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fred_dot_u

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    florida
  • EUC
    Airwheel S8 (x2)

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  1. I subscribe to his channel and the "vehicles" he creates are amazing. This one may be one of the top five he's built. It appears in the video that he was successful in all aspects, not requiring any fine tuning or mechanical changes and that the responses to his inputs were just as desired. I picture this with a lightweight shell around it, hiding almost all of the mechanicals. It would be similar to a not-so-aerodynamic velomobile when traveling forward. The best part would be watching observers' faces when he translates/slides or pivots about the center!
  2. The "standard" approach may be useful. Remove the bluetooth devices appropriate to your device from the remembered list. Toggle off the bluetooth feature of the phone or tablet. Perform a full hard power off of the phone or tablet. After powering up, turn on the bluetooth feature and re-pair.
  3. I have an Alibaba account, but ten of them is far too many. I have three working units and two in need of battery packs. I rotate the three from full charge to previously 80 percent SOC, but now the rotation is from full to 50-60 percent SOC, with no ill effects. I do, however, only charge fully on the day of any expected use, which prevents the scooter from sitting overnight with a full charge, which can be detrimental to the battery life. I had pursued purchasing at least one more, possibly two and adding them to the rotation, but the source I found (which might have been through Alibaba) wanted US$800 for one and told me to expect $600-$800 shipping plus customs fees. I'm eventually going to pursue a custom battery pack via Endless Sphere as that forum has been around what seems like forever and is likely to have some useful resources overall. I get plenty of interest in the scooter, but far too little serious interest to consider becoming an ersatz dealer. There was a fellow in my area many years ago who became a distributor but moved three hours away and no longer is in contact with headquarters. He's become disillusioned. One of my three was purchased used from him and I'm thankful to have it. I've considered to build an external battery pack from an off-the-shelf battery of appropriate capacity and voltage, add on an aftermarket BMS with phone app monitoring (or get the BMS with LCD panel) and route the wires in the seat column. It would make monitoring so much better and using an available pack means that weak point disappears. I've considered it and like so many projects, my health interferes, along with all those other never-get-done tasks.
  4. I've run into this at a local warehouse store. I pretty much ignored the door greeter and also the floor supervisor sent to run me down while in the store. I sent a letter to the corporate headquarters and received a positive response. The document I believe assisted me is: https://archive.ada.gov/opdmd.pdf As with service animals, there are restrictions on the demands that a facility can require of an OPDMD: The above is extracted from page four of the document. I have in the past visited the local bus station after being refused transit. It was recognized for a different reason that it was acceptable for me to bring the euc aboard. The store problem was related to my Airwheel S8 and has not surfaced for the past five years. Of course, I don't travel 10 mph inside the store (unless it's a completely empty aisle with no intersections from which someone may pop out!) Consider to visit your local transportation authority and provide a copy of the document.
  5. It's normal for any battery chemistry to lose capacity while idle. Some are more severe than others, but lithium chemistry is pretty good in that respect. Our EVs will display a range after the charge completes and three days later will have lost less than 2 percent. The system in the vehicles limit the charge to 80 percent, which means we can leave the charger on until completed. I'd love to have that option with these scooters. I don't travel on the scooters as far as I once did. Now it's drive to the store and scooter about, rather than scooter to the store and back. Maybe when the rebuild is complete on the local supermarket (torn down and going back in from the ground up), I'll return to the 3 mile round trip.
  6. I don't know the timeline for the mini, as it was the S8 which first caught my eye so many years ago. The mini has never appeared in my saved searches and I've seen it only on the Airwheel video collection. I've changed my charging practice, although it does slightly increase the workload. I record the charge level after a day's errands and if it's above eighty percent, I'll take it out again without charging in advance. When it reaches the eighty percent level, I'll position it next to the charger, but not turn it on until the morning of expected use. Lithium batteries don't like to be stored at one hundred percent charge level. I'm hoping that this practice will extend the life of my scooters. Sometimes when I'm searching for replacements, the Wall-E pod appears, always dated from years back and clearly not in production. I'd want one without the pod anyway.
  7. I know this is old and certainly out of date, but the question about the "mini" aspect appears to need an answer. The S8 mini has a straight seat post from the foot base to the seat, while the non-mini version has the curved seat post. The photo shows a curved version, making it the better model of the two. It's been months since I've seen the S8 available, new or used. I fear we've seen the end of that great scooter, with no other model of this sort on the market. I'd love to be proven incorrect about that. If one knows of a sit-down self balancing non-tandem two wheel scooter, by all means, post a link!
  8. After I received number four, I ordered a gel seat cover from Amazon, the widest one they have a Sanctus model: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08DTQRNKZ?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details It doesn't fit particularly well, but does strap on to the seatpost and stays in place, plus the gel pads are in just the right spot. Replacing the mainboard is likely to be an easy task, it's finding one that's the tough part. You're on the other side of the continent from me otherwise I'd be happy to toss a screwdriver at the project. Shipping is brutal nowadays and not likely to get better.
  9. I've arranged for my fourth S8 this week, used but with a new and uncertain battery and some problem with no overspeed warning/auto-braking. The seller states that he might have mis-arranged the wiring when replacing the batteries, which makes me hopeful I can compare the inside to the photos I've taken or to compare to another working one I can open up again. Fourth S8 would mean three running machines, swapped in rotation to keep the batteries healthy and to keep a reserve fleet as they continue to vanish!
  10. Yeah, the SBU has been out of production for years. The emails and phone calls go unanswered. The one I have is still a good ride, and I have the battery welder which would allow me to build a new pack for it. I had learned to ride a pedal unicycle when I was in my forties and it is a ton of work. Without the book "Learn to ride the unicycle" found back then online, I would not have tried to learn, but the book provided a solid foundation to allow me to understand how it works. I don't think being an S8 operator makes it easier or harder to learn to ride an SBU. It may make it easier to understand the practice and the general aspects of any self-balancing device. Think of the SBU as a bicycle and the S8 as a trike. In the latter, on the part of the operator, no real balancing is required; it's managed by the electronics. On the former, one has to provide left/right balancing, just as with a bicycle. Equally appropriate, once up to speed, the balancing left/right is managed by the wheel. In the case of the SBU, up to speed is about 5 mph at first, then as low as one or two mph when one becomes comfortable. I really miss riding it, ten times the fun of the S8, and that's not lacking much either. Here's a teaching scenario for the SBU: pedals retracted/folded up, seat low enough for feet on the ground. Rock fore and aft, don't move feet from position. Rock fore and aft, move/drag feet accordingly. One pedal down, repeat the two rocking steps. Repeat second rocking step with greater travel until down foot isn't needed on the ground. Other pedal down, boogie on!
  11. I have an Focus Designs SBU v2 which is lacking only a battery to become operational again. It has a genuine unicycle seat to which I attribute a good portion of my visits to the urologist. Despite stating that I had the device, he chose to ignore my statements until I was unable to ride it, at which point the symptoms abated somewhat. Not soon enough, which means a lifetime tied to a pharmacy, but better than it was! It's really difficult for me to try to market/sell the SBU because of that aspect of the vehicle, but it sure was a ton o' fun compared to the S8. 15 mph top end, but the handling was a blast. Not as easy to learn, but still pretty easy. Had a friend try it and over two 20 minute lessons, was zipping up and down the driveway. I miss it, even though it's collecting dust in my garage. I also wish I had the electronics acumen to figure out the problem with S8#1, but without any form of schematic or manufacturer's support, we are on a sinking ship!
  12. I share your opinion. I was able to return one of my questionable S8 scooters to operational status by building a battery pack. The battery welder I purchased was too much on the cheap side and I think some of my welds have released. Recently, the power button provided no power and the charger would not indicate connection. I think I'll have to take it apart and re-spot weld some of the cells. It's disturbing to be so limited. Rather than use one of the 4 wheel store provided scooters, I returned home and charged up the other S8, even though I know the pack is weak. I was surprised to find that it's stronger than I thought, but it also needs to be replaced, as I'm sure that there are bad, dying or dead cells within. My first S8 had a fracture of the frame just under the seat, dumping me on my backside at very slow speed. Helmet protected the skull. I ordered and received a replacement frame, but when assembled, I pinched one of the wires and the scooter would not return to life. It makes no sense to me that a sensor wire (turning, seat switch) would cause a main failure, but now I have a carcass for spare parts of questionable quality. Even Airwheel is abandoning the S8 for the S8 mini, which uses a unicycle seat. Unicycle seats cause prostate problems on these types of transports. I don't know what I'll do if I run out of S8 scooters.
  13. I'm unfamiliar with the flashing sequences of your transport. It seems there is no standard and very little reference, other than your own experience. Until you know the certain status of your pack, conjecture would be haphazard.
  14. If your scooter sat idle for as long as you've indicated ("for a very long time"), it will have self-discharged sufficiently to kill cells in the battery. You can confirm this by opening up the device and testing each cell with a voltmeter. If you can't get to each cell, you might be able to get to each cell's balance lead. You can select just about any pair, but the correct way to test using the balance leads is to contact adjacent balance leads. This will give you single cell readings. Even a nearly dead cell will take a forced charge but will die almost immediately after the power is removed. If done incorrectly, it's also possible to damage or destroy the cell and possible create an explosive event, although that would take some doing, generally speaking. I suspect you'll find that multiple cells are kaput and you'll have to replace the pack to return it to functioning condition. My Airwheel S8 died a "normal" death from time and I was able to construct a replacement pack from cells purchased domestically. What would have been a full charge that deteriorated to 80 percent in a single day now has become a three or four day stable full charge.
  15. I took the email from the dealer at face value, as he referenced a test drive provided many months ago. It's not an A8, which is the two-wheel self balancing wheelchair. The scooters he had included in the email is an A3, but all my objections remain. I'd forgotten another useless feature of that model, a push button brake on the handlebars. It was disconcerting the first time I pressed it, to have the handlebars "rear back" in my hands. It is an impressive aspect of the technology, though. 34 kg empty weight is a back-killer.
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