Arthur Randolph

The scooter has tail brakes that can make it stop within a few meters even at top speed. If all else fails, a kick scooter has the nice failure mode that you can just step off of it and grab it to stop within half a meter.

Bike/rollerblade/scooter experience helps a lot with predicting pedestrian movements. With enough experience, it is not significantly more dangerous than walking really.
You learn for example that if you need to choose between passing near someone walking away from you or towards you in a non-crowded area, you always choose the former. People who don't see you have much more predictable trajectories.

tfar

All good and well, Arthur, but as you indicated, one needs to learn. Learning (being connected to intelligence) is not given to many people as witnessed by vehicular traffic on the road. And even if the scooter user learns, how will the pedestrian learn? And what will happen until both have learned? There aren't even any rules of engagement so to speak. It's a liability quagmire waiting to happen.

Finally, as I said, the speed and added weight of the thing will make any injuries more severe. It is one thing to stop within half a meter and to stop in mid stride. The usual space between two people not running into one another while walking (speed vs. reaction time) is half a meter. That means this distance won't be enough once the speed is increased. As a "scooterer" myself I also know that any really quick stopping/unmounting maneuver usually has the scooter flying out in front. Frankly, I wouldn't want to be in its trajectory.

We'll see how it plays out. I personally wouldn't use one in an airport and if they were to be used and somebody injured me while using it, I'd make sure to get my money's worth out of it and I am totally against frivolous law suits but IMO these things have no place in an airport.

Till

Flubber2012

I agree with Till. People are people and will push the limits of weight and speed with these things.

Since kinetic energy = 1/2MVsquared, we're looking at substantially more damage when a collision occurs. Also, with regard to stopping on a dime, since momentum = MV, while not exponentially higher, comparing stopping on a scooter while wearing shorts and sneakers to stopping wearing wingtips with 10 kg in the "suitcase" is apples and oranges methinks.

I also think it adds to much weight and bulk but that's me.

Baghoarder

I think you sacrifice too much packing space for the weight. I couldn't see it being worthwhile in a crowded terminal, but then, my home airport is not Schiphol...

tfar

Would it be possible to simply take an ordinary backpack-style carry-on and an ordinary scooter? This way the two are separate without the disadvantages that come from merging the two but with enhanced benefits like more packing space and better scooter performance.

Or would the scooter be deemed unsafe by TSA?

Till

Arthur Randolph

I have transported a Razor several times through TSA in its transport bag. They don't seem to mind.

There's no good way to put a regular backpack on a scooter without making it dangerously unbalanced and unstable. If the backpack turns around the handlebar, the sway is guaranteed to send you in the bushes. You'd need some sort of rigid frame mounted on the base plate to strap the backpack to so that the bag and the base plate form one dynamic mass. That would sort the stability issue, but it's still going to be unbalanced.

The Micro-mobility scooter solves this issue with the lean-steer three-wheeled design.

tfar

Thanks, Arthur. That's good to know.

Tbh, I was thinking rather of putting the backpack on my back. After all, that's what it's there for. With a bit of practice even a messenger style back with waist strap might work.

Till

lairdb

I like the idea (partly just for the sheer lunacy) -- but it seems way too small to be practical. According to this it's 1586 ci of capacity (and even that seems awkwardly shaped.) I've got briefcases that have more capacity than that.

Anybody actually tried it?

GadgetFreak

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9B176 Safari/7534.48.3)

I hadn't thought of it in the terms of positive lunacy, but that is an interesting way to look at it I suppose.

barajag

Hello everyone...

Having owned and used one of these now for the past two years,
(Ok I mainly use it for my annual trade show visit to LV and at the show for 3 days straight.) I wanted to point out a few things.

First off I am 99.9% sure it is NOT made in Europe anywhere, as if it was it would most def have the Made in label on there very "in your face" but in fact at least mine doesn't have any country of origin on it whatsoever. I bought my 2nd hand from someone who got it as a gift so I never had a box to look at.

I remember when looking for one I was sort of convinced it came from Asia but can't find any reason for that conclusion now. I still believe firmly it's assembled in either China or Taiwan though. Though I still agree 100% that is is VERY WELL BUILT!

As for steel, at least the weight and my magnets tell me there is only aluminum on the metal frame parts. Including the axle or shaft the front wheels are on. I just pulled my front wheel off to see where I could find replacement bearings or complete wheel.

I used it extensively in LV even out on the sidewalks (which aren't always super smooth) so one of the rear wheels (yes it's two rear wheels) has some small chips/chunks out of it, and one of the front wheel bearings I think has some noise.

I just want to find the parts before it gets worse. Seems fairly hard to track down the wheels for this one though!

BTW Looks to me like they've brought it down a little additionally on Amazon to $249: http://www.amazon.com/Micro-ML0001-L...pr_product_top

chx1975

I have one for sale should anyone want it.

Mavatar

Does it not use standard wheels for rollerblades?

barajag

Not to my knowledge, but bearings inside are standard as are most bearing in the world.

barajag

Which style does it say Samsonite or not? Price?

Mavatar

If that's the case, then I think rollerblade wheels will work. Finding the right size might be an issue though if its an atypical size.