> Since the wheel doesn't roll side to side, I imagine it's much the same as balancing a bicycle.
A bicycle moves. A stationary bicycle is impossible to balance (for most people anyway). I don't see how this would be any different. As soon as you stop you fall off?
If it were me I'd add two small wheels (training wheels? :) on springs + shocks on either side. (Make them fold in to maintain portability.) You'd have to make the spring force tunable for different people, but that should be possible by adjusting a screw to change the effective length of the spring.
Re:Solowheel
by freehunter on Thursday August 01, 2013 @09:25AM
(#6140103)
When a bike stops, the rider puts their foot down to balance side to side. I don't see how that's different here. Training wheels on bikes are meant to help kids learn the proper speed and when to put their foot down, an adult who already knows how to ride a bike shouldn't have that issue.
You can put your foot down with a bike because you are holding the handlebars, and your weight is on the seat.
How would you do that here? You are standing on it - if you took one foot off you'd fall. You'd have to hop off every time you stop.
If you are athletic with good balance you could probably stand on one foot, but I doubt most people could.
Most people couldn't stand on one foot? Really? Am I that out of touch with reality?
Not even being snarky.
It's not that people can't stand on one foot, it's that if you stand on this wheel with only one foot, then you'll fall sideways before your other foot has a chance to hit the ground. Well, that's my assumption, anyway. Get on a (normal) bike, ride along, then stand up on it so your weight is on the pedals through your feet. Come to a stop, then try and get off it, from standing, without supporting yourself with handlebars or seat.
I've had an opportunity to try this contraption (or something remarkably similar) and this problem is academic: it's very much unlike a bike, but you'll learn how to stop and dismount without falling off, very quickly (haven't really tried whether I could stop w/o dismount, as I've played with it for a few minutes at most). It's similar to unicycles in this respect (note how in the videos, users ride back and forth a little bit, instead of coming to a complete stop).
OK fair enough, I've never tried anything like it - was just explaining why it wouldn't be quite as simple as "can you stand on one leg".
man they got this girl riding around in circles on one foot, you can't do that?
They show a woman being able to accelerate forwards, then slow down enough to drive backwards, all the while without having to put one of her feet down.
Also, since the wheel doesn't roll in that axis, it would also (I think) be impossible to auto-stabilise, since there is no steering capability. Perhaps it could have weights slide around to try to balance it, but I can't see that being particularly effective.