So… I bought hover shoes.
What are hover shoes? They’re like a “hoverboard” (neither hovers, nor is a board) or like a mini Segway for each foot.
Why did I buy them? I have been waiting all my life for hover shoes. The idea of portable, intuative, convenient personal transportation has always interested me. I wanted something that goes forward, not sideways (counts out skateboards and free skates), that has the smallest possible footprint (no scooters then) and that doesn’t attach to the foot so you can jump free if you need to (no roller or inline skates in that case). And here they are! Electrified is a bonus.
So, are they good?
Firstly, they are easy. They don’t look it, but a person with no skating experience can get on them and do a circuit of the room in less than 5 minutes. Actually getting good at it will take longer, of course, but you can start having fun indoors or on very even surfaces pretty much instantly. I’m currently practicing my outdoor riding. These things have a wheel each, about the size of a single electric skateboard wheel but a bit wider. What this means is that they catch every bump. It’s possible to ride over many of the most common footpath cracks, but it’s taking some time for me to trust them. At first I was approaching bumps like I would on inline skates, by pulling my toes up and making my feet light. Unfortunately the backwards lean just makes these things stop, so a new approach is needed. The bump from lino to carpet at my office door is fine to just ride over with a bit of speed, but trusting the wheel not to stop dead and chuck me off is going to take some testing.
What about hills? They are spec’d to handle 9 degrees of gradient. I don’t really know how steep that is, but not very. I took them around some of the sloped pathways at work and they handle them fine. I tried a steeper driveway on my street and they struggled. It’s also partly a mental barrier: leaning forward up a hill is strange. Going down hills is very easy. They use the motors to break, so you never gain unmanageable speed. I won’t test it on anything too steep though.
Battery life so far has been fine. Apparently you should be able to go 10km on a single charge but I haven’t tried that yet. I was too impatient to charge them fully when I first got them but since then have charged them once all the way and they have given me a few casual sessions out of the single charge.
I’m no speed demon, but these things can go up to 12km/h. I haven’t had them that quick yet because it’d need a great surface with a fair bit of space to get going. They do slow very well though. You can easily cruise around at walking speed without anyone freaking out, so you can use them in a crowd (unlike other PEVs).
These things are agile, portable (3kg each), easy and fun. I got them half price and I’m not sure I’d have paid the full whack for them. I can envisage using them to travel short distances around town once I’m more confident on slightly uneven surfaces. I hope one day they make some with all-terrain tires and sophisticated battery management.