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Every single Onewheel is being recalled after four deaths

• brokenmachine 3y ago
  Louis Rossmann called this ages ago. Future Motion sounds like a terrible company.
• scrose 3y ago
  I have emails talking with Future Motion support as early as 2017 when my Onewheel+ was nosediving randomly at medium/low speeds (ie. Idling back and forth at a red light). I could never get them to acknowledge it was a defect. I put over 2,000 miles on the board, so I was no stranger to how it should ride. All of my close calls came from it just suddenly powering down on me and are why I lost enough trust in the board to get rid of it. If not for that defect, it would have been the best tool for commuting in the city. It could ride off curbs, over torn up roads, through grass, and best of all, I could actually bring it inside any building without needing to go through a freight elevator
  • cjrp 3y ago
    Did the wheel lock-up, or was it more like a blip of power-off then back on again?
    • scrose 3y ago
      The board would completely disengage and the nose would drop. The best I can explain the feeling is that it felt like I’d go from tapping the gas to pushing the clutch all the way down. There would be no ‘pushback’ from the board beforehand. Sometimes it’d happen even when starting from a standstill. From what I remember, the blue power light would be on, but it would take restarting the board for it to engage properly again.
  • 8n4vidtmkvmk 3y ago
    2 wheel scooters are pretty compact too, no? Not sure how good they are on various terrains.. maybe they can make the wheels a bit bigger
    • jareklupinski 3y ago
      went down this rabbit hole recently and ended up getting a folding ebike once you start scaling up 2 wheel scooter wheels to become big enough to comfortably ride anywhere in a city that wasnt explicitly designed for scooter traffic (nyc for example), the weight of the whole scooter starts surpassing even lighter ebikes (60 lb+), without the benefit of lower costs or more transportability (few/none 500W+ scooters can be carried comfortably through a narrower nyc restaurant door) this one came closest https://inokim.shop/collections/inokim-scooters/products/inokim-ox https://inokim.shop/collections/inokim-scooters/products/ino... but after testing it out I couldn't see the upside over a smaller folding ebike
      • senkora 3y ago
        Any models of folding ebikes that you liked? I’m in the market for one.
        • sleepybrett 3y ago
          I have one but it's quite heavy and designed more around cargo, trips to the grocery store etc. I have used to it commute into town to go to the office a few times and it works ok for it, but if I started doing that every day I'd probably buy something more 'commutery'. I have a rad power bikes 'expand 5'.
          • masklinn 3y ago
            What is the commutery-ness issue? The tyres do look chonky which might be inefficient for long-ish distance, or is it a bit small for long rides? Or is the maintenance a bit much for a daily?
            • sleepybrett 3y ago
              Yeah it's got wide tires (and they are pretty small in diameter as well) and it's a stepthrough with an awfully heavy frame. I might go with something like the radcity if I were going to commute daily. Currently that commute is only 6ish miles though and I'm still mostly WFH, so it's not as critical. Rad does consider it a commuter bike, I just consider it a tad non-optimal but not anything terrible. Great for neighborhood errands though. My neighborhood 'main drag' is great for a little shopping/eating but is about a mile and change away so it's certainly walkable but I wouldn't want to lug groceries a mile up a hill so the bike is perfect. Haven't touched my car all summer unless I was getting out of the city. It is a bit small. I think they rate it for people who are 5'10" max, which is my height to get full leg extension. While it does fold it is quite heavy so if you are thinking about a scenario where you drive the edge of the city and bike the rest of the way in just know that getting it in and out of a trunk is a bit of a wrestling match. Maintenance-wise, no big complaints in almost a year and a half. I had a flat tire and was able to find a replacement tube no problem at a local bike shop. I've had to replace the brake pads and frayed up the brake cable in the process so I replaced that too, did all the work myself cost me maybe ~$20 in parts. Considering swapping the brakes for some 'hybrid hydraulic brakes' aka cable pull hydraulics, those will run me a couple hundred bucks for the pair, the work seems easy enough if you've ever swung a wrench. Did some lubing of the chain... No battery issues, no controller issues. https://www.radpowerbikes.com/collections/electric-city-commuter-bikes/products/radexpand-electric-folding-bike?variant=39442977783904 https://www.radpowerbikes.com/collections/electric-city-comm...
  • vernon99 3y ago
    I confirm this behavior and this is also the reason I vot rid of the board. Nosedives at red light are not fun at all when you are standing next to a road full of traffic.
    • kzrdude 3y ago
      What is a nosedive in this context?
      • scrose 3y ago
        They’re probably talking about when you try to mount the board after waiting/dismounting at a red light, but the motor doesn’t actually engage and it just falls forward
        • bowsamic 3y ago
          That's not what they meant https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37717656 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37717656
          • scrose 3y ago
            You linked to what I wrote :) It seemed like vernon99 was talking about nosediving from a complete stop(trying to go from motor off -> motor engaged but the motor doesn’t engage), whereas in the post you linked to, I was talking about starting from having the motor engaged already at a low speed (ie <5mph slowly moving back and forth waiting for a light) and then the power would just drop out. Same result, but likely different causes.
            • avianlyric 3y ago
              I read it as they’re stopped stationary at lights, balancing on the board (so both feet off the ground), and at some point the One Wheel just decides to turn the motor off. If I had to guess, it sounds like the motor hits some thermal limit and cuts out. Which would explain why it happens at red lights often, lots of high torque motor excursion performing small moves to maintain balance, but little to no airflow because the motor isn’t moving fast enough to pump air through itself.
  • permo-w 3y ago
    why not just get some equivalent with two/four wheels then? I get the feeling the answer has something to do with aesthetics rather than practicality
    • MivLives 3y ago
      Maneuverability. You can turn in place. The tire is massive compared to a skateboard wheel. It can run off road, it feels nice on road.
      • Tossrock 3y ago
        Electric unicycles can do all that and are better in every practical aspect, but don't have the cool-factor of standing sideways on a board.
      • asdff 3y ago
        You can turn in place on a skateboard too by kick turning.
      • Xenoamorphous 3y ago
        Stupid question, but how do you turn?
        • eknkc 3y ago
          You can forcefully pivot it if you wish to turn in place while stationary. Otherwise you lean on the side and accelerate, the wheel is huge and there is enough sidewall to lean on to. You can perform pretty sharp turns. I'd also do a back and forward move, like a 3 point turn but rapidly and within something like 20cm space.
    • scrose 3y ago
      I can absolutely assure you that ‘aesthetics’ don’t play any role in any of my commuter options :) I also stand by this: The Onewheel was the most versatile commuter option I’ve ever used in NYC. If failsafes were added that didn’t rely on ‘maintain balance while skidding on your nose or tail at 15+mph in traffic if the power decides to randomly cut off’, I’d likely buy it again.
  • asdff 3y ago
    This is why a regular unpowered popsicle skateboard with some big fat soft wheels (60mm 79a ish is good) is the king of urban commuting in my experience. I ride it over torn up asphault that would have stopped a hard wheeled skateboard in its tracks. I pick the occasional glass piece out of the wheel and its none worse for the wear. I can take it with me anywhere. On a crowded train I can put it in between my legs. The board is very easy to stash out of the way indoors. The board probably weighs 1/5th the one wheel and I never have to worry about charging it or very much maintenance. It also has its own skill progression with tricks that has been really fun and satisfying to get into. ollies are downright useful to learn. I have seen better skateboarders than myself ollie up ~1ft tall curbs commuting through town; I don't think any other micromobility device can take a 1ft curb.
    • ClumsyPilot 3y ago
      I think e-scooter like xiaomi ones works better for majority of population and is also foldable
      • asdff 3y ago
        They are fold able but certainly more clumsy when I see them on the train. Also a lot more expensive and yet another thing you gotta charge and eventually replace a battery for. Its also a 30lb hunk of metal still, not everyone can comfortably tote that up and down train station steps all day. Most people I see don't even fold their escooter on the train just hold the handle, roll it in and have the tail out and let people deal with stepping over it. Makes me think transit as we know it wouldn't even work if everyone got one of these things or an ebike and took up so much extra space as a result.
        • FrankoDelMar 3y ago
          > Makes me think transit as we know it wouldn't even work if everyone got one of these things or an ebike and took up so much extra space as a result. I’ve been wondered something like this too when I see people bring their scooters into a restaurant, the gym or other indoor spaces. I get that you don’t want it stolen but it would untenable if everyone did it.
  • mongrelion 3y ago
    I ride electric unicycles and I have a question about these OneWheels: when you are rolling, the wheel self balances, right? And when you are reaching the power limitations of the board, does it let you know of this in any way? The EUC will either tiltback (the wheel will literally stop you from leaning even more, so you are forced to lean man) or it will beep very loudly for several seconds, before it finally cuts off either because you fried the board or because the wheel is protecting itself.
    • eknkc 3y ago
      It has a tilt back feedback. However it is possible to miss it and there is not much buffer after you hit the feedback point. I believe they just released a new firmware along with this recall and they have added something new. Might be vibration or sound but I can't remember exactly what.
      • thinkmassive 3y ago
        Yes that’s correct, the firmware update is to provide haptic feedback by modulating the motor to cause vibration. It sounds like a great idea, hopefully it works well.
        • bredren 3y ago
          The idea of sound + vibration notice of porential power related shutoff was requested openly and repeatedly at least since 2019. If this is such an innovative and important feature, there is no reasonable way to explain why it took the company so long to release it. Here’s the announce copy from their email on the update: “Today we're releasing an innovative new safety feature called "Haptic Buzz". Haptic Buzz is an audible and tacti e alert that riders hear and feel when nearing the operational limits of the board. Haptic Buzz provides riders with additional feedback that is immediate and intuitive so they can ride with more confidence than ever.”
          • thinkmassive 3y ago
            Sounds like a great improvement. I just installed it on my GT, looking forward to trying it out. If you have more technical details I’m interested to understand how it works. In the distant past I started my career in a power electronics research lab, building motor drive systems among other things, so a deep dive into HapticBuzz would be amazing.
  • TaylorAlexander 3y ago
    This is one of those situations where I think it makes loads of sense for the product to have open source software. I guess it would make clones easier but I hear there’s already third party open source code for onewheels so they can’t prevent it. But if the mainline code was open source, some engineer would spend three weeks chasing down these bugs and submitting patches and everyone would benefit. Instead, they ship buggy code and put users and their business at risk. The business world has this attitude that proprietary closed source systems should always be the default, and open source needs justification. And further the business types tend not to know very much about open source, so they stick to what they know. But I don’t think these assumptions really make a lot of sense, as open source would help so many issues we see today, even from the business’s perspective.
    • thinkmassive 3y ago
      The VESC community is extraordinarily impressive. At the same time, I’m doubtful that software bugs in the proprietary code are related to the vast majority of these failures people describe. The only legitimate issues I’ve seen are caused by sensors (either the foot sensor itself, or improper mounting usually related to grip tape) or water damage. A Onewheel attempts to self balance. To accelerate, you lean the direction you want to go. As your speed increases, the board starts tilting the nose up to signal it’s reaching its limit. Powering the motor requires energy, and self-balancing requires additional energy beyond that, so a safe amount of headroom needs to be reserved to accommodate for variations in terrain and rider movements. When the noise starts tilting up, there’s nothing to stop the rider from leaning forward more, which also signals to accelerate. This is called “pushing through pushback” and it’s required to go more than ~16-18 mph. Imagine the extreme case where you quickly lift your rear foot off the board. Obviously it’s going to stop suddenly, and you’ll fly through the air and smash into the ground. Every nosedive is exactly this scenario, just slightly less extreme. Once I grasped this simple concept it became obvious that every fall was my own fault. This is why I recommend new riders practice balancing with the board powered off. If you can’t easily do that, you have no business pushing through pushback. The boards being “fixed” by this recall are getting a new feature that makes the board vibrate at high speeds. This is done by modulating the motor, it requires no new transducer. The only “failure” is of the rider being oblivious to the signal the board is sending. Source: own a V1, Plus, and GT; ridden thousands of miles on my own and other’s boards; ran a meetup and met a huge variety of rider types; once raced in the GoPro Games; crashed hundreds of times including the obligatory bone-breaking incident resulting in surgery tl;dr: Future Motion is anti-consumer, haptic feedback is overdue, but there’s nothing inherently wrong with the Onewheel. Every nosedive is ultimately due to rider error.
  • edanm 3y ago
    Have you found a good alternative tool? I've been using the Segway mini for years and think it's amazing, it hits all those things you mentioned. Its only problem is that it's no longer sold, and mine is starting you show its age. My wheels and battery need changing, but I'm not sure if anyone can actually do that anymore. So I'd really like another option...
    • Animats 3y ago
      The Segway, at least originally, had considerable redundancy in the control system. I think they had four gyros and four accelerometers arranged in a tetrahedron. If you have four set up that way, you can get out info for all three principal axes, plus an error value that indicates sensor trouble. So failure can be detected quickly. Does the one-wheel have that?
      • gnicholas 3y ago
        The original Segway had 5 gyros! [1] 1: https://science.howstuffworks.com/transport/engines-equipment/ginger.htm#:~:text=Sensors%3A%20The%20Segway%20uses%20five,included%20as%20a%20safety%20precaution https://science.howstuffworks.com/transport/engines-equipmen....
        • Animats 3y ago
          Yeah, Dean Kamen had enough engineering experience not to build a human-carrying vehicle one sensor failure from a faceplant.
  • Dwewlyo 3y ago
    You still would ride something which can't work if a hal sensor fails or a battery or anything else. It's not like a bike or E-Bike. I have no clue how you look at this and don't think 'death trap's or 'stupid way of dying '
  • sneak 3y ago
    > If not for that defect, it would have been the best tool for commuting in the city. Except for that part where you're going faster than the fastest sprinter, with a high center of gravity. Even with a helmet, and no explicit defect, these things are inherently extremely dangerous by their very design.
    • 303uru 3y ago
      I ride my bike, a lot. And I got passed once or twice a week for about a year by a guy on one of these that I assume was modified because it would go at least 25-30mph. No helmet on and he’d pretty belligerently pass me and pedestrians with little margin. Then I didn’t see him anymore.
      • lstamour 3y ago
        Similarly, I used to see these a lot last year, but I've only seen one person near me riding a one-wheel recently. Sadly, he was riding it with what looked like his 3 year old daughter holding on to his knees for dear life. I wanted to say something, but I assumed they're just going "to the store" nearby. But still... hurting yourself is one thing, but riding an e-scooter or one-wheel with young children seems like quite another...
    • thinkmassive 3y ago
      They can also be extremely fun! It’s unfortunate that so many people fail to recognize the inherent danger and choose to blame the device instead of their abilities. Anyone who can’t control their balance on the fulcrum of a kart tire — under their own muscle power — trying to go fast on one of these boards is outright reckless.
      • nomel 3y ago
        New things, that don’t have historic/cultural armor, can’t survive. For example, there were 450 bicycle deaths in 2020, unrelated to traffic.
        • 3y ago
  • JeremyNT 3y ago
    I've got a Brompton folding bike and it's really a great way to move through a city. It's not as compact as your device, but it gets quite small when folded for storage, and there's a configuration where you fold it down except for the handlebars and can push it around like a little cart.
    • mauvehaus 3y ago
      I can second that a Brompton is an awesome city bike. I had one in Boston, and besides the aforementioned utility, it got compliments from people from every possible demographic. They put a smile on damn near everyone's faces. Get a good pair of padded gloves though. The small, high pressure tires are a punishing ride over shitty pavement. I.e., the kind that's found everywhere in Boston.
  • gnicholas 3y ago
    > why I lost enough trust in the board to get rid of it. If you sold it or gave it away, did you tell the new owner about this defect?
• jpwerty 3y ago
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• bluecalm 3y ago
  There is another safety related recall going on right now - this time in the world of cycling. Shimano (the biggest parts manufacturer) is recalling more than 2 million cranks (and it's likely they will recall even more in the future). It seems companies are seriously afraid of US agencies in this area.
  • digdugdirk 3y ago
    As they should be. Product safety should never be reduced down to a cost of doing business.
  • deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  • jdechko 3y ago
    Thanks for posting this. I’m going to check mine as soon as I get home. https://bike.shimano.com/en-US/information/customer-services/corrective-actions/11-speed-hollowtech-ii-crankset-recall-notice.html?cmdf=shimano+recall https://bike.shimano.com/en-US/information/customer-services... For quick reference the affected model numbers are DURA-ACE and ULTEGRA branded cranksets with the following model numbers: ULTEGRA FC-6800, FC-R8000 and DURA-ACE FC-9000, FC-R9100 and FC-R9100-P.
    • lostlogin 3y ago
      Luckily, mine are all the cheap Shimano ones. This is their top stuff isn’t it?
      • bombcar 3y ago
        In biking especially the high end stuff is often made out of exotic materials for low weight and can do strange non-metallic thinks, like shattering.
        • wl 3y ago
          These cranks are aluminum. The problem is that they are a hollow clamshell design to save weight. The bonding of that clamshell design is problematic.
• ecf 3y ago
  [flagged]
  • saulrh 3y ago
    Perhaps they're trying to impress upon the population that wearing a helmet is an incredibly good idea, literally a lifesaver?
    • davidw 3y ago
      The actual statistics say that the real lifesaver is keeping the deadly vehicles away from cyclists and pedestrians: https://usa.streetsblog.org/2016/06/02/why-helmets-arent-the-answer-to-bike-safety-in-one-chart https://usa.streetsblog.org/2016/06/02/why-helmets-arent-the... I mean, go ahead, wear one, they aren't going to hurt for sure, and probably make a lot of sense at an individual level, but at a macro, systemic level, helmet wearing is not really the answer.
      • mcpackieh 3y ago
        > I mean, go ahead, wear one, they aren't going to hurt for sure Is "they don't hurt" really the best you'll say in defense of helmets? Correct me if I'm way off the mark, but from what I understand the argument against mandatory helmet laws goes something like this: Helmets aren't stylish/comfortable/convenient, therefore people don't like to wear them, therefore people are less inclined to bike if doing so would require a helmet, therefore people are more likely to die from being fat or in a car accident. This argument seems rational to me. It may or may not be correct, the devil is in the numbers, but at the very least there's a rational chain of argument here. Let's suppose that argument is correct, the rational response is to simultaneously oppose mandatory helmet laws and wear a helmet anyway. Helmets break so your skull doesn't, on an individual basis you are safer if you choose to wear a helmet. Helmets aren't designed to solve "macro, systemic" problems with society, they address the problem of you getting your skull cracked open and they do that very effectively. You should be willing to admit that wearing a helmet not only doesn't hurt, it absolutely helps you. If you're not willing to concede that helmets help on an individual level even if systemic social issues remain, that's madness. I see room for debate over the value of mandatory helmet laws, but there's no rational debate about helmets on an individual level. Biking with a helmet is safer than biking without one.
• biggc 3y ago
  How is this a recall? It sounds like if you're an early adopter all they're offering is a $100 discount on a new one.
  • ceejayoz 3y ago
    > For the newer Onewheel GT, Onewheel Pint X, Onewheel Pint, and Onewheel Plus XR, a software update with a new warning system is the remedy. Recall just means “fix needed”. It doesn’t necessarily mean they all get returned to manufacturers. (I’d have gone through half a dozen cars if that was the case.)
    • hackernewds 3y ago
      The warning system seems insufficient to say the least? Usually there's a hardware fix.
      • bombcar 3y ago
        It seems you’re just going to perhaps have to agree that the One Wheel may kill you, just like the self driving car warnings.
      • zamadatix 3y ago
        I'd say hardware fixes are becoming increasingly less common. As more of the ways devices function rely on software there is less a need to physically change them to correct problems.
      • deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
• willk 3y ago
  I have a Onewheel XR. Mine took a nosedive at pretty low speeds and I broke my arm. Onewheel blamed me, I had a lot of experience on the XR and a lot of time skateboards and skates. The device problems, I’m happy they are acknowledging that. I don’t like that it is a voluntary recall. I don’t want store credit, I don’t trust Future Motion or their products.
  • sleepybrett 3y ago
    > I’m happy they are acknowledging that A full year after the CSPC told them they had problems YEARS after their customers had been telling them they had problems.
  • deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  • noman-land 3y ago
    This for sure warrants a lawsuit.
    • catiopatio 3y ago
      It’s very likely that the hardware and/or firmware was not designed to meet a quality standard appropriate for the associated customer risks.
      • varjag 3y ago
        Move fast and break bones?
      • salad-tycoon 3y ago
        These are the ones that move super fast with a terrible braking system (one wheel) and zero protective gear right? Never seen one in person but I’ve read chatter and seen a video a while back. I mean anyone that jumps out of an airplane should also be prepared for the chute to not deploy. I’m guessing the difference is that you dont have to sign a waiver for onewheel riding?
• endisneigh 3y ago
  I used to use an electric skateboard in the 2010s - very early on in the e mobility movement. Though I knew (and still know) how to skateboard I found it to be pretty dangerous due to the speeds you’re now capable of. Unlike long boarding where you’re forced to learn to slide in order to stop anyone can go 20mph+ and get themselves killed. The one wheel in a sense is worse because inherently there’s no way to use it without electricity and people overestimate their ability to travel on high speeds on it. That’s why I ended up going with e-bikes and escooters. I think the nature of the motion lends itself to be inherently safer.
  • sleepybrett 3y ago
    I looked at the skateboards, the onewheel, scooters. I discounted the skateboards and the scooters because i know that small diameter wheels suck. A little gravel and you could be fucked. The onewheel was still interesting, I hit up the subreddit, tons of people talking about how they got hurt mixed with people telling them how dumb they were.. That was enough for me, I bought an ebike instead.
    • marssaxman 3y ago
      I just bought an electric longboard with large, all-terrain wheels - not for off-roading, but so I don't have to worry so much about the gravel and potholes on poorly-maintained Seattle streets. Seems to work well, so far - I can ride right down the unpaved gravel alleyway behind my house, even. You can still feel the bumps and ruts, but you just roll right along, there's none of the lurching you get with smaller wheels. Ebikes are both fun and practical, but I don't know where I'd store one during the work day; the skateboard can just come up the elevator with me.
      • sleepybrett 3y ago
        I am also in seattle, I wouldn't want to ride the streets in ballard with a skateboard, even with 'all-terrain wheels'. See a couple of onewheels doing it though. I store my bike in the bike cage at work, when I go into the office, most offices have them. At home I store it in my apt, we've had a couple of garage breakins that got a few bikes in the last couple of years. My bike is a folding model so I can store it in the big laundry closet I have to get it out of the way.
• migf 3y ago
  Every middle aged former skateboarder turned bartender or liquor sales person I know who's gotten on one of these fuckers cracked their face open. You have been warned. I just looked at one and it stole all my hyphens.
  • deleted 3y ago
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  • dfc 3y ago
    Steal your hyphens? What does that mean?
    • coolspot 3y ago
      This comment is a humorous remark that implies that the person who wrote it is so old and fragile that even looking at a skateboard (one of these fuckers) caused them to lose their ability to use hyphens in their writing. Hyphens are punctuation marks that are used to join words or parts of words, such as in "middle-aged" or "liquor-sales person". The comment is exaggerating the effect of aging and skateboarding on the person's health and grammar. It is also a self-deprecating joke that mocks the person's own lack of hyphens in their comment. Thanks LLM!
      • fuzzybear3965 3y ago
        Wow. I'm not sure it's right. But, that feels/seems right.
        • redhale 3y ago
          I think the opposite. This feels like a hallucination to me. There are no Google results for it, suggesting it's not an actual phrase in English. Maybe a rough translation of a phrase in another language?
          • wan23 3y ago
            The LLM pretty clearly got the gist of the joke. The original comment started > Every middle aged former skateboarder turned bartender... In "proper" written English that should have been "middle-aged former-skateboarder-turned-bartender". But at the end of the comment the author claims to have lost their hyphens (i.e. their ability to use the - symbol). Probably because they were having trouble deciding what parts of that should be hyphenated and just made a joke about it instead.
• gamblor956 3y ago
  A few years ago, I used to see a middle-aged guy riding one of these every single day from his office to his apartment in Downtown LA. Then I suddenly stopped seeing him. According to a street vendor who saw the accident, the guy's Onewheel froze up on him riding down Grand Ave from Bunker Hill, he went flying, and he suffered severe brain damage. He's been in a coma since then, and his family's lawsuit against the manufacturer is still working its way through the courts.
  • sleepybrett 3y ago
    Yeah after seeing one i was tempted. Seems like a great way to last mile a commute. Did a little research, reddit sub full of people who had been injured being belittled by the regulars. Went with an ebike instead.
• jaybrendansmith 3y ago
  Any disclosure on the reasons for the failures? Is there some kind of internal gyro that locks up, for example?
  • petre 3y ago
    Too much tech. Just use a bike. Proven for over 120 years.
  • iancmceachern 3y ago
    It's basically that they handle failure modes like low battery, using it at the limit of the motors power, etc poorly. Rather than earn the rider they just much then off
• chubot 3y ago
  This is just my personal opinion, but as a both a programmer and a cyclist, and as someone who saw the OneWheels all over SF -- I just can't trust that any organization will write code well enough to get on one of these things, especially where there is split-second interaction with SF traffic, and where my face being broken is one of the consequences. (I might trust certain people, but not organizations.) I don't know if they did anything bad or not, but the very concept seems suspect. I want my body to learn the laws of physics, as on a bike. I don't want my body to have to interact with software that gets updates over time. You can level similar criticisms at modern planes -- planes worked before software, and people learned over time how to fly them in bad conditions. They had skin in the game!!! People writing code in a company somewhere aren't personally liable for your face breaking, or the plane going down in flames. I didn't follow very closely, but the recent Toyota/Boeing issues basically seem like typical organizational blame deflection. No skin in the game. Unlike mechanical systems, this type of software has no end-user/operator repair. When software is doing too much, then the pilots and operators lose agency. --- So I believe a bicycle (or unicycle) has more agency than a OneWheel. The human is forced to learn it, and it's a STABLE target for learning. Humans have an intuitive sense of physics, and it can be honed to incredible degrees This reminds me of those viral videos of indoor cyclists that were going around >10 years ago https://youtu.be/WB3qTVg3hhs?t=158 https://youtu.be/WB3qTVg3hhs?t=158 It's a perfect example of why you shouldn't underestimate the human's brain ability to learn -- software is not that flexible or reliable; AI is not that flexible or reliable. I mean think about SLOW the self-driving cars are after 10+ years. Their reaction time and judgement is shit. I'm not an exceptional cyclist, but I've learned to make decisions safely in 15+ years of riding around SF, through diverse conditions and terrain. It's obvious to me that these capabilities are beyond software.
  • andrelaszlo 3y ago
    I saw a dad with his son together on one (or a similar product) last week. I doubt that they test things like that thoroughly. It definitely looked like an accident waiting to happen. Both were wearing helmets but they were going pretty fast. I can imagine that smashing your face into the ground will be ugly at those speeds. Especially for a 6-7 year-old with the weight of an adult added on top...
• unsupp0rted 3y ago
  > four known death cases — three without a helmet — between 2019 and 2021.
  • deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
• browningstreet 3y ago
  I was just checking events in the Tahoe area and noticed that there’s some national off-road one wheel competition coming to Sky Tavern above Reno in a bit…
• Relys 3y ago
  First of all, fuck Future Motion on the C&D for REWheel. Also why haven't they still haven't patched the security vulnerability of hardcoded AES key in their devices? REWheel was specifically architected so that it did not share any IP, and they came in and bullied Nish under an archaic clause in the DMCA that's being hotly contested in R2R. The VESC implementation was Whitebox reverse engineered and none of the coders (Mitch, Dado, Nico) ever even looked at any FM binary. All REWheel was trying to do was let users repair their BMS's and re level their boards for aftermarket rails as well as provide safety features so that boards didn't drop users. Besides this recall, here are all the other issues with their boards: 1) BMS discharge protection shutting off board instead of pushback/buzzer. 2) Wires breaking in cable harness leading to BMS communication drop shutting off board during mid ride (my friends have broken bones on the XR because of this). 3) Pint X Balance cable pinching 4) GT motor connector coming loose during midride leading to board cut off. 5) Lack of locktite in controller box screws and nuts (common for power button nut to come loose and short controller in Pint) 6) Lack of proper waterproofing in controller and battery box (should put silicone sealant around connector ports internally and externally) 7) Water getting into Pint motor connector causing short (should put dielectric grease on all connectors) 8) Underspeced charging connector on Pint PCB for hypercharger leading to arcing and damage. 9) Unknown reproducible GT shutoff over certain bridges on later hardware revisions. My theory is that you swapped out IMU because of chip shortage and didn't validate high pass filters properly. Either that or GT motor connector looseness issue. I can go ride one of my friends GT and make it shutoff right now if I wanted to by riding over certain bridges! It's insane! 10) Underspeced mosfets on controller leading to lack of torque and recovery in nosedive situations. My VESC Pint beats the GT on hill climbs. 11) GT axel weakness leading to breakage. 12) Powder coating on GT rails leading to overheating 13) Lack of proper coolant (like statoraid) in GT Hypercore hub leading to overheating. 14) Reverse polarity on XT-60 connections (this is just evil) The above design flaws have lead to multiple injuries and broken bones in Future Motion devices that I have mitigated in all of my VESC boards I have built for myself and the people I love and don't want to see get hurt. OneWheels are great devices. I myself have close to 10K miles on them. I have felt infinitely safer after I started converting my own to VESC boards, removing the discharge path on the BMS (so it couldn't power off the board unexpectedly) and disabling moving faults (so it couldn't drop the user due to a failed footpad). This has been achieved by swapping out both the BMS and ESC to open source, aftermarket solutions.
• denton-scratch 3y ago
  Yikes! That thing looks intrinsically dangerous, whether or not it's used within "limits".
• furyofantares 3y ago
  Mine is rotting in my garage. I couldn't sell it or give it away given what I know about it. $100 credit for a new board - no thanks. I'm not giving these assholes another cent and I don't want anything they've touched anyway. Resisting the recall is a full and likely permanent breach of trust.
• 6stringmerc 3y ago
  Half Tesla autopilot still?
• btbuildem 3y ago
  I've never trusted the design of that thing -- not even to get on it once. It's just so.. dumb. It doesn't have a failsafe mode. At least put some small wheels / rollers on the leading edge so when it inevitably nosedives, it wouldn't dig in. Terrible design. I ride an electric skateboard (boosted stealth) -- it makes sense to me. If the battery runs out, or if it loses connection to the remote, it turns into a dumb, heavy skateboard. When it fails mechanically (snapped belts, burned out motors), it turns into a dumb skateboard. You can carve to lose speed, you can drag your foot to slow down, you can even slide it like a regular longboard. Even with all that, I sometimes imagine what could happen if the software glitched and cranked the throttle 100% forward or back - makes my skin crawl. Luckily I've never heard of that happening with any of their boards in however many years. All that said, I think these types of "last mile" small-scale mobility devices are a very good way to help people decouple from cars, make transit more accessible, and generally take back street space from the monoculture of heavy, dangerous, energy-intensive vehicles.
  • skymast 3y ago
    [dead]
  • rich_sasha 3y ago
    Some very good points here. What happens to a Segway when it runs out of battery?
    • c22 3y ago
      The Segway has redundant control circuitry, motor windings, and battery. If there is a failure of any of these I believe it will fault and perform a controlled stop.
    • bombcar 3y ago
      Since we’ve not heard stories of it being involved in deaths I assume that the battery stops providing propulsion score it stops providing gyro. (And depending on how the gyro is designed it might keep spinning long enough for it to slow down and stop.)
• deleted 3y ago
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• MivLives 3y ago
  I sold my Onewheel because I was seeing more reports of this sort of stuff. Personally never experienced it in about 2.5k miles ridden. I guess I was lucky. The way I've seen people take drops on these things, or modify the electronics can't be good. I've honestly wondered if those little front wheels (called Fangs I think) would become a standard thing.
• deleted 3y ago
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• slowhadoken 3y ago
  It’s tragic but I’m not shocked.
• perihelions 3y ago
  Aside: if anyone's trying to talk someone they care about out of purchasing something like this, I suggest tricking them into getting a skateboard first. I think that would ground most people in reality. Fuck around enough at low speed in less-than-lethal environments, you'll get onto a first-name basis with Newtonian Physics, and it'll clarify, on a viscerally intuitive level, what these types of machines are really about. The first thought that comes to my mind looking at this device is "these are failure-is-not-an-option situations". There's many ways to fall off a skateboard without dying, and to me it's viscerally obvious, absolutely none of them will ever apply here. You can't recover onto your feet, because these lithium-battery things are like 300% faster than your top sprinting speed. You can't fall onto your arms either, because your inertial speed is faster than your autonomous reflexes. (You learn all about your autonomous reflexes). It's just your face, and skull. This is the first thought that comes to mind: there's no way to bail, 0% chance. It's just completely not-an-option to fail on such a device at cruising speed. And I'm grounded enough to realize, I'm not a person who never fails physical feats. That's not what a human is.
  • green-salt 3y ago
    I got a Boosted board and basically bought all protective gear and did laps around a school find all about said physics before using it as a daily last-mile transport. Helmets are so important.
    • gnicholas 3y ago
      I assume that riding a Boosted requires more skateboarding skill than riding a Onewheel?
      • green-salt 3y ago
        Yeah it requires that base skill since its just a longboard with a really good motor/battery controller.
  • bombcar 3y ago
    Think how many times a toddler entertains the carpet with his face whilst learning to walk and run - years of training is involved in us walking normally. You need similar training to learn these other devices which can operate VERY unexpectedly compared to normal balancing.
• alex_young 3y ago
  I broke my pelvis and elbow while learning to ride a OneWheel+. I overcame the motor’s resistance when attempting to accelerate from a low speed and went flying off the front. Recovery was rough, but not the end of the world. I still ride the thing. Mostly trail riding; I find the concentration required doesn’t mix well with bumpy streets. I’ve also had injuries snowboarding and doing other sports. The recall thing makes sense, but offering $100 to destroy a $1700 toy seems kind of lame.
• jtokoph 3y ago
  This seems like a cheap (or maybe even profitable) recall. For new models, it’s just a software update (~free) and for old models it’s a $100 credit on a new board which probably doesn’t consume all of the profit on a sale of a board. Plus this coverage is now a ton of free advertising for a product many forgot about or didn’t know about. Shouldn’t they have just done this years ago? Am I missing something?
• donw 3y ago
  Maybe they can pivot and rebrand themselves as the Deathwheel?
• exo-pla-net 3y ago
  To be a rare positive voice, I own their newest model, the Onewheel GT, and I absolutely love it. It feels like snowboarding around town. I've put hundreds of miles on it without a single issue. For safety, I wear motorcycle armor and wrist guards with it, and I keep my maximum speed at ~15mph. Injuries are almost always caused by people not wearing simple safety equipment and trying to go way too fast. I'd never recommend an adrenaline-adjacent activity, since I don't want it on my conscience if a person gets hurt. But Onewheeling might be my favorite part of the day: it's like having a cabin on the slopes of Colorado, where you're able to step out the front door and immediately have the experience of snowboarding. So, I won't recommend it per se, but it's as fun as advertised, and you'll know it if you need it.
  • sneak 3y ago
    > For safety, I wear motorcycle armor and wrist guards with it Does that include a helmet?
    • exo-pla-net 3y ago
      I think you can guess. I specifically wear a BMX helmet.
  • tra3 3y ago
    What’s a wrist guard? Googling seems to result in rsi soft braces.
    • gnicholas 3y ago
      Probably something like this. [1] I've used them when rollerblading and snowboarding. 1: https://www.rei.com/product/875825/dakine-wrist-guards https://www.rei.com/product/875825/dakine-wrist-guards
      • secabeen 3y ago
        The plastic stays on my wristguards probably saved me a ton of pain when rollerblading as a kid. Hit a tiny asphalt stone at high speed going down a hill; the guards saved my wrists when I instinctively took the fall on them. I'll never forget the sound of the guards scraping down the street, and how bad it would have been without them.
• rytill 3y ago
  To add a perspective I haven’t seen yet in this thread, I’ve been riding one of these for 6 years and it’s basically my favorite way to get around. For me, it has more utility than a bike. I usually go around 15 mph and I’m careful to not nosedive which happens when you go really fast (~20+ on a pint) or accelerate too quickly. Though, I learned the behavior of the board the hard way. I wouldn’t recommend it to most people even though I love it personally. I hope Future Motion increases the reliability and safety of the board and keeps refining their product.
  • JeremyNT 3y ago
    > I hope Future Motion increases the reliability and safety of the board and keeps refining their product. Maybe the concept of this product could work, but would you really ever trust this company again? You may have been lucky but you know others were not, and the company kept downplaying the issues with the device. It took them this long to finally do a voluntary recall of this device, what's going to happen next time something goes wrong?
• concordDance 3y ago
  I do wonder how the danger level compares to scooters or bicycles.
  • extropy 3y ago
    Bicycles fail safe unless a wheel falls off or both brakes fail simultaneously. Balancing onewheelers - if the control or power system fails, you immediately go down, hard. And since the cruising position is weight shifted forwards, it's 100% nose dive.
• hackermeows 3y ago
  I have seen first hand how these things fail , i was riding down a hill with my friend on the on wheel and it just decided to stop flinging him on to stopped bus . If the thing fails there is nothing to hold on to , its either your hands that stop you or your face
• MarkusWandel 3y ago
  I haven't personally seen a Onewheel crash, but someone did pass me on my (non-electric) bike with a powered skateboard the other day, and not 10m past, one of the wheels dug into a pavement defect, board stopped, he didn't. Low-ish speed, got away with some scrapes and a bruised ego, but no bones broken. The fact with these things is, you don't have leverage to stop. On a bike with proper posture, your center of mass is a fair way behind the contact patch of the front wheel and you can brake hard to the point of wheels skidding and not nosedive. Though a front wheel motor hypothetically going from full power to sudden lockup probably would send you over the handlebars. Someone passed me on an e-scooter with 6" wheels, going at least 40km/h (I was going about 30km/h and the passing speed was significant). Disaster waiting to happen.
• fumar 3y ago
  I bought one, thought I mastered it, ended up in the ER, sold it. Onewheels require a full face helmet and pads. Even under ideal conditions, the device can fail of function different than expected causing the rider harm. I was riding mine off a 2-3 inch curb, which was on a familiar path I took daily, when the nose slammed and I flew off fracturing my rest. The sensation of a OW is amazing at low and high speeds, but the risk isn't worth the reward.
• sbdaman 3y ago
  What the hell is a Chief Evangelist?
• h2odragon 3y ago
  I remember seeing ads for the one wheel the first time, and thinking it must be some kind of joke. Surely no one would have the nads to sell that in the USA? How are they not going to be steamrolled by the liability lawsuits? Maybe that was part of the business plan in the first place, and they're also sponsoring the inevitable class action big lawsuit through another subsidiary company. Buy the victims off with a little money now in return for large shares of the settlements. 15 years from now when the courts decide they're due money for being stupid enough to get on the thing in the first place, the original company will have been long bankrupt, and the State (ie Taxpayers) will be on the hook to relieve the suffering of the poor victims. Not to mock people injured on these things; but seriously, just look at it. You embraced the risk when you stepped on it.
• jrm4 3y ago
  Never touched one, but FWIW it's the only thing I see daily that feels like the future. That being said, I literally only see one, and it's the same one, there's a kid who commutes to my kids school every day in a suburban area.
• mnming 3y ago
  I sold my onewheel pint a few years back only after 200 miles because of a few uncontrollable crashes and nobody believed me that this is a dangerous product. I warned the next buyer but he still bought it, just like me before crashes. But I did convince him to join the Onewheel Crash Club Facebook group. For everyone who is interested to know how dangerous this is, check that page out.
  • shawn-butler 3y ago
    You knew it was defective and sold it to someone else? Not sure about the ethics on that one
    • mnming 3y ago
      I couldn't prove that mine was defective, I was more convinced that mine was working as it was designed, which is inherently dangerous.
• mdaniel 3y ago
  This could very well be the wrong "vibe" thread to ask such a thing, but I'd guess those who are here would likely be an informed audience to solicit: has anyone heard of, or tried, to build Byte Sized Engineering's one-wheel: https://www.bytesizedengineering.com/projects/openwheel https://www.bytesizedengineering.com/projects/openwheel (and also https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkXIBCzrUr0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkXIBCzrUr0 )?
  • shkkmo 3y ago
    There are better solutions than that these days and tons of people building and designing parts for custom built boards that use few or no components from FutureMotion. https://pev.dev https://pev.dev
    • mdaniel 3y ago
      Thanks for the pointer; for anyone similarly interested, there's a post in that forum showing the build log https://pev.dev/t/diy-onewheel-build-review/918 https://pev.dev/t/diy-onewheel-build-review/918 and they report: > Overall I would highly recommend going through with this build. It feels pretty close to the real thing and is a fraction of the cost. The build got a little frustrating at some points but that’s just part of the learning process. The board is a bit large which is kind of annoying. but I didn't read the whole thing in order to know how much experience they came into that project already possessing (or, of course, supporting tools)
      • shkkmo 3y ago
        The amount of experience you need depends on how deep into doing it you wanna go. The community makes and sells kits and components and there's facebook groups and discords that help answer questions and troubleshoot problems. You can definitely source components that require no soldering and no 3d design skills and build your own board without pre-existing experience. Sourcing those components may take time since a lot of the best ones have a lot of demand and can't really scale. The ride I went on yesterday in SF had six riders on vesc boards, two of which the the Floatwheel which is starting to be made at scale by a member of the community in China and sold via cryptocurrency since Future Motion has successfully blocked his ability to accept credit cards.
• someonehere 3y ago
  I was convinced the smaller one they were about to release was something I wanted to try. Height of the communal electric scooter rental phase, I thought this would be a great way to get around downtown where I worked. Paid the deposit and couldn’t wait. As time went on the excitement wore off because it seemed more dangerous when I would see existing riders going around. I eventually cancelled the pre-order. Here we are years later and three or four people have died. Just like my instinct told me.
• 999900000999 3y ago
  I don't think these should go over 10 miles an hour. That's the only way to make these safe. At 20 miles an hour it's way to easy to lose control
  • callalex 3y ago
    That’s how I ride mine. I’ve recently hit a thousand miles, 50/50mix of paved and trails. I’ve had many crashes in that time but have had nothing but a few bruises and scrapes to show for it. I also ripped my pants once which sucked. I liked those pants. So yea, most of the problems with this board are related to people going faster than they can safely bail.
• deleted 3y ago
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• spandextwins 3y ago
  That thing looks too risky for me. But so does a horse.
  • atom058 3y ago
    You should continue to be scared of horses. There are quite a few injuries and deaths related to horseback riding every year.
• grumple 3y ago
  I don't ride these but I and many friends ride electric unicycles, EUCs. There's a known safety concern: if you're riding at the maximum supported speed, and you lean forward, you're going to fall forward because the device can not speed up to catch you. Similarly, if you lean back to brake but are leaning too far for how quickly the machine can stop, you will fall backwards. At high speeds this is catastrophic. You can also draw too much power due to things like incline, music, etc. OneWheels would presumably have the same limitation. EUCs have default warnings at high speeds, but you can disable or change these warnings (making them higher or lower). You also need to monitor your battery health; I wouldn't trust an old battery. Ultimately the rider determines the risk. I'm the only rider I know that wears a helmet. Many friends or acquaintances have broken their legs badly or been hit by multiple vehicles. I ride slower and safer, generally, but even I've done some minor damage to myself. I'm inclined to get rid of the EUC in favor of a scooter or ebike. Two points of contact with the ground is so much safer.
  • 93po 3y ago
    My EUC gives a very strong "push back" at maximum speed and learning forward. I think it would take max speed plus leaning forward through push back plus hitting some obstacle like a large pothole to actually induce a nosedive. it's much more difficult on a EUC vs onewheel My EUC is one of the dinkier ones though, not the high powered fancy ones that cost $2k
• jonfromsf 3y ago
  Those high-powered electric unicycles are next.
• archsurface 3y ago
  Not that I wish anyone hurt, I do wonder if there isn't some abandonment of common sense - moving things result in accidents, there's no way to prevent that, and if you don't want to get hurt don't use them. For example, I was cycling through a large park this evening, empty because the weather was gloomy and it was a Saturday evening. Cars, cyclists, walkers and joggers use the road through the park but only myself and one other cyclist were on the long straight heading towards each other. When he was about 20 meters in front of me he suddenly fell into the grass on the side of the road. No potholes, no animals, no gust of wind, no broken parts, ... just over he went. A lapse of concentration? No idea. He climbed back on and continued. Point being that even with perfect conditions people still manage to come a cropper.
  • buffington 3y ago
    I'm normally in the "use your common sense" camp for sure, but with One Wheels, I feel a bit different. They're very easy to ride. It takes about 5-15 minutes to learn how to ride them well enough to go very fast. I love the thrill of going fast on stuff, but I think the One Wheel and similar devices need to be capped to a "safe" speed (where science determines "safe"). If a firmware update came out that did that today, I probably wouldn't even notice, because I don't ever let it get above 10-15mph if I can help it.
• iancmceachern 3y ago
  I wonder if, and how much, product liability insurance they have, amd how much their rate just went up.
• deleted 3y ago
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• devit 3y ago
  It seems that the problem is that the Onewheel is a fundamentally flawed design that should perhaps not even be legal to sell. Basically the issue is that the only control available is turning the wheel, but an unstable scooter actually needs two controls: one to balance the board and one to control the speed. Having a single control means that they are tied and thus that, discounting air resistance, if the user continuously leans forward, then the board has to continuously accelerate up to arbitrary speeds since turning the wheel to balance also results in acceleration. Furthermore, it seems that they don't even have a motor powerful enough to always be able to balance the user along with air resistance, so if the rider continuously leans forward eventually the motor is no longer powerful enough, the board loses balance and the rider probably falls down and dies. Not sure how they could even think of selling a design like that or how they are surviving the lawsuits. The simplest fix seems to be using four wheels instead of one, which also removes the need of active balancing and is a normal proper design. If "leaning to accelerate" is desired instead of a more normal handle with a throttle control, then it should be achievable by adding suspension springs and detecting their extension. Not sure if it's possible to have a proper design with one wheel; a thing that comes to mind is having a sort of "landing gear" that can come down and make the board stable on demand. An alternative could perhaps be an internal reaction flywheel, but not sure if that works and is feasible.
  • Pyxl101 3y ago
    How do two-wheeled segway devices handle this? If you continue to lean forward and try to exceed their maximum speed, they will somehow tilt you backward and slow down anyway. (Presumably, enough force on the front edge could cause them to over-tilt, but riding normally, it will forcefully tilt you back and slow down.)
  • RetpolineDrama 3y ago
    >The simplest fix seems to be using four wheels instead of one Classic. But that's not enough, you also need airbags and crumple zones. We can't realistically expect everyone to wear motorcycle gear all the time so we need to build it into the mode of transport itself. Soon enough, you end up building car :)
• ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago
  What about those millions of cheap knockoffs? Around here, they are like rolling molotov cocktails.
• nojvek 3y ago
  Had an electric skateboard. Fell off due to wheels slipping in rain. Injured wrists. Took a good 5 years, but not fully back. Skateboard: $700. Hospital bill $6000 - it blew past the deductible. I’m alive but electric scooters are much better since you have big strong handles to hold onto. Even then don’t go at stupid speeds.
• bentt 3y ago
  The real news here is that they have sold 300,000 of these and there have only been four deaths.
  • 93po 3y ago
    43k car deaths in the US in 2022. 14 million new vehicle sales. That's one death per 325 car sales. Onewheel is one death per 75,000 sales. Significantly safer than cars.
    • Panzer04 3y ago
      One also wonders how many 3rd party deaths were caused by cars, as opposed to the virtually zero for the foreseeable future from these sorts of devices. Pretty classic holier than thou commentary from HN, for sure.
• michaelmrose 3y ago
  > The Onewheel GT, Onewheel Pint X, Onewheel Pint, and Onewheel Plus XR will receive a firmware update that will add a new warning “Haptic Buzz” feedback that riders can feel and hear when the vehicle enters an error state, is low on battery, or is nearing its limits and needs to slow dow What the ever loving fuck is the "error state". Fucking websites and laptops can have "error states" Vehicles shouldn't have "error states" or they shouldn't exist. Also if it buzzes when you go too fast people will deliberately attempt to make it buzz.
  • callalex 3y ago
    Ever heard of the Check Engine light on a car? Error states for the Onewheel include “battery got too cold” and “battery got too warm” for example.
    • michaelmrose 3y ago
      Fair point
• Decabytes 3y ago
  I have a rad rover 6. It’s a fat tire electric bike with disc brakes that can go 20mph. When I got on it the first time and hit max speed, I was like this is definitely fast enough for me. A lot of people say you don’t need the fat tire but I’m heavy and I live in Michigan and the roads are crap here. I never ride it without a helmet and the side view mirror but even then I have to be attentive. The boosted boards and one wheels always seemed too dangerous for me.
• parentheses 3y ago
  These things are downright dangerous!! Avoid at all costs. In at least one way, onewheels are the safer of the electric "board" options - the weight transfer _is_ the throttle. Consider slowing down without shifting your weight forward - immediate face plant. While the one wheel is dangerous, electric boards are even more risky. I'd expect the number of deaths per e-board owner to be higher than that of the one wheel.
• temikus 3y ago
  I feel Evolve skateboards are next. Remote drop-outs and start/stop issues have been known in community for ages. I miss Boosted - they really cared about rider safety :(
• deleted 3y ago
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• gcanyon 3y ago
  I owned a first gen Evolve Carbon skateboard back in 2014. That thing was capable of something like 24 mph, but I took it over 10 mph maybe five times total, and every time I did it was brief and nerve-wracking. In two years of commuting over two miles to work and back on it every day, I'm proud to say I managed to never have to put my hand on the ground. I had to bail a few times -- broke the drive belt once, and hit a few serious pavement gaps and rocks -- but I never went down. Phew!
• rkagerer 3y ago
  >>For early adopters, however, owners can receive a “pro-rated credit of $100 to the purchase of a new board,” according to Mudd. The credit will only be issued after owners confirm that they have disposed of the old model. You've got to be kidding me. I hope they're hit with a class action forcing them to replace all of the flawed early units or reimburse purchasers at some ammortized rate.
• lrvick 3y ago
  I think I will stick with comparatively safe forms of traffic-defying travel, like motorcycles.
• yieldcrv 3y ago
  so latest death is one with a helmet, and an “error state” after the device is pushed to “certain limits” I’m sorry, what? This is very scant on details
• lionkor 3y ago
  > claimed that it tested and found nothing wrong with the Onewheels Is this the hardware manufacturer equivalent of "runs fine on my machine"?
• TheHappyOddish 3y ago
  I understand that HN swings US and we don't like editorialising titles, but this one sucks. It's every Onewheel in the US. "Every single Onewheel" has a clearly absolutist meaning, and the title should be edited to reflect, or a [US] at the end at least.
• nmca 3y ago
  I think this is a mandatory software update, no physical devices are moving, and that the article is written misleadingly, even if technically correct. Or am I the only person that doesn't understand this new definition of "recall"??
• lobocinza 3y ago
  One wheel, one life.
• 3np 3y ago
  So the company is issuing a firmware update with some new warning system. Early adopters where for unstated reasons this is not sufficient/possible are up for a $100 store credit iff they show evidence of disposing of their $1000 board. Destroy your unsafe board and you're up for 5~10% off on a new model! If I were were one of these people I'd probably be pissed off. A proper replacement or money back should be the only reasonable response. At this point there's no way this company would ever have me as a potential customer again after seeing their irresponsible handling of this.