Feet-On With Boosted Boards’ New Faster And Cheaper Electric Skateboards

http://techcrunch.com/2014/11/06/electric-skateboards/

by skdoo • 12 years ago

54 50 12 years ago

techcrunch.com

nicolethenerd• 12 years ago

Funny brand name, considering that the word can be slang for "stolen." I can see this causing some confusion.

JTon• 12 years ago

It didn't irk me. I guess it's my video game background where boost is a ubiquitous term for increasing your velocity

Fuzzwah• 12 years ago

Boosted rolls off the tongue far better than sv_maxspeed 1000 too.

deutronium• 12 years ago

I'm curious about this statement. Is there any electronic workaround for that?

"BRAKING DOWNHILL ON A FULL BATTERY WILL CAUSE BOARD SHUTDOWN since the regen will overcharge the battery. To prevent this from happening, the remote will warn you by beeping, and you’ll lose your braking power. Safely come to a stop before this happens, and ride on flats or uphill to drain the battery."

tlrobinson2• 12 years ago

The energy would need to be dissipated through a large heat sink.

jff• 12 years ago

Switch the regen output into a big-ass heatsink so as to burn off the energy? Put actual brakes in there for this sort of situation?

Nightmare situation for a SF resident who lives on top of one of the crazy steep hills, charges his board at night and is just about to head to work...

vkjv• 12 years ago

A simpler solution might be the ability to tweak the maximum charge percentage like you can do with a laptop.

skdoo14• 12 years ago

It's basically impossible with our current electronics to only charge the battery to 95% and leave headroom for regen braking. We could let the battery charge to 100% and then bleed off energy slowly, but most users keep it charging and then start riding immediately after unplugging it.

The other option is to divert braking energy to heat instead of recharging the battery. But on steep hills, braking energy can reach hundreds of watts, which would quickly overheat the electronics or motors without regen.

This is an issue that affects a very small subset of users, almost all of whom live at the top of a hill - definitely a unique corner case to design for. We tell them to discharge the battery by running it uphill or on flats briefly to discharge the battery enough to allow some regen headroom.

mik3y• 12 years ago

Naively I would have guessed you include something like a 1kW resistor + heat sink package, and divert to that.

Assuming such parts exist, are they just cost prohibitive, or is there more to it?

(Thanks for taking questions!)

btbuildem2• 12 years ago

what about charging the onboard laser?

krasin2• 12 years ago

In my non-educated opinion, one should never regenerate energy to a Lithium battery of any flavour. All of them are too unstable.

A supercapacitor is what should be the destination for the regenerated energy: it's empty by default; stable; could be discharged at high rate

jgable• 12 years ago

This is indeed a non-educated opinion. Please don't spread FUD.

Lithium-ion batteries are perfectly safe to regen. You need to monitor the cell and pack voltages and limit regen under certain conditions, but it's well understood how to do this.

Any electric vehicle with a lithium-ion battery (and there are millions of them, from skateboards and scooters to cars and trucks) does regen braking. Without regen, you lose one of the most compelling advantages of having an electric vehicle in the first place.

In general, supercapacitors do have much better power density than batteries, but much worse energy density, making them impractical for vehicles at this point in time. There's a reason the vast majority of electric vehicles today use lithium-ion batteries.

Disclaimer: I was formerly a controls and systems engineer for a hybrid-electric vehicle company.

at-fates-hands• 12 years ago

Or you could learn how to powerslide.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QJVDGtzvEE

Not sure if this is feasible on this board, but you never know. If the wheels are soft enough, I think you could pull it off.

philsnow• 12 years ago

I face a similar issue with my honda civic hybrid: they have worked to let you pretend it's a regular internal combustion engine (it looks nearly identical to the other honda civic trims, down to the instrument panels), but you _must_ actively pay attention to the battery level if you don't want to be surprised when trying to pull into traffic (if the battery is under half, it's _much_ more reluctant to boost your acceleration) or trying to brake (if the battery is topped out, it does not assist your braking _nearly_ as much).

In general, if you're trying to evade (either with braking or acceleration), you have to know the state of your battery or else the car will not perform the way you think.

I don't know if all hybrid/electric cars are this way or if it's specific to my particular year of the HCH or what.

skdoo14• 12 years ago

Founder here. Happy to answer questions.

One of the most interesting things we've learned about recently is the temptation to cut corners using cheaper parts or processes or relaxed quality control procedures. It's easy to get quoted prices much lower than what we currently pay, but the long-term cost of choosing those parts (greater failure rates, manufacturing problems, and warranty costs, not to mention unhappy customers) is hard to quantify at decision time.

This is where experienced supply chain and hardware engineers are especially valuable. They understand the implications of these decisions and know the right way to account for them. For example, major manufacturers set aside "warranty accruals" as liabilities in their financials to cover the average future cost of servicing a unit that ships today.

I suspect this is a problem facing many hardware startups, Kickstarted or not. It feels non-intuitive to build hardware carefully and at such high initial costs, especially in the "move fast" culture of software development. And it's especially dangerous if a company goes "in the red" without realizing it by shipping many units that may fail or incur high warranty costs that exceed the margin on the product, but at a later date.

ISL• 12 years ago

Agreed. Anything with product liability attached requires careful consideration. Spending extra time and attention on quality can yield dividends in better sleep at night.

If you operate with a mindset of, "what you ship, you can't take back or modify," you're on the right track. It's in partial conflict with the software ideology of, "build an MVP and iterate fast." You can still do that, but the MVP can't suck.

Source: Shipped a pretty great product, still stay awake at night.

tomsaffell2• 12 years ago

When I worked on PC hardware at IBM we operated on the rule that the cost of fixing a problem is 1x development, 10x in testing and 100x once sold to customers. Alas, that was before IBM's PC division was bought by Lenovo...

reledi2• 12 years ago

With a normal skateboard you often have to clean the wheel bearings. The maintenance is what I like least about skateboarding. Is a Boosted board any different in that regard?

mmagin2• 12 years ago

Or you can just get a new set of bearings for $10 or so. If you're in the market for their product, you can probably afford it.

skdoo14• 12 years ago

It's needed less frequently. Since the board is powered, you won't notice a bit of extra drag from dirty bearings.

windsurfer• 12 years ago

How would you say it compares against the less expensive, faster, and longer range Evolve boards? http://www.evolveskateboards.com/

skdoo14• 12 years ago

Their boards are quite fun. The specs they achieve are due in part to some of the compromises I discussed above. For example, these are some independent long-term reviews (that are of course from a self-selecting sample of Evolve riders).

http://scrapedup.com/e-board-reliability-results/

slashink3• 12 years ago

Hey skdoo! I waited for version 2 of this and was about to pull the trigger on the dual+ 10 minutes ago when i saw that you don't currently ship to Europe. What's the estimated timeframe for shipping to Europe?

How does the board feels if you don't use the motor in case of empty battery. Are the motors braking per se or do they spin freely if no power is applied?

skdoo14• 12 years ago

European certifications are still in process for us to officially ship, but there are some boards in Europe either brought or re-shipped by customers.

The motors spin freely when unpowered. It will skate like a normal board, but with a bit more drag.

btbuildem2• 12 years ago

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1scP9uZP9Y

Seems more informative and less salesy-pitchey

abat• 12 years ago

This video may be a better introduction to Boosted boards, but it's an old vid that lacks all the news I got from the posted one: new models/software/pricing/potential future products.

infecto2• 12 years ago

Love the idea but not sure about the use in denser cities. I saw my first boosted in action on the streets of SF during my morning commute. Seems cool but the gentleman was riding in the bicycle lane at around 10mph which is much slower than all other traffic on the road, including bicycles.

I really want to love these types of transportation but I have a hard time seeing how they can scale without cities adopting to them. We already have enough trouble getting proper bicycling safety and then we introduce electric longboards on top of the existing skate/longboards and push scooters that already roll around on the streets and worse, sidewalks.

Maybe I am just biased because I dislike push scooters on sidewalks but then where is the push scooter legally able to go?

danvayn• 12 years ago

I would like to read some feedback from city users. I'm from Chicago and it's fun to think about getting a boosted board but $1200 dollars is a high price for something that I never read about.

skdoo14• 12 years ago

We usually ride at the same speed as others in the bike lane. It works well around bikes and doesn't need any additional infrastructure. It was originally designed for a campus but we learned early on that users in dense cities love it in part because it's faster than any other mode of transport they've tried.

infecto2• 12 years ago

Does not really answer the issue though. Most cities do not treat boards as legal to use on roads. Yes they make great campus or paved pathway tools but they still have no place on the streets with bicycles and motorized vehicles. When there is already poor bicycling infrastructure in most cities these seem to be more headache than helpful. All of the ones I see rolling around San Francisco move at about 10-15mph with bicycles passing them all the time. I have no numbers to back this claim but I am going to guess that a bicycle still has a shorter stopping distance than these.

mmagin2• 12 years ago

As someone who commutes 3 miles each way 4 days a week on a Yuneec E-GO, I'm laughing at the article's "Unfortunately its 1000 watts will only get you up to 18mph". Either the writer hasn't actually ridden it, or they're an experienced downhill longboarder :)

Even on the E-GO's (larger) 90mm wheels, 12 MPH is quite enough on a lot of the uneven pavement I encounter.

FWIW, the E-GO is a great deal for $700, and the range is considerably more. Maybe if I had to replace it I'd consider Boosted's product.

skdoo14• 12 years ago

If you would like to try a Boosted board, I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on the differences between the two.

tlrobinson2• 12 years ago

I've gotten very comfortable riding the Boosted Board at it's top speed (in SF), and sometimes wish for more speed. I had never ridden a skate/longboard until I got the Boosted Board.

rastapasta42• 12 years ago

How do Boosted Boards compare to Evolve Boards?

http://evolveskateboardsusa.com/collections/carbon-series-el...

Boosted seems to be slightly cheaper, but Evolve boards have longer range and replaceable wheels for different terrains.

skdoo14• 12 years ago

Some things about them are great. I linked to some reliability reviews, which are not so great, above.

etrautmann• 12 years ago

As a (very happy) boosted rider as of July, I'm a little concerned about the "single" model. I've blown through three belts already, and find that it's usually while breaking that a belt will fail. Having two is safe and redundant, but having only one is a double whammy since you double the breaking force on that single belt while also relying on it entirely.

dinor• 12 years ago

I have had an evolve board for 12 months, it was the first generation and I have had loads of fun. The newer models have a bigger motor and are better at climbing and stopping by all accounts. I haven't had any reliability issues and have been able to ride it every time I wanted to. Recently though the range has reduced and I am hoping its just a single battery cell that needs replacing or rebalancing. I haven't opened it up to look and will most likely send it to evolve to diagnose. It still gets more range than the boosted board so its very usable.

I think battery problems will be discussed more frequently as electric boards age. They make up a significant portion of the board cost and I hope suppliers have a good strategy to help customers when problems arise.

Boosted boards look awesome and I can't wait to try one someday. I only ride for fun and its typically 45-60 minutes at an average speed around 14-16mph, so a boosted board falls a little short in their range. I was wondering if Boosted had considered having an 'eco' mode that only runs one of the motors enabling extended range?

Feet-On With Boosted Boards’ New Faster And Cheaper Electric Skateboards

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