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Future Motion, the maker of the Onewheel electric skateboard, is recalling every one of them, including 300,000 Onewheel self-balancing vehicles in the US. Alongside the US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), the company now seeks to remedy the products after four known death cases — three without a helmet — between 2019 and 2021.
The recall comes a year after Future Motion took issue with the CPSC’s calls for recall and claimed that it tested and found nothing wrong with the Onewheels. At the time, the company issued a press release in objection to the CPSC and called the agency’s statements “unjustified and alarmist.”
Now Future Motion is moving forward with a voluntary recall it chose not to do almost a year earlier. The company is asking owners to stop using their Onewheels until they take appropriate action. For the newer Onewheel GT, Onewheel Pint X, Onewheel Pint, and Onewheel Plus XR, a software update with a new warning system is the remedy.
For early adopters, however, the CPSC and Future Motion are telling owners to stop using and discard the original Onewheel and Onewheel Plus. We asked Onewheel chief evangelist Jack Mudd in an email how many of the original units are affected, but Mudd refused to answer. Mudd also wouldn’t tell us why the company claimed there were no issues and publicly resisted issuing a recall back in 2022.
Mudd did say that the software update for the other models is rolling out worldwide, not just in the US.
Some crashes occurred due to Onewheel skateboards malfunctioning after being pushed to certain limits. The Onewheel GT, Onewheel Pint X, Onewheel Pint, and Onewheel Plus XR will receive a firmware update that will add a new warning “Haptic Buzz” feedback that riders can feel and hear when the vehicle enters an error state, is low on battery, or is nearing its limits and needs to slow down.
“This update is the culmination of months of work with the CPSC,” reads the company’s recall website. Last November, it called the CPSC’s warning about Onewheels “misleading” but stated it would “work to enhance the CPSC’s understanding of self-balancing vehicle technology and seek to collaborate with the agency to enhance rider safety.”
To install the update, owners must connect their Onewheels to the accompanying app and run a firmware update — the process is fully explained in a new video.
For early adopters, however, owners can receive a “pro-rated credit of $100 to the purchase of a new board,” according to Mudd. The credit will only be issued after owners confirm that they have disposed of the old model.
Alongside Future Motion’s blink on the decision to recall Onewheel, the company shared a new video on YouTube highlighting the new Haptic Buzz feature as well as best practices when riding. “We’ve been working closely with the CPSC for over a year in order to develop this new safety feature,” Mudd says in the video. He adds that ignoring pushback or Haptic Buzz “can result in serious injury or death.” It took engineers a while to whip up Haptic Buzz; perhaps it’s something that would not have been ready in a timely fashion after CPSC’s first whistle last year.
I’ve never understood what gap these things fill that isn’t better filled by a bike. They look really fun, but as soon as I think seriously about it I can’t see why I wouldn’t want the exercise and mobility of walking or biking, and what I can’t do with those is satisfied by my car.
Not trying to shit on it, just musing.
Skateboard/last mile niche. You can pick up and hold them with one hand when on mass transit, then zip to your destination easily.
If it were a lot cheaper I might be down. Saw a guy cruising along the beach near the water in Oregon and that looked really nice.
You might want to check out the smaller EUCs. There’s a bunch that cost half as much as Onewheels, while still having more power and range.
It’s more fun and easier to store
The answer to this is also the answer to where they were created, San Francisco. They’re perfect there because:
Cars are a hassle to deal with for traffic and parking. It’s dense enough and public transit is good enough that you only really need to walk/ride the last half mile.
The hills are no joke, I’m pretty in shape and even I have to walk a bike up most of the hills. This can be helped by an electric bike but that brings us to
Bikes get stolen fairly often. Especially if you have an ebike this will cost a lot in the long run. With a one wheel you can just carry it in the storeand not have to worry.
For most other American cities that are less dense, more flat and have less thefts they start to make less sense.
That makes a lot of sense. I’m in Milwaukee, so quit different from SF in the ways you described.
Portability. You don’t have to worry about bike racks, or how to carry it to the upper floors in apartment buildings and offices, and where to store it. You can just carry it like a briefcase and throw under the desk at the office and nobody would have a problem with that.