not that experienced, but until the Extreme has a much larger battery capacity I can't really see why anyone should buy it no matter how good everything else is.  From an engineering point I would consider it a complete fail, it's like building a truck or something with an undersized motor or gas tank, it becomes something nice to look at, but not practical.  Even though they talk a lot about how practical their designs are, they fail to recognize the need for more battery capacity. I have to assume they are so absorbed in their own world they fail to see the big picture. 

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  • 2 weeks later...

If Solowheel Jeffery doesnt get the Polly Anna award from Solowheel, I dont know who will. 

"Oh sure the springy feel, wobbly some have described it as, takes some getting used to when going over bumps, but we feel even having your life flash before your eyes can become a casual affair at no more than 15 mph. If the bumpy springy ride was good enough for the pioneer's wagon leaf springs its good enough for this 21st century fare. Be amazed you're even surving the experience; thats the benefits of our new firmware :laughbounce2: Most of our employees can barely even stand the awful ride during the meager range on these horrible beasts and find the range to be more than enough. " :facepalm: omg its classic middle manager falderal. So exquisite!

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1 hour ago, Stan Onymous said:

If Solowheel Jeffery doesnt get the Polly Anna award from Solowheel, I dont know who will. 

"Oh sure the springy feel, wobbly some have described it as, takes some getting used to when going over bumps, but we feel even having your life flash before your eyes can become a casual affair at no more than 15 mph. If the bumpy springy ride was good enough for the pioneer's wagon leaf springs its good enough for this 21st century fare. Be amazed you're even surving the experience; thats the benefits of our new firmware :laughbounce2: Most of our employees can barely even stand the awful ride during the meager range on these horrible beasts and find the range to be more than enough. " :facepalm: omg its classic middle manager falderal. So exquisite!

I enjoyed that when I read it too :)

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