Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/11/26/new-high-end-electric-scooter.html
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Can’t ride it in the rain? Really? If it can’t take New England weather, then to hell with it.
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“… a scooter with a soul.”
I don’t even think that I have a soul. and if i did think that i’m not sure i’m ok with any kind of blood-based ritual manufacturing process extracting human souls for scooters,
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In that case you may want to steer clear of fan theories about Pixar’s Cars movies.
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Since my old EX3 scooter bit the dust, I’ve been waiting and hoping someone would make a new version. This is the closest I’ve seen… but Kickstarters have a way of not happening. I’ll check back in a year or two and see what’s what.
But it has to work in the rain. I live in Vancouver.
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Looks like it gets just as easily thrown into the dumpster/fire lane/behind the hedge as all the other Lime, Bird, and all the other start-up vehicles that promote anti-social use of the sidewalk + traffic-related idiocy.
You damn kids stay the hell off my lemonade!
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Puhleeze! Do you even 'lectronic? If they can’t even get the basic math right on power calcs, this is flat out vaporware! The 2 models on offer have exactly the same battery capacity, exactly the same range, exactly the same speed, but one has a single 250w motor and the other has dual 200 + 250 w motors (450w total). How in the everloving fuck does this shittolio get past a crowdsource web editor who one hopes passed high school physics?
Hard pass.
Can you run the 450 in 250-only mode, thus generating the same specs for that mode?
from the linked article in electrek.co:
In fact, the scooter is technically waterproof, meaning you could ride it in the rain if you wanted to
from the same article:
While Kickstarter and Indiegogo projects always come with the standard caveat that you are backing a project and not directly buying a product, at least in this case we can confirm that the product exists and works well.
sure, which doesnt necessarily means they will go into production after the campaign, but so far it seems ok.
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Their own faq says it is not safe to ride in the rain. Which suggests the fancy tires have lousy traction.
Pluuuuuuuuueaseeeee, this is the Qingmai Swan scooter , they just rebranded it (actually the sweatshop in China did) and ask you to pay the price of that. Soul my ass
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“better design through marketing”
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Looks like the fancy “obsessively” designed scooter’s handle bars don’t fold flat for transport the way non-fancy ones do…so I’m gonna have to go with non-fancy 
Wow, pesco’s post kind of implied his friend created this scooter using his obsessive problem solving skills. Instead, this is just a superfluous Kickstarter campaign for a product already in production under a different name?
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that’s correct michael. the two models are different in the amount of torque. we cap the speed of both at 25kph. the 450 watt model is default running with the front motor. when you approach an incline, you double click on the power button and that engages the rear motor. yes, engaged it certainly uses up more battery range faster. too many variable like weight and incline to give an accurate measurement.
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Unagi’s relationship with QMY is an exclusive one and explained in detail here. And the scooter is not the same as the Swan. That scooter was not one anyone would want. Very much beta. Essentally the scooter has gone through a total rebuild aside from the design. New motors, controller, brakes, display, inverter, to Unagi’s requirements.
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I guess you didn’t bother to read the linked article before replying?
“The designers [of the Swan] who call themselves QMY and Unagi are now one team. They are/were 3 young brilliant industrial designers who built a scooter and I was so blown away by it compared to every other scooter (I’ve been to every scooter factory in China multiple times), that after months of discussion, negotiation, and investment, we formed Unagi which is essentially one entity with those 3 guys on our team. Unagi is the only scooter that one can ever get exclusively & globally designed by these 3 guys in conjunction with efforts and input from the rest of our team. We spent 6 months massively improving on the legacy design. New motors, new braking mechanism, new lighting, new display and most importantly, improved folding hinge, and rebuilt from the ground up controller from the drone world that’s bullet-proof. The “Swan” (as it was called) was essentially a beta and never went into mass production, and the Unagi is the 1.0. Going forward it’s all Unagi”
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One could just as easily note that the OP doesn’t mention any of these rather key details either.
I did not read everything on all of the multiple links in the OP, but I did browse the article for the Swan and the Kickstarter campaign for the Unagi. They both use the identical parts breakdown photo, so you can perhaps forgive me for thinking that Vittorio_Piccotti’s post appeared to be consistent with a quick look at the links.
Did the electrek.co article swipe a new Unagi image for their old article on the Swan? (Possible, but seems unlikely.) Or is the Unagi campaign still using parts images that are obsolete since David_Hyman says the scooter is a total rebuild of the original design? Either way, I’d say that using original Swan PR photos (assuming that’s what is shown below) can be confusing.
Swan:
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ah, my bad; but is it just not save because of the tires or the battery & electronics?
