Fan-powered Skateboard

March 25, 2010 by Mike Szczys 37 Comments

[Chris Neal] is starting his hacking career young. He built this fan-powered skateboard for his fourth grade ‘Invention Convention’. The ideas were his own but he had some help with the construction from his uncle who owns a repair garage. On the back of the board there’s a motorcycle battery that powers the fan. We’re not sure where that fan came from, but apparently it can push a rider at about 3-5 MPH. [Chris] scored a free MacBook pro from this hack after being featured on the Ellen DeGeneres Show.

For some reason this sparks the memory of the drill powered minibike.

[via Gizmo Watch]

Balancing Skateboard/segway

March 21, 2010 by Caleb Kraft 20 Comments

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UKxuVliaIA]

[XenonJon] got a lot of attention for a skateboard/segway style balancing platform he took to the Makerfaire in Newcastle. He decided to try to build it the cheapest and easiest possible way in an attempt to help others build their own. The build is documented very well, however you have to email him to request the code for the Arduino. Maybe after enough requests, he’ll just pop it online. We thought this looked familiar, so we searched the archive and found this very similar setup from back in 2005. Unfortunately, that project page appears to be gone now.

Skate Or Die With A Real Skateboard

March 1, 2009 by Caleb Kraft 11 Comments

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPIwJO-Ekj4]

In order to update Skate or Die to a newer experience, [Jeff] has hacked together a skateboard controller for his Commodore 128. He’s using a parallax propeller to interface the skateboard to the unit, and another controller to boot up the game. Watch out Wii.

Balancing One Wheel Scooter

March 8, 2007 by Will O'Brien 54 Comments

Fresh off the tip line, [Ben] sent in his one wheeled balancing scooter. It’s a nice simple design – I just might have to build one myself. The steel frame surrounds a pair of 12V 12Ah SLA batteries, a 400w 24v DC motor, one of the ever handy OSMC motor controllers, rate gyro, accelerometer and a PIC 16F876A. I love the entire concept! (For some reason, I’m thinking it needs a brake light on the rear…

Check out the video after the cut. He walks through the hardware at the end.

By the way, Eliot and I’ll be at Shmoocon in a couple of weeks. We won’t have boards from the Design Challenge yet, but we should have something to give away to people who find us there.

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