Jump to content

How to ride an electric unicycle - understanding the dynamics


John Eucist

Recommended Posts

@MR BRAD Disable tiltback (or maximize the speed) and see what happens then. Maybe something's wrong with your wheel? You could try if a calibration from the app changes anything. What's your weight? Are you so heavy that even a slight acceleration at low speed brings the wheel to its knees?

Never hurts to ask ewheels. Also about your tiltback issue. Maybe your board is just bad.

Did you ever do a range test or do you have some range vs battery % numbers? Just to check if that sounds ok.

Edited by meepmeepmayer
  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, /Dev/Null said:

@MR BRAD:  I started at 20 or 25km/h.  20 is only slightly more than 16, why not raise it to that & see if you still feel like the wheel is fighting you?

I'm currently @ 30 and I did some carving in a skate park & I scraped the pedals twice I think due to lean angle :)  It's fun, and it will come more & more naturally.  What PSI are you riding at ?  The wheel should be more agile @ higher PSI.  

Thanks @/Dev/Null. I’ll try to increase the speed limit (though I’m literally hitting tilt back at about half speed - not always, but quite a bit. I currently have the PSI at 35-38. 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

34 minutes ago, meepmeepmayer said:

@MR BRAD Disable tiltback (or maximize the speed) and see what happens then. Maybe something's wrong with your wheel? You could try if a calibration from the app changes anything. What's your weight? Are you so heavy that even a slight acceleration at low speed brings the wheel to its knees?

Never hurts to ask ewheels. Also about your tiltback issue. Maybe your board is just bad.

Did you ever do a range test or do you have some range vs battery % numbers? Just to check if that sounds ok.

Thanks @meepmeepmayer. I’ll ask @Jason to weigh in. I’ll follow your advice with a calibration (hopefully I can figure that out - I’m guessing there is a reset sort of function?). I’ll increase the speed limit after I try the calibration (I’ll try one thing at a time?). I haven’t come close to hitting a range test (I think I have about five miles on the wheel and less than three total hours). I’ll see if I can check the battery and range values tomorrow and respond. 
 

As for weight, I’m 170 pounds (sorry, I should have added that to my post initially).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@MR BRADSounds like you are making good progress. :thumbup:

16km/h is really slow. That is less than 10 mph. I go faster than that in my living room sometimes. Don't tell my wife! :ph34r:  

For some reason while learning to ride some people hit a 13 mph or 20 km/h speed limit wall until they get more experience. They just don't feel comfortable above 20km/h.  I would set it at about 20kp/h and keep comfortably under that.  

:cheers:

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The Jason you mean is @Jason McNeil. I guess he knows best what your symptoms (unexplained tiltbacks) mean.

Calibration is somewhere in the Inmotion app. I think it has a nice picture tutorial of what to do (put the wheel on its bumper and press the button).

170 lbs is nothing for a wheel like a V10. Maybe it really is just a slightly bad board (if changing the settings and calibrating doesn't work).

Edited by meepmeepmayer
  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

20 minutes ago, RockyTop said:

@MR BRADSounds like you are making good progress. :thumbup:

16km/h is really slow. That is less than 10 mph. I go faster than that in my living room sometimes. Don't tell my wife! :ph34r:  

For some reason while learning to ride some people hit a 13 mph or 20 km/h speed limit wall until they get more experience. They just don't feel comfortable above 20km/h.  I would set it at about 20kp/h and keep comfortably under that.  

:cheers:

Thanks @RockyTop. I actually meant 16MPH (so I think I’m above the 20KPH). Your secret is safe with me. My wife would kill me too! 😃

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

20 minutes ago, meepmeepmayer said:

The Jason you mean is @Jason McNeil. I guess he knows best what your symptoms (unexplained tiltbacks) mean.

Calibration is somewhere in the Inmotion app. I think it has a nice picture tutorial of what to do (put the wheel on its bumper and press the button).

170 lbs is nothing for a wheel like a V10. Maybe it really is just a slightly bad board (if changing the settings and calibrating doesn't work).

Thanks @meepmeepmayer. I appreciate the @Jason McNeil correction! I actually just sent him an email with a rehash of my observations. I’m sure he will have valuable input too. At least I’m getting closer to being a real member of this club! :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@MR BRAD it os possible someone miss typed the S/N wrong during manual registration of their wheel. 

The interesting part is how much mileage your wheel has done so far. Also in the inmotion app you can do a wheel diagnostic. 

I think reaching out to ewheels is the right way anyway. 

Next tip is to start a thread under inmotion as this here is moving away from this thread topic. You can copy a link of your earlier posts to that new thread if you like. 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

 

15 hours ago, Mookie said:

 Is it good to learn to ride/mount ambidextrously?

I’d echo what you said, ”might come in handy”. I still can’t do it on my weaker side, even after riding for over 20000km. But there have been situations where it would’ve been more practical to start with the weak leg. Instead I’ve had to do a clumsy switch of sides.

15 hours ago, Mookie said:

did a wide turn like in the videos perhaps 8mph, the physics didn't quite work the way I expected and I spilled.

Yeah... seeing someone else do it and having learned it oneself are indeed different skills. Some riders make some things look so easy you’d never imagine how hard they are before you try them yourself.

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 12/25/2019 at 5:23 AM, Mookie said:

 Is it good to learn to ride/mount ambidextrously?

In theory, yes. In practice, dunno. What is handy (and it comes with learning this) is that you will be able to lift one foot while riding without getting completely unstable. It makes repositioning your feet a lot easier. I can do this no problem with my right foot, but I can't with my left. When I start riding my right foot is the one on the ground so I am used to one-footed riding like that. 

 

Edited by ir_fuel
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 12/25/2019 at 5:23 AM, Mookie said:

Is it good to learn to ride/mount ambidextrously?

Besides that one needs to learn it, I can't see any disadvantages, while there are advantages (as already mentioned above). Are they decisive? I don't know either. I do see it as a relevant safety feature that I can tap either of my feet (with weight) on the street surface while riding, which is a similar though not identical skill to roll-in mounting.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 hours ago, Mono said:

Besides that one needs to learn it, I can't see any disadvantages, while there are advantages (as already mentioned above). Are they decisive? I don't know either. I do see it as a relevant safety feature that I can tap either of my feet (with weight) on the street surface while riding, which is a similar though not identical skill to roll-in mounting.

I have noticed some riders (youtube) will put one knee forward a bit and use their extended foot to push down, rather than leaning forward so much.   I watch their feet on the pedals and their footwork is pristine.  Must take years to get that good.  Looks like it would provide a better outcome in case of crash though.

Edited by Mookie
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Mookie said:

I have noticed some riders (youtube) will put one knee forward a bit and use their extended foot to push down, rather than leaning forward so much.

You might be describing an offset/staggered foot positioning, where the other foot is positioned more forward than the other. It can provide more stability and make it easier to accelerate and brake hard, especially on the MSX or other large wheels that require a lot of leaning.

1 hour ago, Mookie said:

Looks like it would provide a better outcome in case of crash though.

Not sure if there is a notable difference. Crashes tend to make one land in a random position, since one will inavoidingly try to regain balance by throwing hands in the air, crouching, and other bodily movements as one’s film of life passes in front of one’s eyes...

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 11/8/2019 at 11:29 AM, NerdAlert said:

Nerd alert/warning... If the angular momentum (moment of inertia x angular velocity) of the unicycle wheel were significant enough ... This is more apparent on motorcycles where the moment of inertia of the wheel and the angular velocity are much more significant

So a greater moment of inertia should be helpful.  Bigger wheel size (easy to do) and more weight concentrated around the rim -- rather harder; maybe those wheel balancing weights they use on cars? Probably insufficient, I expect you'd need several kilograms of lead to feel any effect!

Presumably if you could keep an independently spinning mass (perhaps a dummy wheel, with slightly smaller radius, alongside the real one) you could stay balanced while moving very slowly, or even stationary. That would make the wheel far more practical as a transport rather than a fun machine. Hint for wheel designers ... ;)   Though I suspect there would be a price to pay, like you would probably be spinning round on the spot. Any physics experts care to comment?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, Ancient Wheeler said:

So a greater moment of inertia should be helpful.

Not for a zippy wheel though.

4 hours ago, Ancient Wheeler said:

Presumably if you could keep an independently spinning mass (perhaps a dummy wheel, with slightly smaller radius, alongside the real one) you could stay balanced while moving very slowly, or even stationary. That would make the wheel far more practical as a transport rather than a fun machine. Hint for wheel designers ... ;)   Though I suspect there would be a price to pay, like you would probably be spinning round on the spot. Any physics experts care to comment?

Now there’s an idea! This could even be something we’ll see in 20+ years.

Two discs with a lot of weight at the edge, spinning forward on both sides of the tire. Their speed would be inversebly related to the vehicle speed, so that the wheel would still turn normally at higher speeds. But at very low speeds, as long as the wheel is upright, they would spin fast enough to create a notable gyroscopic effect, and would both resist the wheel when falling to it’s side as well as help in steering the wheel when trying to tilt it.

The discs must of course accelerate and decelerate quite slowly, otherwise the wheel would be one jerky devil.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I learned by leaning on the wall technique -After I got the feel for the wheel I went to an open area (without cars or pedestrians), lowered my max speed via app to 6mph, and let go of the wall. I went on a straight line until I stopped flapping my arms for balance-in all it took about 8 hrs to accomplish -it took longer to successfully loop around and doing tight turns. The key for me was to ignore my fear of falling at high speeds. After a while, I increased speed on app, but once you get it- what a sweet ride it is-

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

2 hours ago, Mookie said:

What is the best foot position?

I haven’t checked where my ankle bones are, but at the center of the wheel does sound just a bit forward for me.

The optimal place for me is where braking is slightly more effortless than accelerating. In the beginning I did a few very short accelerations and brakings to get a feel for the position, then adjust accordingly.

 

2 hours ago, Mookie said:

Sorta squat down and bend the knees, let the thighs absorb the shock.  Last week, when I saw a sidewalk crack, I would brake while going over the bump, cuz it felt more stable that way.

Having the knees bent does exactly that, it gives you shock absorbers!

Whenever the wheel goes over a bump, curb or other obstacle, it slows down a bit because a part of the kinetic forward motion gets transformed to a vertical one. So leaning back a bit for bumps makes a lot of sense, as it’s then easier to keep the balance.

Also, instead of just squatting for obstacles which increases your downwards pressure on the wheel for a short moment, I hop a bit just before the obstacle and make sure my weight is pressing on the wheel as little as possible at the obstacle. That makes the obstacles go smoothest for me.

2 hours ago, Mookie said:

   Hitting a bump unexpectedly is a scary thing.  Very important to have eagle eyes.

Many of us constantly ride with slightly bent knees exactly because of this. Lock your knees and a surprise bump will set you flying upwards while the wheel itself slows down a bit. Like an ejecting seat on a fighter jet.

 

2 hours ago, Mookie said:

Like folks invested in the horse and buggy during the advent of the Automobile.

:roflmao:

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 hours ago, mrelwood said:

The optimal place for me is where braking is slightly more effortless than accelerating. In the beginning I did a few very short accelerations and brakings to get a feel for the position, then adjust accordingly.

This is exactly what I do.  If my feet are too far back, when I brake it feels like Im gonna drop off the back of the wheel.  Too far forward and it gets wobbly.  Gotta find that sweet spot.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

18 hours ago, mrelwood said:

Now there’s an idea! This could even be something we’ll see in 20+ years.

Maybe not that long, if some creative engineering type spots this post!

Quote

Two discs with a lot of weight at the edge, spinning forward on both sides of the tire. Their speed would be inversely related to the vehicle speed ... The discs must of course accelerate and decelerate quite slowly, otherwise the wheel would be one jerky devil.

The speed relation could be achieved very simply, no extra smart electronics needed, just a mechanical differential connecting the main wheel to the gyro wheels, and driven by an extra motor running at constant speed. The sum of the two spin rates would then be constant, and if the MOI of the gyro wheels matched that of the main wheel, the angular momentum would be constant, and so balancing would be equally easy at all speeds. In theory! Note that the wheel would still not be self-balancing sideways, but the rider should easily be able to stay balanced while stationary - a bonus in traffic.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...