Hello
My 11 year old is trying to learn to ride the Ultimate Wheel. He is very good at riding a normal uni.
I made a 20" UW for him. I understand bigger wheels are easier - does this size seem right for an 11 year old?
The tyre on it is a bit knobbly, BMX probably. Given that (I think) on a UW the insides of your calves can rub on the wheel (and help control it?) might a slick tyre help?
Any advice I can pass on to him, most welcome.
20" is ok, but bigger is easier.
You do not want a knobbly tyre on the UW, best to have a thin sooth tyre. It is also best to have leg armour of some kind when riding to stop rubbing and help the wheel to move.
For learning, use 2 spotters, one per side holding them up. This helps them concentrate on the riding smoothly and keeps momentum.
Good advice, thanks. Looking for a thinner/smoother tyre now.
Are spotters like the leg guards that you can find on the lunicycle and that Terry incorporated in his design?
Iāve had a few rides in shorts because of the heat and I forgot to change to long pants. So I ended up with chafing marks on the inside of my knees. I didnāt wanna drive home again to change, so rode on until I couldnāt bear it no longer 
However today in my session with loose jogging pants, they also started rubbing and now I have blister. The problem I had with shin guards on the 28" UW was that they were too loose and the rotation of the wheel made them spin around my legs.
I was thinking of maybe tying something like compression bandage around my legs. That should stay in place and then I can also ride in shorts basically.
Hi Gavin,
you said you made a UW for your boy. Is it just the easy way of removing the frame from a unicycle and tada UW, though with cranks, or did you make one where the pedals are screwed directly in the wheel?
I bought this one last: a 24", but the tire is wider than the frame, so when it hits my legs, it acts as a brake.
Then this one the 28" was my first :
It has a very narrow tube and needs to be pumped until 125 PSI. It is a great wheel and Iāve been able to make some 50-60 metres distance with it. Unfortunately I twisted my knees because of overdoing it, but then Iām not 11 anymore.
Basically those are the sizes that are on the market. 36" UWs are custom projects.
There are various other threads now about riding UW that you can find on the forum.
ā¦and you are dreaming of a FUW (fat ultimate wheel)!
ts, ts, ts.
I currently have 35mm wide tire on my 28ā UW. Will someone please check theirs, and report whether you have a 28, 25, or 23 tire, and whether it rubs your legs?
I am planning to buy this tire,
but I am not sure whether I really need to buy the thinnest tire. @unitortoise , do you remember the width of the tire that was on the UW that I sent to you (I believe you may have replaced that tire?)?
i havenāt changed the tire. its 700x25c or i think 12.5x622. not sure i understand the 25 vs 12.5 since i thought they were both supposed to be inflated width in mm?
700x25C is 25-622.
yeah thatās what was confusing me.
looked at the photo again and realized i was misinterpreting a left-parenthese as a 1 
. so yeah itās 25mm wide
Thank you!
Looking at the threadās heading I thought my UW beginner riding advice is:
DO IT!
It is an interesting trick to have a very small tire so you only touch the rim. As a side effect with a smaller tire the wheel size gets smaller and as we noticed smaller wheels are more difficult to ride.
Last week I bought these in the store. Since lately my knees have been hurting, I wanted to try something like this. Then it turned out, I could now ride with shorts, because the wheel just rubs against the knee bandage. And after the rides I have no more hurting joints either, which can also just be because my technique is getting better, but still.
Cool! Youāre lucky, my knees usually donāt like things that āhugā them.
Too good to be true
https://www.facebook.com/share/r/18MWFDt2Ao/?mibextid=wwXIfr
I found this ultimate wheel vid on the Thai unicycle facebook group
