Electric (self balancing) unicycles

If you like EU’s that’s fine with me. I don’t see them as unusually hazardous to society, or as something that needs to be regulated or banned. They’re not remotely the same thing as a real unicycle though and I don’t think they bring anything to the sport.

Im mostly worried it can have a negative impact on the unicycle community. If an electric uni or scooter gets into traffic accidents, unicycles could be banned along with them.
I think unicycles are in the category with bikes.

The French, obly, right…

Electric Unicycles are what got me into unicycling personally. I was interested in unicycling before, mostly because I stumbled across a muni video on YouTube, but always shrugged it off as too difficult or impractical.
I got an electric unicycle after seeing a video about those, and a guy at work got one. I can’t think of any other purchase under $1000 that brought me as much fun or contentment as that solowheel glide 3. They are awesome IMO. It got me hooked on one-wheeled riding, and reignited my fascination with uni/muni. I got a “real” uni a year later, and haven’t looked back. Instead I want that oracle 27.5 now! But I also want a new inmotion v11 with suspension too if Im honest.

Are they different? Sure! The real uni is much more difficult (I wouldn’t call an EUC “easy” per se, but easier than a pedal unicycle for sure- but still offputting to some)
They are as different as a motorcycle and a bicycle. I happen to enjoy both (actually all 4… unicycles, EUC’s, bicycles and motorcycles too!) very much!
Gliding along silently, quickly, and effortlessly on an EUC is something to be experienced. Don’t knock it 'till you try it! They are pretty practical in urban areas too… a little electric vehicle in a briefcase if you will that you can stash almost anywhere.
None of that detracts from the joy and challenge “real” unicycling brings though. What I find is I want to bring both my EUC and uni anywhere I go.
Don’t worry, there is a fantastic forum for EUC’s too. I don’t think you’ll have much concern with them taking over the forum discussion here any more than the folks here taking over their forum over there.
(Both forums are great BTW!)

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True, but I’ve heard several times “monoroue”, literally “uniwheel”. And not necessarily from kids pointing at me!

I like acoustic uni. Though analog uni sounds better.

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I think there should be an insurance on electric Unicycles and scooters. Any kid can go “fast, silent and effectively” in an urban setting.
How fast is it, 20-25km/t I believe.
Unicycles is more in line with bikes.

In many parts of the world they’re still illegal anywhere that’s not private land so you’d never be able to get insurance for such a thing until there are some law changes.
The laws surrounding them are also typically not adequately explained to potential buyers.

Illigal or not, they are still widely used everywhere. Of course, every country will have to pass a legislation. (Is that correct English? Lol)

That’s true, but you’re still never going to be able to get insurance for an illegal activity so we need the law changes first.

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First people have to figure out that traffic is not divided in two categories, “cars” and “everything else”, where one gets a lot of space and the second has to share what little space is left only because the fist category consists of unreasonably large two ton metal boxes.

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No car zone is part of the future, I think. And unicycles will be a great for getting around in those.

I think bike trails and designated bike roads are the best way to go. For roads, simply adding some obnoxious speed bumps along with a cutout that a bicycle/unicycle can use to avoid them could accomplish this. That way local people can still drive on the roads, but it keeps most of the traffic off them and at slower speeds. Also the people that live there are unlikely to object, because they’d appreciate less traffic on their street too.

What local government likes to do where I live is to make bike lanes on the main arterials. I’m not a fan of this, because riding alongside vehicles traveling at 40 mph still sucks, even if you have your own lane. Also, those lanes usually happen to be right next to the parking strip, so if someone in a parked car opens up their door while you are cruising by…

I’m kind of of the opinion that motorists, cyclists and pedestrians aren’t completely compatible and that whenever possible we should try and provide them with their own pathways. Just like cyclists dislike cars passing near them at high speed, pedestrians dislike the cyclists buzzing by them on multi-use paths.

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First I want to put in another vote for “acoustic” as our own differentiator for “real” unicycles. I don’t know if it plays well at all in other languages but it’s pretty easy for English speaking people to get the idea. The only downside of that label is that acoustic guitars aren’t particularly more difficult to play than electric ones (IMHO; I don’t play either).

Acoustic unicycle. The real deal. No batteries or electrical source, amplification, etc. required. Physical energy required. Physical skill required. Much better workout as an unavoidable benefit. :slight_smile:

I feel a kindred spirit sort of thing when passing (or passed by) EUCs on the bike path. I’m usually on the bike path; have seen few to none on dirt trails, except for some One Wheels.

EUCs don’t “bug” me. They can be fun to ride. I’d like to spend enough time with one to see what kinds of spins and other cool moves you can learn with one. It would have to be one that gets knocked down a lot. Safety gear, please!

What’s missing, for me, is a seat. If I’m not pedaling, if I’m not working to make the thing go, why am I standing up? It makes for crap aerodynamics, and is no particular advantage I can think of for that position, other than to keep the vehicle smaller/lighter. But I wouldn’t want to commute to work, on anything, standing up the whole way. Maybe on a bus, but not for more than a half hour at the most…

I like this one:
https://unicycling.smugmug.com/Travel/Europe/Spain-2016-Madrid/i-9qnppdn/A
which I was briefly allowed to play around with in Madrid, on our way to Unicon 18. Not fast, but built to look more like a motorcycle than a scooter/skateboard; might get a little more respect/space from cars. Built in headlights.

Justin LE (see the YouTube video posted above) has the coolest, smartest commuting or just badass FAST unicycle ever made. And that video is from 2016! I got to ride a much earlier version of it in 2010 and it was super-cool even then. It had a simple knob you could turn, like a motorcycle throttle, to increase or decrease the level of power assist. Similar to some bikes Jacquie and I rented recently in Hawaii. It worked great even then! I want one. :smiley:

Crossover: There will be some crossover between acoustic and electric unicycling, but probably not a huge amount. Ours will remain the niche sport that requires much more sweat equity and dedication, just to go down the street. And will remain the one that gives greater benefits to the rider, both physical and psychological, unless all they care about is getting to work or school. :stuck_out_tongue:

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I started acustic after electric. I was looking for a commuting item. The EUC was great for that, but with downsides: it is great for commuting but it weight more than 10kgs if you try to fit it in a backpack. You can buy a lightweight and tiny one, but you should mind the max range and consider that if you run out battery those 6kgs will need to be pushed around. So I sold the Euc and started Unicycling. However for short distances I still think that a good Electric skateboard could be great and portable, it could be pushead when out of battery too. If you need long range use an ebike.

I haven’t tried seated EUC riding yet but I did have this wacky idea of adapting my EUC to make sort of a hybrid EUC/unicycle. The EUC pedals just have a hinge/pin that go onto a bracket on the EUC. I thought it would be cool to make a unicycle frame that pins to the pedal bracket instead of a bearing/axle clamp, but more or less a standard unicycle frame/saddle with footpegs instead of cranks. It would have to have wider “forks”, due to EUCs being wider from containing electronics and substantial # of batteries. The benefit? Seated riding position capability, and maybe would help with learning unicycle skills some too (maybe backwards especially. Where you can get used to reverse steering without having to worry about reverse pedaling/balance too)… saddle time without the pedal balance so to speak

I have been meaning to try to weld something like this. I bought my first welder a while back but have no welding training/experience on how to use it, so this seems like maybe not the best firat project to try. Not sure how well it would really work either. I will be sure to share the results of my experiment if I attempt such a thing. I imagine it would look something like this with a commercial EUC in the middle:

Back to your point though, not being able to ride seated is a bummer. Stabilizing oneself with only foot platforms is tiring on the feet/shins/calves. This gets better with more time riding through a combo of conditioning of those infrequently used muscles, and relaxing more while riding, but I still need a break after 45-60 mins or so of riding.
Some EUCs have optional seats that can be put on the top of the e EUC that you sort of crouch down to sit down on. I hear it’s a bit of a challenge at first, and less stable though.

One day you might :smiley: :rofl:

That’s no EUC. It’s a EQC (Electric Quadricycle).
Though I think by the time I’m that old I will get me an Airwheel A3, which is one you can sit on.

:smile::stuck_out_tongue:

Well, as for SBUs with seats, there is already stuff like this:

unicycle-inline2

As a biker, I itch to try one of those. :smile:

I think the bar on the front should be a bit longer, so when you brake heavily, you will fly further.

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