King Song 14D cut out...writing this from hospital

[King Llama]

Riding my usual 2 mile route home, very familiar route. Around 6PM so light still out and wheel suddenly cuts out at around 15 mph. Immediately face planted, some people drag me out of the street. Luckily was wearing a helmet and no severe damage to my body. Broke my fall with my hand and not wearing wrist guards although I was wearing gloves, a hoodie, and jeans. 

I have really bad road rash on my face, scrapes, laceration on my lip that will require 2 stitches. My wrist is in A LOT of pain...they will x-ray and I am really hoping no fracture.

Fortunately no broken bones other than potentially my wrist. I will keep you updated.

Feeling really frustrated but also feeling incredibly fortunate, I was overall very lucky and it could have been so much worse. I was also wearing safety glasses so that protecting my eyes otherwise they would also be messed up.

Maybe I'll post some photos when I get home if I'm not feeling shy. I had a Inmotion v10f coming in next week...now I don't know if I can keep it.

Stay safe out there guys.

[Cloud]

Ouch, this sounds very painful. I’m glad you were wearing gear and there was no serious damage. Fast recovery to you!

[ED209]

Sorry to hear that, what do you think was the cause of the cut out?  over leaning? Low  Battery? Pothole? 

[King Llama]

Battery was at 80% so definitely not battery. 

Honestly, I have no idea. I’m going to have to inspect the wheel for some kind of damage or issue with the control board. 

Unfortunately, that may have been my last ride. 

[Hunka Hunka Burning Love]

Sorry to hear about another riding posting from the hospital.  Be sure to let @Jason McNeil know what happened.  I wonder how @Scott Henley is fairing with his.  It sounds like there is an odd coincidence happening to this particular model which could use some follow up. 

[Jason McNeil]

10 hours ago, King Llama said:

I have really bad road rash on my face, scrapes, laceration on my lip that will require 2 stitches. My wrist is in A LOT of pain...they will x-ray and I am really hoping no fracture.

That sucks, sorry King. Let's send the Wheel in for analysis, then decide how to take it from here. Where you accelerating at the time? Did it go over a bump or other irregular object? Do you think it was a brown-out condition? With two cases out of 150 Wheels, these are still outliers, but it does give one pause for thought on the cracks that are appearing in KS's claim infallible safety record.

[Marty Backe]

It's disturbing to think that we are all potentially one faceplant away from leaving this sport/activity. I have not had a serious fall like you did, but I have experienced failures which required a few weeks to fully build up confidence again.

I hope I never experience a 'random' cutout like you just had. At a minimum it would probably keep me from ever riding that particular wheel again.

Hopefully given some time away from the wheel you'll feel better about riding and will continue to do so.

Good luck and I hope for a fast recovery for you 

[WARPed1701D]

Ouch! Thanks for sharing your story and reminding us all that we are one failure away from ER. I really hope your tests show no significant injury and you can heal quickly. Be sure to keep us updated and do post photos. As gross as they may be I honestly feel that photos have the biggest impact on others and helps push them towards greater use of safety gear.

This yet again reinforces the argument for a full face helmet. A regular open face helmet just doesn't cut it for EUC use. Apart from avoiding some serious injury it may also allow you to continue riding after the fact rather than face the possibility of quitting altogether due to the mental trauma of the injury experience

+1 for wrist guards too.

[Marty Backe]

3 minutes ago, WARPed1701D said:

Ouch! Thanks for sharing your story and reminding us all that we are one failure away from ER. I really hope your tests show no significant injury and you can heal quickly. Be sure to keep us updated and do post photos. As gross as they may be I honestly feel that photos have the biggest impact on others and helps push them towards greater use of safety gear.

This yet again reinforces the argument for a full face helmet. A regular open face helmet just doesn't cut it for EUC use. Apart from avoiding some serious injury it may also allow you to continue riding after the fact rather than face the possibility of quitting altogether due to the mental trauma of the injury experience

+1 for wrist guards too.

A full face helmet is really not necessary. You just need to learn how to roll during the fall. I thought you knew this?

[kour]

sorry to hear, @King Llama - that's certainly frightening. hope you don't have any broken bones!

[WARPed1701D]

26 minutes ago, Marty Backe said:

A full face helmet is really not necessary. You just need to learn how to roll during the fall. I thought you knew this?

We'll let @King Llama tell us just how much chance he had to react to his fall.

[Ipsiain]

24 minutes ago, Marty Backe said:

A full face helmet is really not necessary. You just need to learn how to roll during the fall. I thought you knew this?

I see that wink, but seriously I think you could only implement your role game if you had a split second warning before hand. With a cut out the wheel is limp before you know whats happening and you wouldn’t have anything to push off of to adjust your position to start your role. So you are essentially just a rag doll.  

[meepmeepmayer]

Good luck with the diagnosis of your injuries, jopefully nothing too serious.

42 minutes ago, WARPed1701D said:

This yet again reinforces the argument for a full face helmet. A regular open face helmet just doesn't cut it for EUC use. Apart from avoiding some serious injury it may also allow you to continue riding after the fact rather than face the possibility of quitting altogether due to the mental trauma of the injury experience

+1 for wrist guards too.

Yep that's really the takeaway here. A regular helmet won' help with faceplants. Also wrist guards, as usual

[WARPed1701D]

The spectre of an incident like this is also why its a good idea to log all your rides in WheelLog. With data gathered multiple times per second it really helps perform a post-mortem of the failure if the fault isn't obviously evident after the incident such as a blown fuse or MOSFET. Was it an environmental induced overlean (a dip or pot hole the motor could not accelerate out of fast enough) indicated by a huge current surge or a cutout (total power loss) indicated by a loss of logging or current drop which suggests loose connectors or bad battery etc? The power of having your own "Black Box" cannot be underestimated in restoring confidence in your wheel. If data showed an overlean I wouldn't blame the wheel and would feel confident riding it again but with much more care and awareness of the road ahead. I think WheelLog data helped @Cannings investigate a fall he had on his commute which suggested a pothole and subsequent overlean from the sudden deceleration/roll/tilt/current spike data. His Tesla was not at fault.

Edited May 23, 2018 by WARPed1701D

[mezzanine]

Thanks for posting about your fall.  Nothing worse than a mysterious cut-out, especially if you're someone who bought a King Song specifically for their safety reputation.  Hope your wrist is okay.  

It sounds scary that people had to drag you off the street.  Having an accident in a high traffic area is one of my fears.  Everyone reacts differently to being in shock/pain and I tend to want to shut down and tune out the outside world so I can focus on sensing how badly I've been injured.  I don't like it when people are right up on me immediately after going down, even though I recognize the intention is good.  I would have been doubly traumatized by having to interact with people in that state.  

I was out earlier today and I came close to my first dog incident.  I had a Rottweiler make a run at me and then back off right at the last moment.  

The longer I ride, the more I like bigger wheels, even though they're less convenient.  I doubt if I'd want to own a 14" anymore.  

[King Llama]

Thanks for the support.

Good news, I just received my results back from the X-ray and although my wrist is severely sprained, I did not fracture any bones. I basically came away with just two stitches and a lot of skin damage, but nothing too serious.

I've attached some pictures for reference and to maybe convince people to wear even more safety gear. I will definitely be picking up a full face helmet. You can't really see my stitches in these photos but you can see how I landed on my face. You can see how my eyes were protected by the safety glasses.

Also, my Apple Watch didn't survive the crash but somehow my phone was completely unscathed. I have a bunch of scrapes over my legs and hips, but didn't include those pictures.

One thing that is really frustrating to me is that after updating the app, the DarknessBot app changed my alarm settings on my wheel without warning me. This seems really dangerous to me and it may have contributed to my crash. It reset my alarm settings to no alarms except for a final alarm at top speed. I did change the settings back to my usual settings on the app, but I did notice that the alarm was not as responsive and was not going off in the same consistent manner as before. Maybe that should have been some kind of warning sign, I don't know. Still trying to figure out exactly what happened...

 

Edited May 24, 2018 by King Llama

[King Llama]

7 hours ago, WARPed1701D said:

 We'll let @King Llama tell us just how much chance he had to react to his fall.

The funny thing is that I've been a jiujitsu practitioner my whole life and have learned how to roll and fall properly.

You don't stand a chance on the wheel due to the failure mode of the wheel. In other words, your feet go out from under you as the wheel dies and basically brakes due to motor drag. You have no chance of taking a step forward during that time and initiating a roll.

Full face helmet + full arm and leg pads + wrist guards is the only way I would ever ride again in the future (which if I'm being honest, I probably will).

The timing could not have been worse because I had two weeks of no health insurance because I just turned 26 and I had a two week period during which my insurance was transitioning. If I had to have wrist surgery, this fall could have easily cost me tens of thousands of dollars.

I've certainly learned an important lesson here...

[Rehab1]

56 minutes ago, King Llama said:

Good news, I just received my results back from the X-ray and although my wrist is severely sprained, I did not fracture any bones. I basically came away with just two stitches and a lot of skin damage, but nothing too serious.

That is excellent news! No fractures!  I had an ill feeling in my gut yesterday when I saw your post. You did get banged up pretty bad but your alive! I know it is frustrating trying to understand the cause of your accident but hopefully over time you will uncover the cause.

Be well and remember that moments in life that cause the greatest trauma end up having a positive influence on yourself and those that care about you. 

[Hunka Hunka Burning Love]

  Yeeks.   Note to self - get a full face helmet ASAP,  choose a different hobby like pinochle or basket weaving, sign my organ donor card.

[Marty Backe]

1 hour ago, King Llama said:

The funny thing is that I've been a jiujitsu practitioner my whole life and have learned how to roll and fall properly.

You don't stand a chance on the wheel due to the failure mode of the wheel. In other words, your feet go out from under you as the wheel dies and basically brakes due to motor drag. You have no chance of taking a step forward during that time and initiating a roll.

Full face helmet + full arm and leg pads + wrist guards is the only way I would ever ride again in the future (which if I'm being honest, I probably will).

The timing could not have been worse because I had two weeks of no health insurance because I just turned 26 and I had a two week period during which my insurance was transitioning. If I had to have wrist surgery, this fall could have easily cost me tens of thousands of dollars.

I've certainly learned an important lesson here...

Can you tell us what type of helmet that you were wearing? Thanks.

[mezzanine]

I'm really glad you posted pictures.  When you said the skin abrasions were bad, I didn't really pay much attention because I'm more worried about bone breaks.  Actually seeing the road burn makes me realize how painful it would be.  

It's funny because I've been holding off on getting a full-faced helmet because money is tight right now.  I keep crossing my fingers that I'm not going to get burned for waiting for a deal.  

Your comment about the timing of your insurance is haunting.  Murphy's Law.  It's why I just know I'm going to eat it face first the day my helmet is arriving.  Right now, I go helmet and wrist guards, and keep my speed reasonable.  My next move after the full-face helmet is probably knee pads.  

Regarding the lack of time to roll, there was a guy here a week ago humble-bragging about how his rolling ability saved him in a 50km/h+ crash wearing zero protection.   

[WARPed1701D]

Ouch. Bloody hell that looks like it stings. Thanks for swallowing your pride and posting the pictures. Already you can see it is having a positive effect on the thoughts of others.

Great to hear your bones are all in one piece and that you might roll on one wheel again with the necessary extra gear. Sorry about the watch. 

All the gear, all the time. It's the only way. 

Edited May 24, 2018 by WARPed1701D

[novazeus]

this is why of all the forums i've ever participated in, this forum sb the most frequented of them all. it's call self preservation.

i wish there was some way to notify all the ks14d owners of these failures.

i'm looking at my ks18s and ks16s a little differently tn.

[The Fat Unicyclist]

4 hours ago, King Llama said:

Thanks for the support.

Good news, I just received my results back from the X-ray and although my wrist is severely sprained, I did not fracture any bones. I basically came away with just two stitches and a lot of skin damage, but nothing too serious.

I've attached some pictures for reference and to maybe convince people to wear even more safety gear. I will definitely be picking up a full face helmet. You can't really see my stitches in these photos but you can see how I landed on my face. You can see how my eyes were protected by the safety glasses.

Also, my Apple Watch didn't survive the crash but somehow my phone was completely unscathed. I have a bunch of scrapes over my legs and hips, but didn't include those pictures.

One thing that is really frustrating to me is that after updating the app, the DarknessBot app changed my alarm settings on my wheel without warning me. This seems really dangerous to me and it may have contributed to my crash. It reset my alarm settings to no alarms except for a final alarm at top speed. I did change the settings back to my usual settings on the app, but I did notice that the alarm was not as responsive and was not going off in the same consistent manner as before. Maybe that should have been some kind of warning sign, I don't know. Still trying to figure out exactly what happened...

 

Mmmnn… That looks stingy!

[Cannings]

Glad you're okay man, i've put myself in a position where I don't really have much of an option as my wheel "is" my transport to work and fuck walking after owning an euc lol. Pad up and get back on just like when you fell off your bike learning when you were 3, or grinding the clutch when learning to drive (americans probably can't relate to this one :P) we only learn from our falls, after mine I never go on that piece of pavement if i can help it as after re-inspection the pavement has what I can only explain of a sink in a line not big in any which way it kind of looks like this:

----------------\/----------------

but it is the perfect storm of if you're going over it, the wheel starts dipping into it but as its only small hits the peak of the curve on the other side and really doesn't take much to push you forward because of the counter momentum add that to the increased power draw due to the bang is what I think happened to me.