18mph !

[roro]

This one is going 18 miles per hour ! :

http://cgi.ebay.com/Segway-HT-i-167-Human-Transporter-hti167_W0QQitemZ200016197244QQihZ010QQcategoryZ473 51QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Rob

[macgeek]

Wonderful Scam, beautiful scam!!

Jonathan

[Stewbonz]

The guy has a 6 year, perfect feedback history.
Must be a stolen account?

[sholloway]

a couple of us talked about this at a recent meeting in Boston (if there really was one) and if you're going 12.5 and then lean really hard on it the machine wants to give a speed limiter. I think Karl was explaining it and has seen it on his GPS that to go from a handlebar forward position to a speed limiter position the wheels have to move forward really quickly. He has seen 17 or 18 mph for a brief second just so the machine can give the speed limiter feedback. So, maybe not a scam (at least just for that statement), certainly poorly written and misleading. I still wouldn't buy it.

[Timezkware Tim]

It's also possible that the seller is simply quoting someone who "rated" the Seg for them.

In any event, it's misleading.

Tim

[KSagal]

I always find the payment method is a tell.

It is no surprise to me that they want a check or money order. Paypal leaves too many breadcrumbs and it is too easy to be held accountable.

As far as the base of the machine having a need to travel faster than the 12.5 mph, that part is true. If going at full speed, if you lean on the handlebars hard, in an attempt to go even faster, the wheels are behind the handlebar at that moment.

In order for the speed limiter to kick in, the wheels need to be in front of the handlebar. The machine has a reserve of power to speed up the base, relative to the the handlebar, so that the wheels can get in front of them.

If you could measure the rpm of the wheels, you would get a faster than 12.5 mph reading, but your GPS could not pick it up. It can only be registered by a tachometer measuring the wheel rotation speed and calculating speed from that. In truth, the whole machine is not moving faster, just the wheels.

Think of it this way. You are standing in the back of a pick up truck. That truck is moving at 12.5 miles per hour. Now, swing that baseball bat you have with you. If someone were to measure the speed at the end of the bat, it would register faster than the 12.5 mph, but GPS could not focus that tight, and it is disengenous to say that because a small part of the whole is moving faster than the 12.5, that the whole is capable of faster speed.

That is how I see it.

[Gihgehls]

But don't the wheels stay infront of the handlebars for longer than it takes to travel a single HT-length? I can see what you're saying Karl, like a reverse pendulum moving underneath it's weight, the weight doesn't' really go anywhere, but I think an HT being forced passed its speed limiter would travel quite a ways before it slows back to 12.5. A segway traveling full speed is going right about 18 feet per second, and it seems to me that the speed limiter takes a hair longer than a full second to slow down the machine, at least with me riding it, so I guess you could reasonably say the HT can go 17 or 18 for about 25 feet. yay

[Stan671]

Tracking the instantanous speed of the Segway, and the top speed in particular, with a GPS is not very accurate over a very short period of time.

I have both a bicycle computer which measures every wheel rotation and a GPS on my Segway and the GPS always reads a higher max speed than the bike computer does. Considering that the GPS is listening to satellites thousands of miles in space, I would not expect it to be able to accurately measure a speed burst lasting 1/2 second over a few feet. I think the bike computer has probably got the accuracy edge there.

Also consider that the movement of the handlebars forward and back as the rider leans forward and then is pushed back by the speed limiter is probably a component of the apparent distance traveled by the GPS. This is not the case with the wheel-RPM-based bike computer.

I have never seen a max speed on my bike computer greater than 12.9 MPH - and that was difficult and scary to do. I have seen them as large as 15 MPH on the GPS.

[Red Seg]

I agree with Stan671, GPS receivers are great but are not at accurately displaying short bursts of speed. I row with a dragon boat team and from time to time, according to GPS, we can get our 40 foot, 1,700 pound boat up to 50+ MPH (we are doing well to get to 7 MPH)! Satellite signals bouncing off of objects such as buildings or even atmospheric dust make accuracy next to impossible.

I too have a bicycle computer on my Segway and find, after proper calibration to tire circumference, it is much more accurate than the GPS.

[KSagal]

Again, most of us are agreeing. My information is not from an aftermarket pulse counter on the wheel, as that is what my bicycle computer is. (Yes, I too use a bike computer)

I was in florida at Segfest, and the factory had a machine wired up with a recording laptop computer, and the speeds are from that data.

I was only one of many that did that "Seg Writing" at SegFest, FLA.

I am not saying that this particular activity will be at Segwayfest this year, but if you come, there will be things that you not only enjoy, but will still be talking about on chat in a couple years...

[sholloway]

Just look at your speedometer! Click the scroll button to get to it. You'll see that you can easily get in to the 13's, I haven't gotten to the 14's yet but I am not trying to either.

[cmonkey]

According to my GPS mine hit 17mph today! Anyone want to buy it or trade it for an I2:p

PS, I have larger tires, and neither of my arms are broken and I have the pictures to prove it:D