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My first face plant - ouch


JimB

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Well I've been riding for a few months and today did my first face-plant.

I was stopped at an intersection downtown (lots of people to witness my failure).  I started to accelerate hard across a wide intersection, and about 15 feet out, my trusty Lhotz gave up and just dumped me forward.  Have to say I wasn't expecting that.  I can understand overleaning, where the wheel can't keep up, but this felt like the pedals just gave way and dropped me.

I hit pretty ungracefully on hands, then head.  Thankfully I was wearing a helmet, as it did smack the pavement pretty hard.  Several people came running over - are you all right?

Minor scrapes on hands and knee.  I think I hyper-extended my right elbow.  Got it on ice.

I think I'll be a little more cautious with wild acceleration.

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I always like reading face-planting stories.  Not because I take delight in people hurting themselves but because it is a reminder for the rest of us that EU riders should never get too comfortable and over confident.  Helps the rest of us to regain a little bit of focus which we may have lost from the last face-plant story and in that I believe will help someone reading this not to get injured because they have gotten a little more vigilant.

Glad you were wearing a helmet could have been much worse if you weren't.  Maybe a good idea to invest in gloves, elbow / knee pads.  Entirely up to yourself of cause.  Some elbow pads also help to prevent hyper extensions too.

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12 hours ago, JimB said:

<snip>

I think I'll be a little more cautious with wild acceleration.

Yep, I tend to more slowly accelerate (and decelerate) now. Good that nothing too bad happened to you. Unfortunately you probably forever dissuaded a bunch of people from ever trying an EUC ;) 

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Thanks for sharing your story. As Chuts wrote, it helps to stay alert at all times.

 

As a fellow Lhotz rider, may I ask the conditions under which this happened? Especially interested in  rider weight, battery status, speed at incident, any incline in the game? How long have you been riding?

My Lhotz never shut down on me until now, just overleaned it once on a incline at low speed, so I could easily run it off. But one time I didn't see a pothole in the dark while riding through a forrest at ~20 kph... Bam. Was wearing leather gloves and helmet, as well as winter clothing. Helmet didn't contact ground, but my knees did so rather unpleasently. One was bruised for a week, so no major problems. I was a bit lucky that I hit the forrest ground and not tarmac...

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11 minutes ago, Slaughthammer said:

As a fellow Lhotz rider, may I ask the conditions under which this happened? Especially interested in  rider weight, battery status, speed at incident, any incline in the game? How long have you been riding?

I've been riding for a few months.  Have about 140km on the wheel.  Weight about 170 lbs with my backpack.  Plenty of juice in the battery.  I finished the day at 60%, and the fall was before a long/serious hill climb.  I'd guess the battery was about 80% at time of the fall.  Wheel is set to "sport" mode and 30 km/h.

Prior to the fall, I had ridden about a half mile at casual speeds.

I was stopped at a light.  Crosswalk was actually red, but it's a 5-way intersection and cars rarely come in the direction I was crossing.  Several pedestrians were already crossing, so I decided to zip across as well.  Ground was level, maybe some minor unevenness in the pavement, but nothing significant.  I started away from the curb, and then accelerated very hard (probably the quickest I've tried to accelerate).  About 15 feet into the intersection, the pedals just gave way and fell forward.

It happened really fast.  I didn't notice any warning or tilt-back.

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Ok, so that makes this a classic overlean faceplant. Thanks for the info, makes me a bit more confident about the reliabillity of the Lhotz.

Yes, of course this happens fast. If you've been accelerating around max power, you will be at about 16-18 kph after 15 feet. Your knees will be on the ground before you realise you're in trouble ;)

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The EUC is pretty rugged, at least with the more expensive brands. It is assembled in China (by human and or robot) and when exported it is sent on a journey with a mission to be functional and to never return. It is designed to self protect itself from harm by shutting off under engineering defined situations of position and current demand. It does a pretty good job of that except in cases like 'idling' where the electronics take a beating transferring large current flows quickly and repeatedly changing the momentum an up to 200+ pound load back and forth. It amazes me how riders can shake the devil out of the electronics by choosing certain rough terrain and the circuit boards components continue to be attached and functional. Learning how to ride safely the rider finds the 'edge' of the envelope where the demands made by a rider impinge on the built in electronic safeguards. The EUC doesn't respond like a fuel injected or carburated combustion engine. It turns itself off to protect itself when demand exceeds capability. I remember my first EUC where on the third or so day if use it  sort of gave way under me and I continued falling forward. I could have handled the request for more speed but the generic EUC could not provide it. I was shocked at being abnormally positioned and leaning forward in space above ground that got closer with each passing moment.

I guess I've learned to 'request' forward power from my EUC without attempting to 'demand' power. You can put the pedal to the metal but only so far. Enough lean to request power works but too much lean is looking for trouble because the EUC is designed to protect itself by shutting off.

The EUC survives either way but the rider fares more favourably in the more conservative power request.

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26 minutes ago, JimB said:

and then accelerated very hard (probably the quickest I've tried to accelerate).  About 15 feet into the intersection, the pedals just gave way and fell forward.

Firstly, glad you're mostly ok.  Secondly, thanks for sharing your embarrassing moment for our education.  Now, re my quote of you; so now that you have " explored the limits" of your machine, and found this one the hard way, I bet you won't try that again.

what other limits are you planning on exploring? Choose one or more:

too big a hole to climb out of

too steep a hill to climb

too steep a hill to descend 

fast up ramp with low battery

too big a rock/curb to climb

braking too hard

---

i know! I know!, there's so many to choose from.

ps get some wrist guards, they're invaluable 

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I also had that kind of fall, because I wanted to show off a wheel when some tourists were looking at me, but my worst fall was because I did not know that the wheel has the safety or warning system (tilbak) and I skipped the wheel thinking that Wheel was disconnected, the second to see you jump from the wheel, the knee I moved out and been quite lame and sore for months, even now I continue with discomfort behind the knee, learning is sometimes painful
 

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29 minutes ago, Smoother said:

what other limits are you planning on exploring? Choose one or more:

too big a hole to climb out of

too steep a hill to climb

too steep a hill to descend 

fast up ramp with low battery

too big a rock/curb to climb

braking too hard

LOL.  Well I've tried:

* Braking too hard - landed, less painfully, on my butt

* Climbing too steep a hill - overcurrent warning and stepped off

* Too big a curb to climb - that's about 1 inch for me, but just hop off, slow speed

I'm a bit worried about descending the steep hill, I've been getting more daring and going a little faster.

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Horseback riding injuries and EUC face planting (or falls) have parallels (injury recovery wise). The horseback rider also falls a greater distance. Both the EUC rider and the horseback rider wear (at least) head protection. The conflict of man vs animal is causative for many horseback riding injuries while man vs machine is causative for many EUC injuries. The recovery from injury (both physical and mental) in horseback riding and EUC riding is similar. I found a forum on horseback riding and did a keyword search for terms like 'fall', 'wrist', 'injury' and came up with a few posts that were interesting for me to read. Horseback riding has maintained a large and loyal following over decades as a significant sport of interest among both young and old. The sport of horseback riding has lived on despite its lesser talked about injury scenarios on a typical private property setting which is  away from traffic and pedestrians.

16 hours ago, JimB said:

I hit pretty ungracefully on hands, then head.

 

http://www.horseforum.com/horse-riding/what-your-worst-horse-related-injury-60254/

http://www.horseforum.com/horse-riding/helmets-injuries-some-studies-long-81416/

http://www.horseforum.com/rider-wellness/long-time-injury-thoughts-737906/

http://www.horseforum.com/general-off-topic-discussion/fractured-both-my-knee-wrist-35248/

http://www.horseforum.com/new-horses/sore-stiff-wrist-remedy-anyone-387097/

http://www.horseforum.com/general-off-topic-discussion/broken-wrist-sprained-wrist-120063/

a horseback riders first 'official' fall

http://www.horseforum.com/horse-riding/first-official-fall-742281/

 

I hope this helps. An institution I once worked for provided horseback riding instruction. Upon falling off a horse the unfallen riders would shout 'cookies', meaning that the fallen rider would receive a traditional gift of cookies to eat following the fall.

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Horse riders fall from about 8 feet.  Pretty hard to eat cookies without any teeth ?  Still I'll try it next time I land a short flight, maybe a passer by will bring me some cookies. But knowing the terrain I ride ill already have dog shit,. I mean dog cookies in my mouth ☹️

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4 hours ago, Slaughthammer said:

Ok, so that makes this a classic overlean faceplant. .... If you've been accelerating around max power, you will be at about 16-18 kph after 15 feet. Your knees will be on the ground before you realise you're in trouble ;)

The Airwheel X3 is pretty low powered, so I can intentionally induce this sort of failure anytime, for practice.  The first time it happened to me I instinctively ran off without injury, so I tried it again and found out how easy it is.  The wheel won't even have a chance to beep, much less tilt back, if you launch aggressively enough.  It's kind of fun, in a stupid way.  Good practice for running off, I guess, but pretty hard on the wheel.

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3 hours ago, JimB said:

 

I'm a bit worried about descending the steep hill, I've been getting more daring and going a little faster.

Faster down a steep hill?  No no that's not good. Gravity makes you slide further, and the fall is further too.  Slow and easy, and be prepared to jump off.  

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58 minutes ago, Ombre said:

The Airwheel X3 is pretty low powered, so I can intentionally induce this sort of failure anytime, for practice.  The first time it happened to me I instinctively ran off without injury, so I tried it again and found out how easy it is.  The wheel won't even have a chance to beep, much less tilt back, if you launch aggressively enough.  It's kind of fun, in a stupid way.  Good practice for running off, I guess, but pretty hard on the wheel.

Lol - never saw it that way: EUCs of the airwheel breed may be the only ones allowing you to explore the edges of the "safe envelope" without imminent pain when you found the limits. Try the same on a GotWay and it's gonna hurt.

Problem is: with most other machines we use, we are conditioned to the telling signs of 'close calls': screaching tires, screaming engines, cracking noises before something brakes. EUCs don't give us any of these signs. You can accelerate hard and use 99.9% of available power and it feels and sounds perfectly healthy and ok. There is no way of knowing, how close the call just was. There may not even be a beep if your power demand was very short.

I believe, there is a lot of room for improvement. Present EUCs know 3 very poor methods of feedback from the wheel to the rider (not counting app functions): the beeper, tilt back and some have voice alarms. Out of these 3, tilt back and voice are way to slow to help with overleans. That leaves the silly beeper. Why silly? Because out of all the different sounds a human ear can hear, those stupid beepers produce exactly one. So, with overspeed alarms, they resort to something like morse code: 1st alarm - 1 beep per second, 2nd alarm - 2 beeps per second, etc.  In the age of carefully engineered sound of car doors closing, how poor is that? Plus: exactly the same beeps are used for speed alarms, triggered by reaching a certain speed (regardless of power used) and by consuming >80% of available power. Thus, the more daring types amongst us tend to hear those beeps quite regularly - without punishment for this ignorance 99% of the time.

When accelerating close to the limits, I want to hear a high pitch noise with increasing distortion the closer I get to disaster. When my wheel is just a hair away from cutting power to save it from burning something, it should not sound happy and healthy, it should sound tormented and panicked! No rocket science required to make that happen; no costly components either. 

@Linnea Lin Gotway can you discuss that thought with your developers, please? That would be one very affordable feature for GW to lead the competition.

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7 hours ago, Slaughthammer said:

Ok, so that makes this a classic overlean faceplant. Thanks for the info, makes me a bit more confident about the reliabillity of the Lhotz.

Yes, of course this happens fast. If you've been accelerating around max power, you will be at about 16-18 kph after 15 feet. Your knees will be on the ground before you realise you're in trouble ;)

It doesn't need to happen fast. The controller could easily detect in advance whether the wheel gets close to its limits and start to soften the pedals ahead in time. This does require a somewhat sophisticated programming, but it is by no means impossible. My (old) Gotway MCM2s gets weak in limit situations such that I have usually enough time to react, but the difference could of course also be in the riding style.

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21 minutes ago, Tilmann said:

I believe, there is a lot of room for improvement. Present EUCs know 3 very poor methods of feedback from the wheel to the rider (not counting app functions): the beeper, tilt back and some have voice alarms.

I believe to have seen at least two more ways to give feed back: 4) vibration and 5) change of riding mode from hard to soft. Both are to my experience pretty effective.

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2 hours ago, Ombre said:

The Airwheel X3 is pretty low powered, so I can intentionally induce this sort of failure anytime, for practice.  The first time it happened to me I instinctively ran off without injury, so I tried it again and found out how easy it is.  The wheel won't even have a chance to beep, much less tilt back, if you launch aggressively enough.  It's kind of fun, in a stupid way.  Good practice for running off, I guess, but pretty hard on the wheel.

Another reason Airwheel is a good learner wheel.  You get to practice cutoff at slow enough speed to minimize injury.

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20 minutes ago, Mono said:

I believe to have seen at least two more ways to give feed back: 4) vibration and 5) change of riding mode from hard to soft. Both are to my experience indeed pretty effective.

Thanks for completing the list. I never had a chance to try that vibration feedback feature, so I can't judge. With an intentional change from hard to soft riding characteristics in critical situations: I have not heard of that strategy and especially with overleans, I'm puzzled how that could help. To me, "soft" means a slightly delayed reaction of the wheel. When I am overstressing my wheel from start by leaning too much forward, wouldn't a softer reaction lead me to lean even further? Consequently needing even more power to maintain balance?

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This is still a little off topic.

In the steeplechase YouTube video over 12 horses start and realistically only the top 4 finish competitively. Ouch...many falls of horse and rider. A really rough ride to watch for entertainment.

 

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2 hours ago, Tilmann said:

Thanks for completing the list. I never had a chance to try that vibration feedback feature, so I can't judge. With an intentional change from hard to soft riding characteristics in critical situations: I have not heard of that strategy and especially with overleans, I'm puzzled how that could help. To me, "soft" means a slightly delayed reaction of the wheel. When I am overstressing my wheel from start by leaning too much forward, wouldn't a softer reaction lead me to lean even further?

Not quite. One cannot lean instantaneously. Soft pedals mean essentially that the target angle under acceleration is large. If the pedal is softer than expected one needs a large inclination angle to get the expected acceleration, one has to push down the front foot more than expected. So a softer reaction leads to push the foot more down, but this is not the same as lean even further. The necessity to push the feet more than expected is a strong feed back to not lean more, well, at least it has proven to work well for me. When it happens, it really gets my adrenalin going. Of course, one can ignore any "sign" coming from the wheel and just "immediately" lean as hard as possible. There is a name for that, but I won't name names here.

Quote

Consequently needing even more power to maintain balance?

I don't think the power needed depends on the angle of the pedal.

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