Segway

The continuing progress of electric motorcycle racing was illustrated this week when MotoCzysz won the TT Zero Race at the Isle of Man for the second year running. In achieving a new lap record for electric motorcycles of 99.513 mph, the Segway-sponsored MotoCzysz E1PC went within a whisker of claiming the GBP10,000 prize for the first electric bike to lap the 37 mile circuit at 100mph at the same time as demonstrating yet another quantum leap in electric bike performance from last year’s 96.820 mph average and the 2009 winning average of 87.434 mph. Read More

Despite not becoming the personal transport revolution that it was designed to be, the Segway has provided a wealth of design fodder for numerous self-balancing concepts, prototypes and production single occupancy vehicles. Mohamad Sadegh Samakoush Darounkolayi's entry into this year's Michelin Design Challenge, however, probably owes more to the Disney/Pixar film WALL-E – hopefully the users of his Supple concept won't end up being the grossly overweight, lethargic, mentally-challenged descendants of humanity like those aboard the Axiom cruise ship. Read More

Bombardier's concept for a one-wheeled self-balancing motorcycle-like vehicle called the EMBRIO has been a long time Gizmag favorite. It was envisioned as the type of personal transportation that people might be using 20 years from now. Well, if 21 year-old inventor Ben Gulak has his way, consumers will be able to buy a similar vehicle a lot sooner. His battery electric Uno may look like a regular motorbike at higher speeds, but when it slows down, the wheels realign themselves into a side-by-side configuration – seen in profile, it looks like a unicycle. We caught up with Ben to get the latest news on the project. Read More

Britain held its first free eco-car show last month on London's famous royal driveway, The Mall. The event was held as part of HRH Prince Charles's latest sustainability initiative “Start”, which aims to promote positive steps to leading a sustainable lifestyle, and was opened by his “Garden Party to Make a Difference”. The Start Eco-Car Spectacular aimed to showcase the future of green transport with a variety of bicycles, cars and other environmental transport solutions. Read More

While rear-hinged back doors are not new in the motor industry (Rolls Royce Phantom/Ghost and Mazda RX8), the first pictures of the GM/Opel/Vauxhall Meriva have surfaced and the FlexDoors and FlexSpace features seen in concept cars over the last few years are finally set for market launch in a family car (main pic and top right). First seen in the groundbreaking Flexstreme Concept Car from IAA Frankfurt 2007 (bottom right pic), then further refined with the Meriva Concept at the 2008 Geneva Motor Show (centre right pic), the flex theme combines improved access/egress and a suite of features offering a quickly reconfigurable interior and is likely to be welcomed by families which need to cater for several types of mobility with one vehicle. Read More

What's on your Christmas list this year? 2009 has seen another bumper crop of innovative products designed to make our lives more efficient, more rewarding or simply more fun. If you've got some last minute shopping to do, and you hurry, this might just help - it's Gizmag's pick of the top 10 tech gadgets of 2009. Read More

The fact that the streets aren’t exactly swarming with Segways seven years after they went on sale hasn’t stopped some major players taking tentative steps (or wheels) into the personal mobility arena with their own device prototypes. As we’ve seen previously Toyota is working on the Winglet, while Honda recently displayed its U3-X experimental vehicle at the 2009 Tokyo Motor Show. Now Nissan is getting in on the act with its own prototype developed in partnership with Japan’s National Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (AIST). Read More

A self-balancing unicycle experimental vehicle from Honda to be shown at the Tokyo Motor Show next month might just be history in the making. Weighing less than 10kg, the 24 by 12 by 6-inch U3-X experimental vehicle runs for an hour, is small enough to be carried onto an airplane as hand luggage, has a wheel which spins in two planes and is set to challenge, perhaps even change, society’s concept of personal mobility. Read More

The eniCycle is the latest entry in the increasingly crowded self-stabilizing electric unicycle market. Developed by Slovenian inventor Aleksander Polutnik, the eniCycle has Segway-like balancing capabilities but only a single wheel. With its three-hour battery and lean-to-go controls, this diminutive one-wheeler prototype brings Jetsons-type technology one step closer to reality. Read More