There's a guy over at esk8 forum who has kindly compiled a list of all known electric skateboards together with their various parameters. Even my Volo-E longboard is listed and doesn't compare too badly against some of the more expensive boards. The Google doc has all the board's specs and is ideal for anyone new to electric boarding. See the document here.
Monday, 8 May 2017
Tuesday, 25 April 2017
Sunday, 23 April 2017
Skateboarding gang!!!
Wife captured this on her walk into town.
They can only join my gang if they go electric :)
Sunday, 12 March 2017
As mentioned in the previous post, this weekend was the first serious time on my board since September last year. This was the first proper test for robustness of the re-purposed bike computer I have documented in previous posts.
It did work most of the time but during one of the trips there was momentarily loss of the screen display when I mounted a curb. However, a few more bumps from the road, and the real time display showing speed and distance covered was working again.
I suspected that the battery for the bike computer was not as secure as it could have been and depending on the vibration from the road, sharp knocks would sometimes cause the battery to separate from the battery contacts. What I've done now is put "blu-tack" on the battery and between the lid of the housing to try and dampen out any vibrations causing battery movement. It seems to have done the trick.
Removing the cover
Adding blu-tack to secure the battery
Screwing the case housing back onto the underside of the board
It did work most of the time but during one of the trips there was momentarily loss of the screen display when I mounted a curb. However, a few more bumps from the road, and the real time display showing speed and distance covered was working again.
I suspected that the battery for the bike computer was not as secure as it could have been and depending on the vibration from the road, sharp knocks would sometimes cause the battery to separate from the battery contacts. What I've done now is put "blu-tack" on the battery and between the lid of the housing to try and dampen out any vibrations causing battery movement. It seems to have done the trick.
Removing the cover
Adding blu-tack to secure the battery
Screwing the case housing back onto the underside of the board
Spring is here!!!
So with Spring fully in progress, this weekend I was able to enjoy the dry weather and take my board on a night ride and a 3.5 mile daytime ride in the park. And oh what nice scenes greeted me:
Not having been on a long trip on the board for a while, I had forgotten how vocal the British public are. Not sure if it was because I was in the park and there were more people present than usual, but I heard four cries of "hey, that's an electric skateboard", or similar words to that effect.
Not having been on a long trip on the board for a while, I had forgotten how vocal the British public are. Not sure if it was because I was in the park and there were more people present than usual, but I heard four cries of "hey, that's an electric skateboard", or similar words to that effect.
Sunday, 12 February 2017
Skateboarding in the UK
The biggest downside of commuting on an electric longboard in the UK is the rain and resulting puddles. My board manufacturer not only states that it is dangerous to skate in the rain but also that the electronics are at risk of being damaged.
Typically, I wake up and look out of the window to see if the roads are wet and if they are I forget about any idea of travelling on my long-board. However, I've been caught out a couple of times travelling to work on my board. For those occasions there hadn't been any rain on the day but it had been raining in the very early hours of the morning. The streets from my house would look pretty dry. I would then elect to travel on my trusty long-board and beeline to the park which forms the majority of my long-board commute to the train station. But upon entering the park I would discover the path had not dried off due to the wind shield from the numerous surrounding trees. The result: when I got to the train station, my trousers from ankle to knees would be covered in brown speckled mud. Goodness knows what my fellow passengers would have been thinking.
As a result my board has mostly been hibernating because of the weather this winter. Instead of road surfing I am forced to surf on the internet to get my long-board fix. As such, a recent discovery for me is that you can get mud guards for skateboards!
The supplier/manufacturer called Wheelshields (no longer online) is an American company and you can buy them for under 100USD (around £80 pounds at the time of writing). Interestingly, the shields are mounted on the outside of the wheel using the wheel nut to secure them.
The shields are reported as definitely working with boards that have wheels of 76 mm in diameter and under. But also wheels as large as 80 mm can also be accommodated depending on the board.
The manufacturer reports additional advantages of using their wheel shields other than just for splash protection. This includes eliminating wheel bite and increasing bearing life. A review of the wheel sheilds by 14Degrees (no longer online) claims these are a positive game changer.
Alas, the manufacturer will not get my immediate request for purchase as my wheels are 90mm in diameter. I have sent them an email to enquire if they make a solution for bigger wheels. In the mean time it's given me an idea to try and make my own guards. Watch this space :)
Typically, I wake up and look out of the window to see if the roads are wet and if they are I forget about any idea of travelling on my long-board. However, I've been caught out a couple of times travelling to work on my board. For those occasions there hadn't been any rain on the day but it had been raining in the very early hours of the morning. The streets from my house would look pretty dry. I would then elect to travel on my trusty long-board and beeline to the park which forms the majority of my long-board commute to the train station. But upon entering the park I would discover the path had not dried off due to the wind shield from the numerous surrounding trees. The result: when I got to the train station, my trousers from ankle to knees would be covered in brown speckled mud. Goodness knows what my fellow passengers would have been thinking.
As a result my board has mostly been hibernating because of the weather this winter. Instead of road surfing I am forced to surf on the internet to get my long-board fix. As such, a recent discovery for me is that you can get mud guards for skateboards!
The supplier/manufacturer called Wheelshields (no longer online) is an American company and you can buy them for under 100USD (around £80 pounds at the time of writing). Interestingly, the shields are mounted on the outside of the wheel using the wheel nut to secure them.
The shields are reported as definitely working with boards that have wheels of 76 mm in diameter and under. But also wheels as large as 80 mm can also be accommodated depending on the board.
The manufacturer reports additional advantages of using their wheel shields other than just for splash protection. This includes eliminating wheel bite and increasing bearing life. A review of the wheel sheilds by 14Degrees (no longer online) claims these are a positive game changer.
Alas, the manufacturer will not get my immediate request for purchase as my wheels are 90mm in diameter. I have sent them an email to enquire if they make a solution for bigger wheels. In the mean time it's given me an idea to try and make my own guards. Watch this space :)
Tuesday, 7 February 2017
Comparing top speeds (in a fair way)
Thinking about electric skateboard manufacturers and their claims for maximum speed it seems that unlike the car industry there is no standard used for measuring speed. How do we know what conditions the skate-board manufacturers are using to determine top speed? There can be any number of factors affecting top speed:- smoothness of ground, board weight, tyre hardness etc. Some manufacturers are reporting a top speed for a given tested weight of the rider but the weights differ across manufacture so you can't make a useful/fair comparison.What is needed is an industry standard dynamometer for electric skateboards. Ideally this would be done by a (certified) test house, and electric board manufactures would send in their boards there for testing.
Interestingly, there is a chap on the Facebook electric board Users who has very recently shown his dynamo-meter for electric skateboards (pictures below). Lets hope something like this can be adopted into the electric skateboard industry.
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