Electric Lawn Chair Build

Electric skateboards have gotten pretty cheap. Astonishingly cheap in fact. So cheap that, upon being served a perfectly calibrated instagram ad in my most vulnerable of consumer states (couched, Friday night, 2nd martini), I officially became an electric skateboard owner at the tender age of 31.

If you’re not familiar with these vehicles, the speed of the board is communicated via a remote that the rider holds. The model I went with, which was set to become the eventual chassis and drivetrain of the Electric Lawn Chair was the Meepo V3. Admittedly, this is a low-end piece of gear compared to some of the higher priced options in this space (Boosted Boards for example). But at $399 this board excelled in a few key areas:

– Raw Wattage: 540 watts to each motor @ (presumably) 48v [this is the output power of the charger] = 1080 watts of high torque power. I’ll see it when I believe it but if that all checks out this should have no problem powering an adult male up 20-30% grades (albeit with minor risk of catching fire)
– Gearing / Wheel Diameter: The wheels are 90mm (large for this class of board) which means 1) some degree of shock absorption and 2) a higher top speed (think about distance traveled on a larger car tire at a fixed RPM). Meepo quoted a 28mph top speed which I doubted.
– Range: 11 mile range meant about 3x runs of the safe neighborhood circuit between charges.
– Cool Handle: There is a cool handle cutout in the deck that was very cool.

Inaugural test on April 6th, 2021 – wow – absolutely tearing uphill. I was also able to achieve a top speed of 24mph on a downhill stretch – GPS verified. We are ready to proceed to construction.

Admittedly, the first prototype had problems. The lawn chair I had purchased for the cockpit (RTIC Beach Chair) had FAR to high a center of gravity and far too short a ‘wheelbase’ between the legs, which created a myriad of problems: 1) Steering with nuance was impossible 2) the risk of crashing/falling off was immense and 3) there was a risk of pitching forward or backward. And 4) it looked stupid:

The RTIC chair, however, was a suitable stand-in for perfecting the mounting system. The chair legs were covered in 1/2in pipe insulation. That served two purposes 1) increasing the friction coefficient of the chair and grip tape [~stability~] and 2) protecting the grip tape when I wanted to ride the eboard traditionally [~aesthetic~].

To mount the cockpit to the board I used inexpensive Husky compression straps from Home Depot, wrapped in a ‘figure 8’ manner around the ESC (Electronic Speed Controller) in the front and the battery pack in the back. You’ll have to fiddle around with this – it takes a lot of force during braking and acceleration so it must be sturdy. And thusly:

But the RTIC chair had to be replaced. Dejected, I slouched to Target. I was ready to give up and the dream was dead. But then, in the pool and summer section – a beacon of hope. The Sun Squad Sand Chair fit all physical constraints + design demands, was just $15, and most of all came in several groovy colors. We had our cockpit.

An added bonus was the longer ‘wheelbase’ (distance been front and rear crossbars). It looked great. It was comfortable. It was undoubtedly very safe. First test with the updated cockpit and ratchet system:

With the core design done all that was left were the fit and finish. I was adamant that the chair be situated on astroturf. ‘Lawn’ is, after all, 33% of ‘Electric Lawn Chair’. I had an old roll of Home Depot turf laying around and cut it to size – making sure to leave room for the wheels to rotate without snagging on the turf. This took a few attempts

The turf also had to be supported so it hovered above the ground on the same plane as the skateboard deck. To achieve this I used a thick cardboard frame crafted from moving boxes, and matched the turf shape closely. All that was left were two final touches:

– Cupholder
– Bluetooth Speaker

The Electric Lawn Chair was ready for the first road test:

Red Dog Approved 🐕

Finally, the first road test:

Cornering

Honestly, pretty exceptional. I have about a decade of skateboard experience, but novice friends and neighbors who gave it a try reported that turning/cornering was pretty intuitive (Don’t worry – I put new riders in N00b mode which is configurable on the aforementioned remote). Simply, the rider leans left to turn left, and leans right to turn right. The turning radius is well under the radius of our cul-de-sacs so cruising around the ‘hood is breeze. Side note: I had tightened the truck bushings prior to this such that oversteer was essentially impossible. So the rider couldn’t really “dump” themselves off since the trucks were tight and the chair was effectively welded to the board via the compression straps. 9/10

Fun Factor

This project got me elected to the board of the civic association, 10/10

Acceleration/Braking

Decent. You won’t get to 24mph like I did in testing, but the acceleration is on part with a 50cc go cart, but zippier on the front end. The power of the EV. 7/10