GT16 Top Speed Test - Fall at 51km/h without protection

[Jean eRide.ie Community]

Warning: This video is not for the faint of heart.
Crazy stuff, but it could have gone much worse.

Thanks to @Nic for sharing it on my Sold GT16 topic as a comment.
 

1st video uploaded (removed from Youtube, but on many news outlets)

https://www.facebook.com/search/str/monociclo+accidente/keywords_blended_posts?epa=SEARCH_BOX

It became one of the most viral videos online in Spain for a week, so it even showed up on different Spanish TV channels, this being one:
https://www.lasexta.com/programas/arusitys/mejores-momentos/un-hombre-graba-su-caida-en-monociclo-al-perder-el-equilibrio-por-culpa-del-postureo-video_201811285bfe3f880cf2f27f34a9ffd0.html

On that one they say he lost balance at 50km/h and fell.

The 2nd video with the fake speedometer has been removed.

 

In Spanish, before falling, he said: "this is where I fell last time".

On the description of the video he explains how bad what he did was and uses it as a warning for riders to use protection, not like him.

He also explains that he was testing the limits of the wheel.

He's lucky to still be alive after such a fall.

[Master Ong]

Thats a hard fall at that speed! Ouch

[DiZZy]

Yes...I saw this video when it happened, but was hesitant to report it. This happened to a member of the Madrid EUC group. Thankfully, he is OK and recovering now. He had to get many staples and had some broken bones.. He was very lucky to not get more hurt from the fall, or  from oncoming auto traffic. Hopefully, we can all learn from this and always wear protective gear when pushing the extreme limits of the EUC / personal limits.

 

 

[Mono]

On 11/21/2018 at 5:47 PM, DiZZy said:

He was very lucky to not get more hurt from the fall, or  from oncoming auto traffic. Hopefully, we can all learn from this and always wear protective gear when pushing the extreme limits of the EUC / personal limits.

Though no protection gear would have helped him if he had caught oncoming traffic. And we saw that he didn't really needed a helmet, am I wrong?

EDIT: I think he was going on some sideline for parking, so oncoming traffic was separated by additional space.

[F.J. Abaya]

Why not wear protection when you’re going to push the limits of your EUC?

[eddiemoy]

Noob mistake.  Hopefully he will never do that again.  

[Mono]

13 hours ago, F.J. Abaya said:

Why not wear protection when you’re going to push the limits of your EUC?

Why push the limits of your EUC before you have a well informed idea of the inner workings and limitations of EUCs, that is, before you actually know what you are doing?

[Reciodvd]

no me cai por el limite de la rueda, me cai porque me desequilibre, no tenia que hacer esa prueba en ese momento, sali a probar la camara y me anime demasiado ya  que siempre llevo protecciones

[Mono]

@Reciodvd, are you sure you understand the torque characteristics of electric motors depending on speed?

If you keep on accelerating, you are bound to run out of torque and just fall over on your face on any EUC. Tiltback is meant to prevent this by stopping the rider from accelerating.

[Jean eRide.ie Community]

@Reciodvd

The most crazy is that you said "here is where I fell last time" before getting to 51km/h without protection, it was easy to see it coming. I hope you wont try it again.

(Spanish: la mayor locura es que dices "aquí es donde me caí la otra vez" antes de ponerte a 51kmh sin protección, era fácil saber que la caída es lo que venia. Espero que no lo vuelvas a repetir otra vez).

[Alex_from_NZ]

 One lucky son of a bitch.

[DiZZy]

Recio said he fell because he lost balance, not because he reached the performance limits of the EUC.

To me.. it looked like the nose pitched down, and the center of mass of the rider was thrown forward. 

I saw your x-rays today on Whatzapp group; glad you are recovering quickly and healing well. 

I broke my wrist once downhill mounting biking, so I have been on that long road of recovery of healing bones.

Now, I always wear wrist guards when riding my EUC.  

 

[Mono]

34 minutes ago, DiZZy said:

Recio said he fell because he lost balance, not because he reached the performance limits of the EUC.

Losing balance is a consequence of reaching the performance limit.

[kasenutty]

That video was horrible. The whole time it was upsetting. 

[Reciodvd]

el lamento no es por dolor, es cuando me impresiono y veo mi brazo colgando, anteriormente en otras pruebas el puesto a 58 km / h ese dia sali a prueba la camara y me anime a grabarlo y no llevar la computadora adecuada (gran error) Si es fijo en mis videos de mi canal, siempre voy con protecciones, anteriormente hace unos meses también ahi pero iba mas despacio.

Por cierto esto es una calle cortada, solo es para aparcar, los coches que están circulando por otra calle.

 

 

[Hunka Hunka Burning Love]

  More of those flat metal bug implantation surgeries.  EUCs need to have some mandatory tiltback at a safe speed to help avoid these types of accidents.  They will keep appearing, and it's not good for the sport, the manufacturer's image, and the people involved.  Some will be lucky and get away without a scratch while others will suffer long term debilitating injuries.  Let's bump up the speed capabilities sure, but there should be a reasonable tiltback before the wheel fails.  If the new future GT45 can go 80 kph, at least cap it off at 65-70 kph with some room to breathe.  I love speed, but I like safety better.  That way people can do all the speed tests they want and still get through it unscathed.  This optional tiltback is asking for trouble.

Sure sure people who detest limits and imposed features will protest.  But most cars do have speed limiters to avoid the engines from blowing up.  Do people hit them?  Rarely.  Are they a good feature?  Probably yes.  Smart engineering involves dealing with those what ifs.  Sometimes it's better to have the technology to keep us safe rather than just having faith in the people using the technology who may not know better.  Ah that's my Brick Friday rant. </end>  

[Rehab1]

3 hours ago, Reciodvd said:

el lamento no es por dolor, es cuando me impresiono y veo mi brazo colgando, anteriormente en otras pruebas la he puesto a 58km/h ese dia sali a probar la camara y me anime a grabarlo y no llevaba la equipacion adecuada (gran error) si es fijais en mis videos de mi canal, siempre voy con protecciones, anteriormente hace unos meses cai tambien ahi pero iba mas despacio.

Por cierto esto es una calle cortada, solo es para aparcar, los coches que se ven circulando van por otra calle.

 

Translation:

The lament is not by D smell, it is when I was impressed and I see my arm hanging, previously in other tests I have put to 58km/hthat day I went to try the camera and encourage me to record and did not have the appropriate equipment (big mistake) If you fixin my videos of my channel , I always go with protections, anteri ormente a few months ago Cai also there but went slower. 

By the way this is a cut off street, it is only for parking, cars that you see n circulating go by another street.

OMG that is one serious break! I’m so sorry! It was hard to watch the video knowing that the outcome would be terrible. Best of wishes on your recovery. 

[Mono]

1 hour ago, Hunka Hunka Burning Love said:

EUCs need to have some mandatory tiltback at a safe speed to help avoid these types of accidents.  They will keep appearing, and it's not good for the sport, the manufacturer's image, and the people involved.

Indeed. It may be the greatest threat to the future of the community.

[Scatcat]

@Reciodvd I do hope that was the last time you "tested the limits". The amount of damage you got is no joke, but even so you were lucky. The next time it is a caved in head, or breast bone, and then it's game over.

An unprotected human being at  >40 kmh/>25 mph is an eggshell waiting for the falling sledgehammer. If you have reasonable protection you're still probably in for a rough time, but at least you have a fair to middling chance of walking away without needing the hospital.

For those about to die/test the limits, I won't salute you. I would though seriously advice against doing it in traffic. Protection or not, you're doing us all harm.

• We don't f***ing need any life changing accidents making it into the papers and ears of police or politicians.
• We don't f***ing need the general public to believe we're totally off the deep end.
• We most certainly don't need to have any of our wheels hit a kid, elderly, pregnant woman, someones windshield, whatever att >25mph!

This kind of shit is what will get us banned, prohibited, hated and lynched.

</END_OF_RANT>

[Lutalo]

If the rider was my worst enemy, I would feel cheated that he didn't crack his coconut on the pavement, or get turned into meatpie by an oncoming truck 

He was very lucky to fall at that velocity and walk away with a broken arm.

I think that it should be quite clear to all riders that if you push the wheel beyond its limits it will fail, and you will fall and possibly not survive. 

"The fool shoots himself to test a gun" - African Proverb. 

 

 

[Mono]

34 minutes ago, Lutalo said:

I think that it should be quite clear to all riders that if you push the wheel beyond its limits it will fail

Maybe it should, but it clearly isn't. Clearly, not everyone is reading technical forums or is ready to work through the physics of understanding the limitations of electric motors and the mechanics of tiltback. I can totally understand that a casual consumer does not expect a product to fail by design in an entirely unsafe way. It doesn't look like a solution to assume that this failure should be clear to all riders.

[Lutalo]

 

25 minutes ago, Mono said:

Clearly, not everyone is reading technical forums or is ready to work through the physics of understanding the limitations of electric motors and the mechanics of tiltback.

If reading the safety warnings in the user manual is too exhausting for these individuals. Then, I suppose "shooting themselves to see if the bullets work" will have to do. 

[Scatcat]

It seems is not exactly intuitive for someone not familiar with electric motors, that the sign you've reached max speed is that you have zero torque.

It should be, since it is entirely logical. If it were otherwise, there would be no max speed......... And if you have zero torque in a self balancing vehicle, it should be just as logical that is a Bad Thing™. After all, torque is what keeps you on the wheel, not splattered out on the ground. Torque is also what makes tilt-back possible, so when you ride the final tilt-back, you ride the margin.

Another thing the "let's test the max speed" crowd seems to miss, is the geometry of a self balancing vehicle. It means that when you have no more power to compensate for you leaning forward, the fall will not be a slip and slide like a fall off a bike. It will be a sudden jack-knife effect, as the thing that drove you forward just became a dead weight anchor for your feet. If you're bloody fast you may get your feet on the ground and try to run at 50 kph - which of course you can't - then you will fall flat as a fish on hands, elbows, knees and if you're unlucky, your head.

Even with protection, there is nothing. REPEAT nothing on the market, that can brace your arms and shoulders well enough to compensate for a stiff impact. The likelihood of a major breakage in your hands, arms or shoulders at 50 kph is pretty close to unity. Good padding with D3O may lessen the impact some, maybe stop the breakage at a fracture level, but don't bet on it.

I've fallen at 30 kph because of an electrical fault, and that's no joke. I had an MC-jacket with built in padding, wrist braces, and knee pads. I avoided breaking anything, but even so I had a few days of seriously overstretched and sore muscles. I had to scrap the bloody expensive helmet, and be happy about it, since it did its job. The scratches in the knee pads, shows exactly what would have happened with my knees had I not worn them. The scratches on the skid-plates on my wrist braces likewise. I'm an old skater, and have fallen more times than I care to remember, which is probably why I walked away with no serious injury. My language as I stood up probably earned me some decades in purgatory (if I had been a catholic that is  )

[Master Ong]

After watching this video, riding with no protection I barely get up to 15mph/ 24km now. Woosh

[eddiemoy]

Weird thing is in his previous videos he at least was wearing a helmet.  Kind of like when i fell on my boosted board, i was wearing full gear except on the day that i fell.  LMAO.