Farewell Geek Wheel

[MaxLinux]

Along with the poorly explained (in my opinion) vanishing of Microworks, its interesting Geek Wheel is also gone.

Few EUCs have been as poorly marketed as the Geek Wheel. It's too bad, because a "muscle" EUC with a 14 x 2.5" tire could have propelled Microworks to become a serious player in the EUC market. Maybe with some EUC sales the company could have survived.

Please join me in a moment of silence for the departed:

 

 

[Hunka Hunka Burning Love]

If MicroWorks would have figured some cheaper shipping options I don't see why these couldn't have been a popular starter wheel.  At over $200 USD for shipping alone IIRC, these were never going to show up in North America.  I'm sure they have probably sold off their stock to local distributors.

Smaller shops were able to courier generic wheels to North America for about $100 through DHL so I don't know why they couldn't snag a similar deal.  Maybe they weren't located that close to a major shipping area, and there were no less  expensive shipping available?   I don't know.

Hopefully they will make some sort of come back in the future.  Maybe they are in the process of moving to larger digs closer to major shipping routes and will release a new Gotway 80 kph killer wheel with a 3000w motor and 100 km range.  

@Rein-tech @Lz Lee

[Bob Eisenman]

7 hours ago, MaxLinux said:

vanishing of Microworks,

Using Yandex search engine I found the following URL

https://github.com/EGG-electric-unicycle/documentation/wiki

"PLEASE NOTE: MicroWorks website on Alibaba is currently closed. I contacted Mr. Lee from MicroWorks and got an answer saying they will re-arrange their website in Alibaba in June 2017. Anyone can contact him to buy the components, on skype or whatsapp: - 0086-136 6042 4065 ( whatsapp ) - Skype: lizhigang540"

 

[Rehab1]

3 hours ago, Hunka Hunka Burning Love said:

Smaller shops were able to courier generic wheels to North America for about $100 through DHL so I don't know why they couldn't snag a similar deal.  

I should have set up a DHL account before shipping out the ACM board to Finland via Fedex. They sound much cheaper.

[Philip W]

Amen to the Microworks! Their controller boards greatly benefited some of us in this forum. Too bad their marketing and designing were lacking. I think if they just sell the modules as open-source and allow all kind of mods like lego toys, they might had survived in a niche market. There are people want to buy the cool looking wheels, but also people like me want to be able to attach all kind of things to an EUC, like extra battery bags, or a bike trailer, or a small seat. Most of EUC designs don't welcome mods or add-ons. I hope one day a new wheel will come and change all that.

[Marty Backe]

Maybe the 1980's styling killed it off 

[electric_vehicle_lover]

I think MicroWorks are B2B and should be alive and well, maybe they tried B2C for some time and retreat. Their boards are great and seem to be used in many diferent devices...

[steve454]

12 minutes ago, electric_vehicle_lover said:

I think MicroWorks are B2B and should be alive and well, maybe they tried B2C for some time and retreat. Their boards are great and seem to be used in many diferent devices...

I got the impression that they were marketing to do it yourselfers and that anyone with the expertise could buy the controller and motor and make their own wheel.

[lizardmech]

On 6/2/2017 at 3:52 AM, Philip W said:

I think if they just sell the modules as open-source and allow all kind of mods like lego toys, they might had survived in a niche market.

I don't think any of them will ever be willing to work with open source. I have seen ads on chinese websites selling startup kits for making balancing vehicles, they ask $20,000 for the reference design + code. Many of the smaller manufacturers may not even own the code for their controllers.

[Bob Eisenman]

http://www.tradesparq.com/users/240425/Charles-lee/company/267924/Shenzhen-Microworks-Electronic-Mechanical-Co-Ltd

Shenzhen Microworks Electronic Mechanical Co., Ltd.

A supplier of Geekwheel parts and more based in Shenzhen, China ?

[electric_vehicle_lover]

Sure, Shenzhen, China.

[Philip W]

6 hours ago, lizardmech said:

I don't think any of them will ever be willing to work with open source. I have seen ads on chinese websites selling startup kits for making balancing vehicles, they ask $20,000 for the reference design + code. Many of the smaller manufacturers may not even own the code for their controllers.

They don't need to open all the code. Just provide an API and some space for additional codes, then we can do the rest. You will be amazed what people can do, even just some part is opened. See the Raspberry PI success? That little thing can do millions of things. If there were an interface that allow the EUC connect to a PI, there would be a lot of applications, and EUC would become very smart.

[esaj]

11 minutes ago, Philip W said:

They don't need to open all the code. Just provide an API and some space for additional codes, then we can do the rest. You will be amazed what people can do, even just some part is opened. See the Raspberry PI success? That little thing can do millions of things. If there were an interface that allow the EUC connect to a PI, there would be a lot of applications, and EUC would become very smart.

I don't think the STM32's have an actual operating system, they don't have much program memory (something like 128-1024 kilobytes depending on model), RAM (64-128 kilobytes) or speed (around 72MHz or so?), basically all the software is just one binary that's burned into the device Flash-memory, so you would need the entire code. It's a bit different with embedded systems like the Raspberry PI's using actual real-time operating systems like Linux or such, they usually have high-performance CPUs (gigahertz speeds, possibly multiple cores, so they could easily have 20x more processing power, or more with multiple cores), several hundreds of megabytes of RAM memory (a thousand fold difference) and a separate SD-card or such for the operating system & files (hundreds of megabytes or gigabytes, again about thousand times as much). The PI's and the like are much closer to a general purpose desktop/laptop computer or a cell phone in terms of hardware, the MCUs (microcontroller units) used in the wheels are more like special-purpose minicomputers that don't pack that much punch but put everything in a single chip (like CPU + RAM memory + Flash program memory).

[Philip W]

4 minutes ago, esaj said:

I don't think the STM32's have an actual operating system, they don't have much program memory (something like 128-1024 kilobytes depending on model), RAM (64-128 kilobytes) or speed (around 72MHz or so?), basically all the software is just one binary that's burned into the device Flash-memory, so you would need the entire code. It's a bit different with embedded systems like the Raspberry PI's using actual real-time operating systems like Linux or such, they usually have high-performance CPUs (gigahertz speeds, possibly multiple cores, so they could easily have 20x more processing power, or more with multiple cores), several hundreds of megabytes of RAM memory (a thousand fold difference) and a separate SD-card or such for the operating system & files (hundreds of megabytes or gigabytes, again about thousand times as much). The PI's and the like are much closer to a general purpose desktop/laptop computer or a cell phone in terms of hardware, the MCUs (microcontroller units) used in the wheels are more like special-purpose minicomputers that don't pack that much punch but put everything in a single chip (like CPU + RAM memory + Flash program memory).

Even so, we just need to read the status like the bluetooth adapter does, or maybe able to tell it to go forward or backward. Nothing really complicated. Only want to make it smarter and customizable. Or perhaps the battery covers can be easily open and change to different covers to allow larger batteries? I mean there are many reasons we want to mod the EUCs, but so far all of them are not modder friendly.

[esaj]

1 minute ago, Philip W said:

Even so, we just need to read the status like the bluetooth adapter does, or maybe able to tell it to go forward or backward. Nothing really complicated. Only want to make it smarter and customizable.

Sure, and I'd like to be able to mod them myself too, but the wheel firmware itself must support it. To nitpick, technically, the Bluetooth adapter does not "read" anything from the wheel, it just transmits data the firmware sends (the firmware controls the adapter) and receives what the app/other connected bluetooth device sends to it, which the firmware can then read and "react" to. If the firmware isn't released as open source and doesn't have some sort of API you could call remotely (over Bluetooth or whatever), there's unfortunately not much that can be done. So far, we've had a bunch of custom apps that rely on reverse-engineered protocols from the original apps, but of course they can't access any more data or controls than what the original manufacturer app can.

I don't want to sound pessimistic, hopefully some manufacturer will eventually open up at least some sort of API, if not the entire firmware, but currently there seems to be little we can do with the original boards, although, @electric_vehicle_lover is working on custom firmware for the Microworks boards and @lizardmech is working on custom controller board. But even they have to write the software (including balancing / motor control) themselves and/or piece it together from existing open source software, since they don't have access to the original software.

 

7 minutes ago, Philip W said:

Or perhaps the battery covers can be easily open and change to different covers to allow larger batteries? I mean there are many reasons we want to mod the EUCs, but so far all of them are not modder friendly.

1RadWerkstatt already sells the larger size battery covers and batteries for Ninebots to allow up to 700+Wh packs. 

[Tilmann]

37 minutes ago, esaj said:

...Raspberry PI's using actual real-time operating systems like Linux or such...

Ooops, you're sure? When I try controlling a simple RC servo with a Raspi under the regular Debian distri, that servo gets the shakes big time. No problem to do that with a primitive arduino, but I thought no run-of-the-mill Linux is real-time??? 

[electric_vehicle_lover]

42 minutes ago, Philip W said:

Even so, we just need to read the status like the bluetooth adapter does, or maybe able to tell it to go forward or backward. Nothing really complicated. Only want to make it smarter and customizable. Or perhaps the battery covers can be easily open and change to different covers to allow larger batteries? I mean there are many reasons we want to mod the EUCs, but so far all of them are not modder friendly.

We need to do that ourself and that why I am being helping developing:
Electric Unicycle developer of OpenSource technology:
- 3D printed plastic shell
- simplified schematic of MicroWorks 30B4 board
- firmware for MicroWorks 30B4 board
- Android app for MicroWorks 30B4 board

And many documentation, see here: https://eggelectricunicycle.bitbucket.io/MicroWorks_30B4_board.html

Also related, OpenSource firmware for EBike motor controllers: https://opensourceebikefirmware.bitbucket.io/About_the_project.html

We need to do it ourself, maybe "grassroots", just like Arnold says:

 

 

[esaj]

9 minutes ago, Tilmann said:

Ooops, you're sure? When I try controlling a simple RC servo with a Raspi under the regular Debian distri, that servo gets the shakes big time. No problem to do that with a primitive arduino, but I thought no run-of-the-mill Linux is real-time??? 

I'm not familiar with the embedded Linuxes (or is it "Linuces" in plural?), but the "normal" kernel likely is not real-time, and Raspbian might have to be compiled separately for the real-time support:

Linux kernel has configuration options that affect it’s real-time capabilities. Default Raspbian kernel is compiled with CONFIG_PREEMPT option that allows all kernel code outside of spinlock-protected regions and interrupt handlers to be preempted by higher priority kernel threads. Real-time patch from Ingo Molnar adds CONFIG_PREEMPT_RT option that allows nearly all of the kernel code to be preempted, except for a few raw spinlock critical regions.

 

[Tilmann]

9 minutes ago, electric_vehicle_lover said:

We need to do that ourself and that why I am being helping developing:
Electric Unicycle developer of OpenSource technology:
- 3D printed plastic shell
- simplified schematic of MicroWorks 30B4 board
- firmware for MicroWorks 30B4 board
- Android app for MicroWorks 30B4 board

 

Completely agree. Unfortunately, I'm an idiot when it comes to SW development or professional 3D design. I am operating a fairly large 3D printer though and working on perfecting its results ("TEVO little Monster", circular build volume 34cm by 50cm high). Happy to contribute with prototype printing!

[lizardmech]

I find thinking of microcontrollers as computers counter productive. They are more like tiny silicon Rube Goldberg Machine most of the functions are just hardware triggering other hardware to perform a certain function. After the hardware has gone through a cycle the cpu looks at some data collected, performs some math then runs the same rube goldberg machine again with minor changes to certain variables. Things like a raspberry Pi can't perform the same functions in software. The only way to do it in linux is with FPGA, but even then they usually create a mcu inside the FPGA instead of trying to get linux to do anything in real time.

[Bob Eisenman]

2 hours ago, electric_vehicle_lover said:

Sure, Shenzhen, China.

[Bob Eisenman]

2 hours ago, electric_vehicle_lover said:

Sure, Shenzhen, China.

Rm. 202, No. 9, Yuanxiatian 2nd Road, Baiyun Dist., Guangzhou, Guangdong, China (Mainland)

Looks like a residential wooded area on Google Earth. Maybe he's a 'manager ' for parts manufactures and new customers using the website.

I'd never heard of Geekwheel (appropriate name?) before this post.

 

On a different note:

I was out riding earlier. Local attitudes about the EUC have not changed much since last year. Riding a short dustance on a foot path on the Salem Commons a walker asked :

'does that have a motor?'....

Yes....

'it's not allowed here'

[Carlos E Rodriguez]

7 hours ago, esaj said:

Sure, and I'd like to be able to mod them myself too, but the wheel firmware itself must support it. To nitpick, technically, the Bluetooth adapter does not "read" anything from the wheel, it just transmits data the firmware sends (the firmware controls the adapter) and receives what the app/other connected bluetooth device sends to it, which the firmware can then read and "react" to. If the firmware isn't released as open source and doesn't have some sort of API you could call remotely (over Bluetooth or whatever), there's unfortunately not much that can be done. So far, we've had a bunch of custom apps that rely on reverse-engineered protocols from the original apps, but of course they can't access any more data or controls than what the original manufacturer app can.

I don't want to sound pessimistic, hopefully some manufacturer will eventually open up at least some sort of API, if not the entire firmware, but currently there seems to be little we can do with the original boards, although, @electric_vehicle_lover is working on custom firmware for the Microworks boards and @lizardmech is working on custom controller board. But even they have to write the software (including balancing / motor control) themselves and/or piece it together from existing open source software, since they don't have access to the original software.

 

1RadWerkstatt already sells the larger size battery covers and batteries for Ninebots to allow up to 700+Wh packs. 

There are plenty of open design balancing bots and old style unicycle self balancing. I have found many available. Just need some one to make more robust and with a generic board. But it need an engineer/software to play with. Talking about customizing. The balancing is not for amateurs. So I think what we need is a board we can buy with a base solid balancing and well documented so customizing and adding features won't break the code. 

I want hardware that won't fry the drivers if pushing too hard. Also hardware that won't shutdown if wheel speed produces back emf higher than battery volts. 

So the hardware has to be solid so not does not burn components. Then a basic balancing with source code. 

The code well documented so it can be tuned to different wheel diameters and different inductance so it can be used on any evoke motor or custom motor.