Inmotion "V13" announcement forthcoming!

[Lieven]

13 hours ago, yoos said:

This approach is used in some scooters, bicycles and motorcycles and looks very cool. But it's impossible in an EUC: you need pedals on either side of the wheel and you need a shell to protect your legs from the wheel on either side. You could make one side easily detachable - like a clamshell body where the wheel is attached to only one halfshell and the other one is easy to flip up. But this would compromise rigidity (or you would need to add extra 10-20kg for an exoframe). So the current setup where pedal hangers are directly and firmly attached to either side of the stator/axle seems to make the most sense. Currently what is taking the most time apparently is the multitude of steps to remove layers and most importantly wires that have to be disconnected which usually requires disassembly of the controller box to get to the connectors.

Edit: rereading your sentence, maybe you just meant having all wires enter on just one side? This seems already standard for hollow motors like the V11. But the wires still have to be disconnected so you can extract the wheel.

At one side the attached Engin with all wines one side of the snel and one pedalen, the otter side, the freezing one YouTube place the otter side of theouter  shell attached above with some sort of hingen and locked with the otter pedalen to remove for opening the wheel casino. EasyJet lijken that

[mrelwood]

We don’t have universally swappable batteries even for common e-bikes, so the feature will forever remain a dream for EUCs. It would be a continuous service after all, and there is simply no money for it.

 Like @yoos explained, a one-sided axle is not feasible on an EUC where the weight increase alone would simply kill any possible execution.

 But I have no idea what the new features or functions could be. So far almost everything that’s been suggested simply doesn’t make any sense, and the few that do don’t seem all that practical in the expected size/performance group.

 Voice controlled settings? AI guided pedal sensitivity? Gnnn… January can’t come soon enough!

[Lieven]

1 hour ago, mrelwood said:

We don’t have universally swappable batteries even for common e-bikes, so the feature will forever remain a dream for EUCs. It would be a continuous service after all, and there is simply no money for it.

Kingsong had one model with swappable batterypacks, it was not successful in it's days

[Lieven]

1 hour ago, mrelwood said:

Voice controlled settings? AI guided pedal sensitivity? Gnnn… January can’t come soon enough

Real brakes, at least assisted:-)

[yoos]

21 minutes ago, Lieven said:

Real brakes, at least assisted:-)

There is actually a valid reason for an EUC to have mechanical brakes: to prevent overcharging (both in the sense of too high voltage and in the sense of too high charging current). But using high-current batteries and perhaps larger capacitors to increase the potency of motor braking is a better solution.

To fit mechanical brakes you would have to make an even wider EUC body and servicing the brakes would be a nightmare. And the brakes would indeed require frequent servicing because they must be reliable and predictable enough for balancing to work. It would work like that: if strong braking is required the EUC engages mechanical brake and uses electromagnetic torque to complement/correct the mechanical braking torque to achieve the desired smooth braking torque. Note that this torque must be reliably tuned to prevent the pedals from jerking caused by the unevenness of mechanical braking. 

 

Edited December 12, 2021 by yoos

[Forwardnbak]

About time hover is included, slay them sets of stairs in style. 

[Unventor]

On 12/12/2021 at 11:55 AM, Lieven said:

Kingsong had one model with swappable batterypacks, it was not successful in it's days

They made a solution but it was too little too expensive vs buying a different wheel with bigger overall battery pack. The thing is to make it ridged enough and not having risk at the connection point and to be able to balance between 2 or 3 different battery levels. All of this is not easy to do and keep price down.

[Forwardnbak]

14 hours ago, Unventor said:

They made a solution but it was too little too expensive vs buying a different wheel with bigger overall battery pack. The thing is to make it ridged enough and not having risk at the connection point and to be able to balance between 2 or 3 different battery levels. All of this is not easy to do and keep price down.

Waterproofing the battery would also be a slight issue maybe? I would love the option to carry spare bat packs.  

[mrelwood]

The reality is that if swappable batteries were introduced, they would cost closer to a grand per 1000Wh. I think the V10F battery was quoted as 800€, and that is without a shell, connecting mechanism, and the added complexity of the swappable BMS.

[Unventor]

Now I know very little about the wheel Inmotion will share information about at some point in January. 

So this is what I think right now about swappable batteries. 

One thing that we wish to happen in future another is what I expect to happen. Yes it was raised they are looking into this. But we have not heard anything since then. 

Swappable battery pack do give some nice options but it also interduce some new problems that needs to be resolved. Since the battery is the bloodline of an EUC I am not sure we have seen solutions just yet that makes swappable possible at minimal risks. This comes down to the voltage and stored power inside the battery packs we used right now. Compared to an ebicycle our battery pack are much more powerful since we don't have have the option to pedal power like on a bicycle. 

[Hellkitten]

There are a bunch of electric skateboard companies that make swappable battery packs. They’ve been doing it for a few years now. The packs are generally smaller, but they face similar issues with the technology. I’d love to see separate modular packs on wheels. 

[Unventor]

4 hours ago, Hellkitten said:

There are a bunch of electric skateboard companies that make swappable battery packs. They’ve been doing it for a few years now. The packs are generally smaller, but they face similar issues with the technology. I’d love to see separate modular packs on wheels. 

I don't recall seeing any using multi packs. And they don't rely on battery for static balance. So I don't see these are facing same issues. 

Don't get me wrong. I have given Inmotion feedback about this during pre-launch period of V11. We discussed the benafits it could bring.

And I think that was part reason to why CEO mentioned they will look at in one of the faq interviews from V11 release period. 

Unfortunately this is not as simple to do as one would think. 

[mrelwood]

22 hours ago, Hellkitten said:

There are a bunch of electric skateboard companies that make swappable battery packs. They’ve been doing it for a few years now. The packs are generally smaller, but they face similar issues with the technology. I’d love to see separate modular packs on wheels. 

Skateboards generally have half the voltage, and can be physically balanced with a single pack. EUCs don’t and can’t. Single pack wheels like the V10F might’ve been able to pull this off with a reasonable increase in size, dual pack wheels simply can’t.

While dual pack wheels could surely technically be able to do it (considering already the ingenious lighting system humans have built for our flat earth for example… ), there has to be a point for it all. As @Unventor pointed out, relying on swappable batteries can work for multi-wheel vehicles, but pulling large amps riding on a single wheel at 40mph, the pack voltages, ages and cell voltages as well simply must be well balanced, and none of the connectors can be oxidized from little use over several years of wild riding in dirty conditions.

Considering that no current EUC can even monitor individual cell group voltages, the leap would simply be to great, in the part of the wheel that absolutely must be working hard, continuously, predictably and reliably.

I wouldn’t take the plunge as a customer. Even with Inmotion.

[Kekafuch]

With multiple wheels , the amount of battery stored is getting crazy. I can only ride one at a time. Would be great to have one set of batteries and controller shared amongst 2 wheels. 

[mrelwood]

3 hours ago, Kekafuch said:

With multiple wheels , the amount of battery stored is getting crazy. I can only ride one at a time. Would be great to have one set of batteries and controller shared amongst 2 wheels. 

It sure would! Just like in motorcycles , we can suck the gasoline and swap the ECU unit to the one we use that day… Not the same? Ok. Well, in bicycles we can simply swap the saddle and handlebars to the active bicycle, right? And aren’t the tires on quick locks for this exact reason as well? 

Kidding aside, I do agree that it would be helpful for a few users. It’s just simply not enough for it to actually happen.

[Unventor]

5 hours ago, Kekafuch said:

With multiple wheels , the amount of battery stored is getting crazy. I can only ride one at a time. Would be great to have one set of batteries and controller shared amongst 2 wheels. 

It also has to do with duty cycle of a battery and risk of degration over time. 

There are both pro and cons to this. Now Inmotion made a public video faq interview that they are looking into this. It is not the same as it is scrapped or that it will happen for sure. 

What I really like a lot is Inmotion listened and see what they can do. Same when people suggested suspension on EUC. For long the concensus was it was impossible. Yet now we see it slowly becoming a new normal. 

My prediction is this need net battery tech before it happens. And that this could add additional cost to each wheel. Once you move into solid state batteries with faster charging, a lot less risk of thermal runaway and maybe better balancing options then I could see a better foundation for swappable batteries. 

It also comes with how easy for people to do and understanding risks of the process. Exposed terminals are not great solution. 

Time will tell if my prediction is semi right or totally wrong. 

[Rotan]

I really don't care about swappable batteries so I'd not spend more money to get that feature.

I'd rather see a build that enables smooth tyre changes, having to do a tyre change is a recurring nightmare right now. 

I don't know about new mindblowing features... I'd like safety systems to prevent faceplants in case of hardware failures but I doubt it's even possible 

[Wolverine]

16 hours ago, Rotan said:

I'd like safety systems to prevent faceplants in case of hardware failures but I doubt it's even possible 

It is possible and it is already done in our environment in different fields. The systems are duplicated and even tripled to make them failure proof / fail safe. Good examples are the metro, elevators, lifts, amusement park attractions, self-driving cars, state IT systems, bank IT systems, trams, trains, power plants, hospitals, cars, robots, electric hand tools, traffic lights etc. These systems and devices are all around us. There is nothing difficult to develop fail safe system that protects the rider from faceplants. It just needs will, money, time, and a lot of tests. As I have heard, one manufacturer is already developing such a system for euc. Its only a matter of time.

[mrelwood]

5 hours ago, Wolverine said:

It is possible and it is already done in our environment in different fields. The systems are duplicated and even tripled to make them failure proof / fail safe. Good examples are the metro, elevators, lifts, amusement park attractions, self-driving cars, state IT systems, bank IT systems, trams, trains, power plants, hospitals, cars, robots, electric hand tools, traffic lights etc. These systems and devices are all around us. There is nothing difficult to develop fail safe system that protects the rider from faceplants. It just needs will, money, time, and a lot of tests. As I have heard, one manufacturer is already developing such a system for euc. Its only a matter of time.

The main problem with duplicating systems is actually already in the name of our vehicle… 

IPS tried to do something related with their i5 and it’s big brother that didn’t get to see the light of day before the company went under. Was the i5 safer than the competition? To my understanding, no.

I don’t think the hardware issues we have should be solved by adding more stuff. Most of the problems seem to be simply bad design or QC. Doubling the same bad design or QC doesn’t sound like the correct solution to me. Frankly, it sounds a bit… hmm, Gotwayish. 

[Wolverine]

2 hours ago, mrelwood said:

Doubling the same bad design or QC doesn’t sound like the correct solution to me.

You are right in that, fortunately no one has claimed that. If you know that the systems have quality problems or design flaws, there is no point in duplicating this particular system or make it fail-safe. This is not how you fix the problem.

 

There are two possible options for making a fail-safe system: 1. make the same system as the original system and run it as duplicate, or 2. make a system with a different architecture and the same functionality as the first system and use it as back-up/fail-safe system. It is often the first option that is used without thinking about what is really needed. Okay, what do we need? We want to protect the driver from possible faceplant. In order to protect the driver from faceplant type of accident, there is no need to duplicate the whole euc system (it would simply be stupid to do that way), all that needs to be done is to develop a proper back-up/fail-safe system that only takes care of avoiding faceplants specifically if the original system fails in that. From the point of view of the system architect it is as simple as it gets.

[Rotan]

Let's go further, why faceplant occurs? Because the motor shuts off. So I see 2 possible approaches: either something that kicks in if the motor goes off, or something that prevents the cutoff, like the pedal tilt. I Think there are other possibilities for both the approaches, at least I have something in mind but to know if it's something actually doable, it's out of my competence

[Unventor]

49 minutes ago, Rotan said:

Let's go further, why faceplant occurs? Because the motor shuts off. So I see 2 possible approaches: either something that kicks in if the motor goes off, or something that prevents the cutoff, like the pedal tilt. I Think there are other possibilities for both the approaches, at least I have something in mind but to know if it's something actually doable, it's out of my competence

Please check the area of how EUC works. What you suggest can't be done. 

[yoos]

33 minutes ago, Rotan said:

motor goes off, or something that prevents the cutoff, like the pedal tilt

You are possibly mixing two things here.

One thing is to prevent a predictable faceplant: the wheel uses beeps and tiltback to notify the rider and to obstruct further acceleration. In this case the wheel knows it is close to 1) an overpower [an event where the controller supplies as much torque as it is allowed by the algorithms but this is not enough to balance. the wheel does not lose consciousness in the process] or 2) an emergency shutdown [where a fuse will be blown or a shutdown will be initiated to safe the wheel internals at the cost of a faceplant. Wheel shuts down for a short duration or indefinitely].

The other thing, that we seem to discuss here are unpredictable, unexpected failures: blown fuses or mosfets without any warning whatsoever, overheat shutdowns that have not been predicted in time, physical failures of contacts and hall sensors and, finally, software errors: glitches, erratic behavior, crashes etc.

Of the latter category physical defects, insufficient QC and inappropriate safety margins in wires, mosfets etc seem to be the number one problem. However, once that is fixed and wheels become ever more sophisticated in terms of algorithms and customization, software glitches and bugs might become an important problem. In that case a backup controller with simplified reliable software could provide a solution, in line with @Wolverine's suggestion.

[Rotan]

No I get it, yes a backup controller is already something good to add, to prevent some some kind of faceplants, while the tilt back only tries to prevent faceplants from overpowering.

So that's something new I'd be happy to see, and if something else jumps in their mind to cover even more possibilities that'd be very interesting

[Lex Smith]

I always smile when someone says  "it can't be done".  Thank God not every one adheres to that attitude otherwise we wouldn't even have light bulbs :-)