Ninebot One Z : Z6-Z8-Z10

[Lukasz]

If Ninebot guys read this forum - I hope so -  What is the actual nature of the tube-less tires for Z model - are we talking about the version used in almost all new cars - that there is no additional tube in the tire - and the pressure is kept by the airtight rim, and valve is still present, or Ninebot wants to use FULL  (non infatable) tires - which in my opinion would be big problem in the longer time use as we loose the control of how much air pressure we keep in the tire - so preference to ride hard/soft

 

Optimal tire pressure for 50kg girl is different than for 120 kg guy.... 

 

Edited January 25, 2018 by Lukasz

[Vik's]

19 minutes ago, Lukasz said:

If Ninebot guys read this forum - I hope so -  What is the actual nature of the tube-less tires for Z model - are we talking about the version used in almost all new cars - that there is no additional tube in the tire - and the pressure is kept by the airtight rim, and valve is still present, or Ninebot wants to use FULL  (non infatable) tires - which in my opinion would be big problem in the longer time use as we loose the control of how much air pressure we keep in the tire - so preference to ride hard/soft

 

Optimal tire pressure for 50kg girl is different than for 120 kg guy.... 

 

Tubeless just like in cars and MiniPro  No need to worry.

[Lukasz]

Good news,

So now we are left only with still the same problems - No information about release date, handle, final performance, availability in Europe, reliability, cost... and so on...

Spring is coming! we look for answers!

 

[EUCGUY]

On 23.1.2018 at 12:25 AM, jojo33 said:

Do not be too excited about the ONE Z
Because there is a major problem
The tire
For Seway Ninebot Mini & Mini PRO, the tires are tubeless, but they are not good quality
I have a Mini and the Mini PLUS since November, I have 700 km of road, and it is already flat, yet the tires of the Mini PLUS seem to be stronger
but no,
Do you know how Mini tires are repaired? We buy a repair kit like for cars, but in fact, it does not work, the tire is too thin
The wick does not hold

As you can see, if the peaked object gets in between the thick plates of the tire

 

they are strong at SEGWAY NINEBOT for design and electronics,
but for the tires and the quality of the materials they are "crappy " (? thank you google translate)

 

 

Just a heads up about "fix a flat" or other simular tire fillers, they are only ment as a temp fix, they actually eat up the rubber from the inside as time goes by. 

[jojo33]

54 minutes ago, EU GUY said:

Just a heads up about "fix a flat" or other simular tire fillers, they are only ment as a temp fix, they actually eat up the rubber from the inside as time goes by. 

seriously ?

 

[Cranium]

54 minutes ago, EU GUY said:

Just a heads up about "fix a flat" or other simular tire fillers, they are only ment as a temp fix, they actually eat up the rubber from the inside as time goes by. 

Interesting....I've never heard this before and couldn't find anything about this happening doing a search.  Can you provide some more information from studies?  I've been running slime in one of my tires for over a year.  Car manufacturers recommend its use.  BMW even sells it as part of their Mobility Kit.  

Maybe your information is on early versions of this where the solution could damage rims or clog a TPMS?

[Zeno74]

15 hours ago, Cranium said:

Interesting....I've never heard this before and couldn't find anything about this happening doing a search.  Can you provide some more information from studies?  I've been running slime in one of my tires for over a year.  Car manufacturers recommend its use.  BMW even sells it as part of their Mobility Kit.  

Maybe your information is on early versions of this where the solution could damage rims or clog a TPMS?

In the mountain biking world, tubeless tires are standard today, you need this liquid inside that will close small cuts or punctures that you could have during your ride, and helps to close any imperfection between rim and tire.

In mtb the liquid does not damage the rubber of the tires...

[cloudust]

23 hours ago, Lukasz said:

Good news,

So now we are left only with still the same problems - No information about release date, handle, final performance, availability in Europe, reliability, cost... and so on...

Spring is coming! we look for answers!

 

China will start selling One Z in May or June so hopefully, Europe will get it in Summer or around IFA.

[EUCGUY]

21 hours ago, Cranium said:

Interesting....I've never heard this before and couldn't find anything about this happening doing a search.  Can you provide some more information from studies?  I've been running slime in one of my tires for over a year.  Car manufacturers recommend its use.  BMW even sells it as part of their Mobility Kit.  

Maybe your information is on early versions of this where the solution could damage rims or clog a TPMS?

I don't mean slime, but cans of white foam that they sell at gas-stations 

[Jason McNeil]

Apologies to everyone for keeping the suspense. If you are planning on travelling to China & having access to your Gmail, YouTube, Drive, etc, the one thing you can depend on is that these sites will not only be inaccessible, but the days of circumvention through VPN is also effectively blocked across the country, making it a real pain to stay in contact with the rest of the world. 

On Tuesday I did a day trip from Shenzhen to Beijing in order to try out the new Z series, see if it lived up to the hype. I have to admit that with the limited evidence from the few clips floating around, I was sceptical that the Z would hold up to very high expectations. 

The Ninebot staff were very obliging, they not only gave me access to their R&D area, but answered all my numerous questions about every conceivable aspect of the Wheel, also allowing me to take pictures of the internals. 

Overall Impressions:
So... the important questions that every Wheel enthusiast probably wants to know are: what is like to ride? With the ultra-wide tire is there impairment to manoeuvrability? Will it be able to cope with extreme gradients & high speeds similar to the latest generation Wheels that are marking their way onto the market? Although there was only a limited opportunity to try it out on the Ninebot HQ grounds (no hills) in freezing conditions, I am pleased to report, that to me, it is going to be a formidable new product of 2018, a complete redemption for the failure of the premature P release two years ago.

I found stability at both low & high speed to be excellent. Similar to the V5F, there's a torque ripple effect at low speed, you can feel the small pulses of power. At higher speed, it feels sure-footed & completely secure. The model I tested was the smaller battery Z6, electronically capped to 30kph. I did a couple runs building up confidence to push the acceleration. On reaching the max speed there's a progressive, non-jerking, tilt-back to prevent overspeed with a not unpleasant audible warning. 

With the 4" tire it's to be expected that there will be a bit of reduction in turning radius over the narrow tire Wheels, in my testing this was nothing dramatic, I was able to a full circle in a less than a meter. If you're thinking about using the Z as your Hurste acrobat Wheel, then it's probably not the best choice for this purpose.

I'll be posting some video clips once I've caught up on things in the next couple days.

Negatives: 
For the present, Ninebot plan to fit the Z with the same old pedals as the E+. I'm going to try to lobby for longer pedals, if not successful, we may be getting some Custom ones C&Cd. It would seem a pity that for all the time/effort invested into this wonderful new machine, the 3 year old ones would be fitted—pedals are after all the most important element between the Rider to Machine interface.  

Control Board
Building on the lessons learned from the unfortunate P release, the Z's control-board is massively over-engineered to take practically any load. The motor is powered by 12x ST 15180 MOSFETs (300A peak)—need to double-check the model, a search for this model is not yielding any results. There are two input wires from the battery pack that feed into primary board. As for the question of redundancy on the motor, the Engineer said that it's the standard 3 hall sensors with a single set of the wires that all modern higher performance Electric Unicycles are fitted with, so nothing special there. 
An independent daughter board with the BT module, inputs, LEDs connectors, control functions mounts into the power-board & is fitted with a fuse, while the primary power-board is not fused.

I was told that the firmware allows a max peak power of 200A to preserve the hardware from catastrophic failure. In real-word conditions, that would be a perceptible slight dip with a 300lb load racing up a vertical cliff face. The heat-sink on the board side of the shell is simply gargantuan, it occupies nearly the full side of the inner-shell of a solid block of aluminium (40cm x 30cm x 2cm) weighing an impressive >1kg!

Lighting
The internal shell has two rings of LEDs that are  visible directly in front or behind. Front is fitted with three very bright headlight LEDs (combined these are unquestionable the brightest on any Wheel today) & about a dozen smaller App Customizable ones for the tail light.

Are there any other hardware differences between Z6/8/10 besides the battery pack size?
No, it has the same board, shell & motor. Firmware settings are tweak between the variants to cap max speed depending on the battery type. Not certain if the Z6 can be upgraded to a Z10 through the installation of the larger pack.

Because of wide 4" tire, will it be easier to learn how to use for new Riders?
This was not a design objective for Wheel, but by lowering the pressure, it will offer a wider profile that should be more stable & easier to use. 

Will the trolley handle be available when the Wheel is ready to ship? 
Yes, I'm trying to see that it gets included as 'standard equipment'

When will the Z be available? 
Current guidance is around the May-June period, similar release dates to the new Inmotion V10 (V8+) & KS18L

Is the Wheel capable of fast-charging?
Although fitted with a propriety charging connector, it will be capable of 7A fast-charging. Because of the lower voltage, total charging input power of 350W

What will the pricing be in North America? 
Based on the expected order volumes, we're going to be placing a fairly substantial initial order, so that the total price for the Z10, including shipping, will be at around the $1550 level.

View of the control-board side of the Wheel. 

Close up of the board

Between the hex screws is the absolutely massive heat-sink. 

Recessed battery pack chamber fits well inside the Wheel. 

 

51.8V (nominal) battery pack composed of 84x LG MH1 cells, 3.2Ah for a combined capacity of 995Wh. The voltage was kept lower in order to meet the potential for UL certification. As a result, there was a great deal of Engineering effort to yield high power through more current.

A jet-lagged Jason with the chief Ninebot Engineer, the brains behind the Z. It's an interesting phenomenon that this project was initiated at the behest of the Engineering department, not from marketing research/ 

Edited January 26, 2018 by Jason McNeil

[WARPed1701D]

Apart from lacking some additional redundancy in the motor this write up reads like a dream. Even the expected price for the Z10 is most agreeable compared to the competition. Build quality looks excellent. Very well designed and I'm very pleased to hear the main board is over engineered for power delivery. 

Does anyone have any concerns about the lower voltage? 

Thanks @Jason McNeil for lifting the secrecy surrounding this wheel. 

Edited January 26, 2018 by WARPed1701D

[houseofjob]

Brilliant @Jason McNeil!! (they really need a 5x like/love)

Would love the record-long pedals I saw on the Z at CES, but if we can buy and retrofit them later, I'd be grudgingly ok with that!

Sign me up!!!

 

[houseofjob]

5 minutes ago, WARPed1701D said:

Does anyone have any concerns about the lower voltage? 

My KS18S rides surprisingly well and fast on just 67.7V, so I imagine they've worked something out here (less chance for melty-wire-short-circuit, no? >> might be wrong here)

Edited January 26, 2018 by houseofjob

[WARPed1701D]

I'm guessing it is a14S6P cell configuration at 3.7V nominal and 84 cells. 

Do we know the motor power yet? 

[kasenutty]

Wow, at $1500 it might be a KS16s and Tesla Killer. Who's gonna pay 1300 or 1450 for those when you can pay 100-200 more for this beast? 

[WARPed1701D]

3 minutes ago, houseofjob said:

My KS18S rides surprisingly well and fast on just 67.7V, so I imagine they've worked something out here (less chance for melty-wire-short-circuit, no? >> might be wrong here)

Yes I understand the 18S is almost too responsive despite not being 84v. I only ask as when @Rehab1did his multiwheel tests at the proving ground the only wheel he had slight disappointment (maybe not the right word) with was the 16S which seemed a little more sluggish on the climb even compared to the 800W  (-400w over the 16S) 84V V8. And that result surprised me a little. 

[houseofjob]

5 minutes ago, WARPed1701D said:

Do we know the motor power yet? 

Unless things have changed from this CES 2018 brochure:

[Adel]

@Jason McNeil thanks for the write-up and it's great news that you will be selling them. I don't think you need to bother stocking up on anything but the z10 version.

Do you think there are plans for even larger battery versions of the Z, maybe 1300/1600wh ?

[WARPed1701D]

4 minutes ago, houseofjob said:

Unless things have changed from this CES 2018 brochure:

Well Jason says there is no hardware difference between models except firmware and cell count which contradicts the brochure. 

[houseofjob]

2 minutes ago, WARPed1701D said:

Well Jason says there is no hardware difference between models except firmware and cell count which contradicts the brochure. 

Not an EE here, but guessing it's calculated software-adjusted nominal motor power perhaps? 

From a business standpoint, it makes no sense to rollout with 3 different motors, increases cost unnecessarily.

[Duf]

Great info and I had no idea you were going to be selling these, awesome news.

[Marty Backe]

1 hour ago, Jason McNeil said:

Apologies to everyone for keeping the suspense. If you are planning on travelling to China & having access to your Gmail, YouTube, Drive, etc, the one thing you can depend on is that these sites will not only be inaccessible, but the days of circumvention through VPN is also effectively blocked across the country, making it a real pain to stay in contact with the rest of the world. 

On Tuesday I did a day trip from Shenzhen to Beijing in order to try out the new Z series, see if it lived up to the hype. I have to admit that with the limited evidence from the few clips floating around, I was sceptical that the Z would hold up to very high expectations. 

The Ninebot staff were very obliging, they not only gave me access to their R&D area, but answered all my numerous questions about every conceivable aspect of the Wheel, also allowing me to take pictures of the internals. 

Overall Impressions:
So... the important questions that every Wheel enthusiast probably wants to know are: what is like to ride? With the ultra-wide tire is there impairment to manoeuvrability? Will it be able to cope with extreme gradients & high speeds similar to the latest generation Wheels that are marking their way onto the market? Although there was only a limited opportunity to try it out on the Ninebot HQ grounds (no hills) in freezing conditions, I am pleased to report, that to me, it is going to be a formidable new product of 2018, a complete redemption for the failure of the premature P release two years ago.

I found stability at both low & high speed to be excellent. Similar to the V5F, there's a torque ripple effect at low speed, you can feel the small pulses of power. At higher speed, it feels sure-footed & completely secure. The model I tested was the smaller battery Z6, electronically capped to 30kph. I did a couple runs building up confidence to push the acceleration. On reaching the max speed there's a progressive, non-jerking, tilt-back to prevent overspeed with a not unpleasant audible warning. 

With the 4" tire it's to be expected that there will be a bit of reduction in turning radius over the narrow tire Wheels, in my testing this was nothing dramatic, I was able to a full circle in a less than a meter. If you're thinking about using the Z as your Hurste acrobat Wheel, then it's probably not the best choice for this purpose.

I'll be posting some video clips once I've caught up on things in the next couple days.

Negatives: 
For the present, Ninebot plan to fit the Z with the same old pedals as the E+. I'm going to try to lobby for longer pedals, if not successful, we may be getting some Custom ones C&Cd. It would seem a pity that for all the time/effort invested into this wonderful new machine, the 3 year old ones would be fitted—pedals are after all the most important element between the Rider to Machine interface.  

Control Board
Building on the lessons learned from the unfortunate P release, the Z's control-board is massively over-engineered to take practically any load. The motor is powered by 12x ST 15180 MOSFETs (300A peak)—need to double-check the model, a search for this model is not yielding any results. There are two input wires from the battery pack that feed into primary board. As for the question of redundancy on the motor, the Engineer said that it's the standard 3 hall sensors with a single set of the wires that all modern higher performance Electric Unicycles are fitted with, so nothing special there. 
An independent daughter board with the BT module, inputs, LEDs connectors, control functions mounts into the power-board & is fitted with a fuse, while the primary power-board is not fused.

I was told that the firmware allows a max peak power of 200A to preserve the hardware from catastrophic failure. In real-word conditions, that would be a perceptible slight dip with a 300lb load racing up a vertical cliff face. The heat-sink on the board side of the shell is simply gargantuan, it occupies nearly the full side of the inner-shell of a solid block of aluminium (40cm x 30cm x 2cm) weighing an impressive >1kg!

Lighting
The internal shell has two rings of LEDs that are  visible directly in front or behind. Front is fitted with three very bright headlight LEDs (combined these are unquestionable the brightest on any Wheel today) & about a dozen smaller App Customizable ones for the tail light.

Are there any other hardware differences between Z6/8/10 besides the battery pack size?
No, it has the same board, shell & motor. Firmware settings are tweak between the variants to cap max speed depending on the battery type. Not certain if the Z6 can be upgraded to a Z10 through the installation of the larger pack.

Because of wide 4" tire, will it be easier to learn how to use for new Riders?
This was not a design objective for Wheel, but by lowering the pressure, it will offer a wider profile that should be more stable & easier to use. 

Will the trolley handle be available when the Wheel is ready to ship? 
Yes, I'm trying to see that it gets included as 'standard equipment'

When will the Z be available? 
Current guidance is around the May-June period, similar release dates to the new Inmotion V10 (V8+) & KS18L

Is the Wheel capable of fast-charging?
Although fitted with a propriety charging connector, it will be capable of 7A fast-charging. Because of the lower voltage, total charging input power of 350W

What will the pricing be in North America? 
Based on the expected order volumes, we're going to be placing a fairly substantial initial order, so that the total price for the Z10, including shipping, will be at around the $1550 level.

View of the control-board side of the Wheel. 

Close up of the board

Between the hex screws is the absolutely massive heat-sink. 

ecessed battery pack chamber fits well inside the Wheel. 

51.8V (nominal) battery pack composed of 84x LG MH1 cells, 3.2Ah for a combined capacity of 995Wh. The voltage was kept lower in order to meet the potential for UL certification. As a result, there was a great deal of Engineering effort to yield high power through more current.

 

A jet-lagged Jason with the chief Ninebot Engineer, the brains behind the Z. It's an interesting phenomenon that this project was initiated at the behest of the Engineering department, not from marketing research/ 

 

Fantastic report Jason. Guess I know what my new summer wheel will be. I hope you're successful in getting better pedals fitted. 

[WARPed1701D]

1 minute ago, Marty Backe said:

Fantastic report Jason. Guess I know what my new summer wheel will be. I hope you're successful in getting better pedals fitted. 

I guess we will all be waiting for the BrokeBacke mountain test before we order. 

[Marty Backe]

1 hour ago, Jason McNeil said:

 

 

Man, I love their use of machine screws for securing the shell. Maybe Gotway will pickup a few tips from this wheel (one can dream, right).

Edited January 26, 2018 by Marty Backe

[Chriull]

@Jason McNeilThanks for the great report!

As i could not see it from the pics – did you have any chance to see the axle / pedal mount construction? As there is no axle to be seen coming through the pedal mounts did they make some new solid construction?

1 hour ago, Jason McNeil said:

Building on the lessons learned from the unfortunate P release, the Z's control-board is massively over-engineered to take practically any load

Or just one of the first nicely engineered  – looks very promising! I am looking forward to the first report from western riders going up hills in summertime!

The motor cables look relatively „thin“ – i hope this is just a huge wheel making them look thin on the photos? The battery wires seem to be thicker? You have any idea which wire gauge they used?