Best posts made by OneDan+

Guess my "old knees" are older than yours, I'll be 60 this year! I'm a 20+ year snowboarder as well and can confirm that you will likely fall as I've had 2 nosedives. One was near the beginning when I accelerated too quickly from an almost dead stop. Before I knew what happened, I was on the ground. After that one, I was much more careful about acceleration. Second one was around 600 miles on the board. Didn't notice I was topping 20 mph when my top speed alarm went off. Hit the ground at over 21 mph before I could slow down. Most of my injuries were road rash with some sore shoulder and hip pain.

The problem is, it's way too fun and you think you can just push it a "little more". Since that last crash, I've kept my speed around 14 mph. Actually, it may be psychological, but I can't seem to get myself up over 15 mph, LOL. I've also always worn knee and elbow pads, wrist guards and gloves, and a helmet.

Anyway, I still snowboard and still ride this board as both are just way too fun to stop. Be careful and enjoy!

@Vapco I started almost 3 years ago at 59 and I'm gonna be 62 in August. Had a couple of nosedives, the worst one at the 600 mile mark going 21 mph! I survived and slowed down. Now, I ride with my Android watch connected to my phone connect to my XR and can keep an eye on battery and speed with a quick glance. Haven't had another wipe out since then and am now pushing about 4700 miles combining my original + and my current XR. Same as you, I ride mostly sidewalks and paved paths with about 10% hard packed dirt and gravel. Having snowboarded for the last 20 years, this is the closest thing to that feeling, but no lift lines, cold weather, or lift ticket costs!

I'll be riding until I can no longer balance! Have fun!!!

I've been riding for 2 years, first in a suburban area where I could switch between road and sidewalk as neither was ever crowded. I am now in a city area where sometimes the sidewalks are crowded and most of the roads have bike lanes. I prefer the sidewalk as I really don't want to become a hood ornament. However, if the sidewalk is crowded, I will go into the bike lane for 1/2 a block or a block to go around them. If the sidewalk has 1 or a few people, I will slow WAY down, almost to their speed as I approach, announce myself so they have time to react, then say thank you or good morning or hello as I pass them slowly and 99% of the time, I get a kind response back.

It seems pretty easy to be nicer than the inexperienced people speeding down the sidewalks on Jump bikes or Lime scooters. Hoping other OW riders do the same as I do so we get a reputation as the kind, aware, and safe riders.

OK, so I've read most of the "wipe out" posts on this forum, some with pretty disastrous outcomes. I've had my + since August and have over 625 miles on it.

At around 108 miles, I had my first nosedive. I was barely moving, maybe 5 mph, when I decided to accelerate quickly for "one last lap" around the park. Found myself flat on the ground with a very deep scraped elbow and bruised rib. That's when I seriously started reading this forum and chalked it up to over-acceleration and over-confidence.

Since then (some 500 more miles), I've learned to accelerate at a slower pace and keep my top speed in the 15-17 mph range. I normally reset the high speed warning when it gets above 17 and if it goes off, I instinctively slow down.

Until today. A beautiful day, sunny, calm, almost 60 degrees, decided to take several rides, charging in between. First ride was uneventful, normal pavement to some off road trails and back, the usual fun time. Second ride, found a challenging patch of off road that was beyond my abilities. I survived the hard part, hopped off and carried the board over a path made of 3-4" rough stones, and was on my way. On the way home however, I breached my top speed near the end and when I arrived I noticed I had hit 19.9 mph, well beyond my normal safe speed.

Then came my third ride. As I was riding out, I realized I didn't reset my top speed and thought to myself, maybe I should stop to do that, but decided not to. I went on a path I've done dozens of times before. A fun ride on some biking/jogging paths and all was going well. I was on a road that gets almost no traffic that connects me back to a sidewalk to my neighborhood, cruising along a bit too fast, when the "new top speed" alarm goes off. I immediately realize "oh $%@#", I'm doing at least 20 mph! My brain goes into slow down mode, but the board has already decided it can't keep me going. Down I go, sliding on pavement at 22 mph (indicated by the new top speed reading, once I recovered). Had my usual protection: helmet (small scratches), wrist guards (left one trashed), and elbow pads (left one slid off a bit, same as my 108 mile slow crash). New left elbow scrape, not quite as bad as my first fall. Four left knuckles scraped up, 1 finger scraped on my right hand, and both knees lightly scraped without ripping my jeans. The left arm of my sweatshirt ripped open, pretty much destroyed. After a few hours, 1 left rib is hurting due to bruising or sprain I think. Overall, lucky for a nosedive at 22 mph. Will rethink adding back my knee pads and gloves with knuckle protection.

Now to the topic. One simple change to the app would have saved me. If I could set a speed warning trigger, with sound, to 15 or 16 mph, I would've never gotten myself into this situation. If FM is listening (or whoever writes/owns the app nowadays), this would be a HUGE help, at least for me, in stopping high speed crashes.

I've always known going too fast is playing with disaster, but not knowing your true speed (and we can't watch our phones easily while riding) makes it difficult to judge when we're close to the limit.

This is the best toy I've ever owned, but I do think FM needs to begin addressing some of the safety issues. I'll be back on my board once I recover and I'll be even MORE cautious than I have been. Everyone please be careful out there!

@510-1-whl I'm size 8 1/2 and had the same issue for probably the first 600-700 miles on my +. I'm pretty sure it is just new muscles being stressed, like you said. I did 2 things. First, I tried to carve more, as it seemed to help me get further before my feet would get numb. While I do like floating straight, doing so for long distances was a sure way to cause this problem for me. Second, I would roll my feet left and right, from the outside to the inside and back, while riding, especially as I felt them wearing out. I'm now at 1100 miles and rarely, if ever, feel that fatigue anymore. Hopefully, like me, your muscles will eventually acclimate to the board.

Good luck!

@glyph You know, in my recent quick acceleration nosedive event (where I was saved by the fangs), I was a few blocks from home after a long ride. The first time this happened (Aug of 2017), I had a total of 90 miles on my +. But now that I think about it, it was the end of a long ride and I was within site of my house.

While I'm sure you can make this happen on purpose (on any OW board) by slamming down the front end, perhaps the fact that the batteries are nearing depletion makes this scenario just that little bit more likely.

While I hope the fangs will save me again (never know, might be on grass/gravel or near a sidewalk bump), I'm trying to make sure I stay conscious of the fact that initial acceleration should never be rushed!

Everyone be careful out there!

@sdonewheel I think it's because they'd have to rename it to the ThreeWheel then! :D

@Franko I skateboarded as a kid and picked up snowboarding as an adult around the age of 40. I was 59 two years ago when I got my first OW+ (will turn 61 this year) and I hopped on it (fully padded), with no one holding my hands, and proceeded around the park on the paved path. Yeah, I had a couple nose dives earlier on, pushing it a bit too hard (that was before all of the great info on how to ride came out), but now after some 2200 miles, I know my limits and float around my area averaging maybe 12 miles/day on my XR. It's one of the most fun activities I can imagine!

@stinkyface said in Start @ 60 - What could possibly happen??:

old mans activity? Or just older persons forum

Nope, just an old persons thread! :)

So, I normally don't look at my tire TOO often, but just happened to a couple of weeks ago on a Sunday after my ride. Good thing because there were threads showing through in at least 4 or 5 places! So I hop online and order a replacement FF Hoosier Whisper T2 (highly recommended, btw). I figured out that I had around 4500 (!) miles on my tire, since I installed it around 1600 and I now have over 6100 miles on my XR.

Figuring it could last the 3 days shipping time (which turned into a week, thank you FedEx!), I went out on my Monday ride. Well, about 4 blocks in, there was a detour on the roads I take to the bike path. I ended up in the bike lane for a bit and, wouldn't you know it, a full broken beer bottle, dark brown or green, appears in front of me and I can't avoid going right through it! Figuring I'd run over glass before, I pushed on.

At the turnaround point in my ride, I noticed a slightly lower than normal remaining charge. As I proceeded homeward, the battery was definitely draining faster than usual and I was trying to decide if the fact that I couldn't feel the cracks in the path meant my tire pressure was going down. Of course, that is exactly what was happening. About a mile from home, I had maybe 18% left and I normally get home with just over 20%. I pushed on slowly and with 5 blocks left, doing maybe 5 mph, I got the pushback and basically stopped with 6% battery left. I did the OW walk of shame and carried it home.

So here's the new vs old Hoosier T2:

I carve a LOT, but it almost looks like I don't even use the center treads, LOL.

Here's my 6100 mile XR ready for another 4k miles on the new tire (that's the original front pad and Surestance Pro Fusion back pad):

During the tire swap, I noticed both my float plates and bumpers all had broken screw holes and missing threaded sockets, so I ordered new bumpers and float plates, along with a mag handle to make the walk of shame a bit less shameful.

Thanks for reading and please check your tire more often than I do!

Turning 60 this year, skateboarded as a kid, snowboarder for over 20 years. I ride pavement and smooth trails and have almost 1000 miles on my plus that I got last August!

@wheelrich this is really interesting because I never thought about it from this perspective, having ridden skateboards all of my life and snowboarding for 20 years. When I got my +, I just kinda took off and, while it was a little wobbly at first, I was up to speed quickly so I could experience my first nosedive at about 90 miles! :D

Have fun and welcome to the float life!

FYI, I now ride WAY more sanely, say 15 mph max, since around 600 miles I took a dive at 22 mph!

@polysix I'm a big fan of the fangs. After a bad nosedive at 22mph (which the fangs probably wouldn't have helped), along with lowering my max speed, I installed these. Sure enough, 500 miles later when being just a bit too aggressive accelerating, the nose went down. Instead of flying off the board, it rolled on the fangs a foot or so and I was able to come back up and continue my ride. In fact, I've already ordered a pair for my upcoming XR purchase. I've never had any problem with them interfering with my ride, but then I don't do any tricks or extreme trail riding.

@skyman88 said in One wheel storage:

I tread my OneWheel (electronic device) just like my phone.

Must be difficult holding it up to your ear! :-D

@Khayman Coming up on 2 years with my + in August and I have over 1650 miles on it. Put a new tire on (treaded FlightFins Hoosier 6.0) around the 1500 mile mark, but everything else, including the battery, is working like new (fingers crossed!). Of course, I'm a mostly paved and hard dirt pack rider, no tricks, jumps, or drops, so YMMV!

I ride mostly bike paths, but this detour is a highlight of many of my rides. A deer crossed in front of me right after I took this pic.

@Kielanders Been riding for over 3000 miles and I think the "can I try it?", mostly from kids, is what I hear the most. Either I'm already past them or I say something like "sorry, battery is low and I need to get home" or "not unless you have a driver's license", which I would hold if I ever let anyone else on my board.

I'm the same way, I haven't had anyone on my board except friends that want to try it or learn on it. No way I'm being responsible for some kid getting scraped up or a concussion or worse and I've already scratched up my OWs enough myself!

Anymore, my boards stay rubber side down at all times! I do sometimes slow or stop for curious adults and have a conversation, but yeah, depends on the situation.

@Franko As for the "do a kick flip", I mostly ignore them or I take off across the grass/dirt/gravel and say "follow me!" . . . HAHAAAAAAAAAAA

@Khayman said in Battery issues:

Be sure to charge it on the floor when charging so you don't use a stand.

Any reason for this? My OW+ and XR are always on the stands and always plugged in . . . over 1700 miles on both of them without a single battery problem.

@Sponge315 Could be, I was shocked at how great it's held up!
@Maverik I love the Burris too!

Took my first ride yesterday on the new Hoosier. It truly is whisper quiet. So quiet, I had to take my ear buds out and I could still barely hear it! Great, now even people without headphones/ear buds can't hear me coming up behind them, lol.

Compared to the Burris, it's very stable on straight lines and long carves. On sharper carves and tight turns is where it differs. When leaning the board into a carve, the Hoosier "catches the edge" sooner than the Burris, so you have to be a bit more careful, but I'm sure it's something to just get used to. I did notice I can make sharper, quicker, tight carves and turns tho, so as long as I'm careful, that's a good thing. :)

I took my longest ride path (just over 12 miles) that used to drain my battery down to around 23 or 24 percent to see how the mileage held up. With the new tire, I got to the 10 mile mark and still had around 40% battery, so I actually added in another 1.5 mile detour and returned home with 26% and 13.7 miles total, so the claim of higher mileage seems to be true. FYI, I'm running the exact same PSI (around 17) as I was before.

Overall, pretty impressed with the Hoosier, but I still have the Burris around in case I want to go back.

Elusive weasel on the Sacramento river bike path . . . my OW isn't in the pic, but the shadow of me riding is! :D