Don’t 
have several thousand dollars in the wallet to spare, but really want your own Segway? Well, you could always try the Do-it-yourself homebuilt Segway-style scooter if you have the skills for that.
Self-balancing scooters, like the Segwayâ„¢ are often thought to be technological miracles, but it is not actually very hard to build one. I built the one described here in about a week using off-the-shelf parts. I spent another week tweaking the high-speed stability, improving the steering control, and writing about it.
Shoot yeah! I have mad skillz. So mad they have to be spelled with a ‘z’ instead. But not quite mad sizzles, which is what I hear Snoop Dogg has.
So just how does the DIY self-balancing scooter compare to a real Segway?
The Segway is made with quite high-quality, high-tech, and expensive components. Overall, the components I used are a lot lower-tech and cheaper than the ones in the Segway. Yet, mine seems to ride just fine. It suggests that there’s room for a Henry Ford of balancing scooters to develop and sell a low-cost everyman’s version. Here’s a quick comparison. Quotes below are from segway.com.
This is followed by the comparison. And I can tell you from reading it that while the real deal certainly wins for polish, the DIY scooter doesn’t measure up too badly on functionality. Now to find a few hundred spare hundred lost in the sofa to make my own.
The author of the page has extensive information on the why of building this, some ideas for doing your own, and even updates on his next generation DIY home-built. Overall, it’s a really cool project. The write-up and details are long, but if you are into this kind of project work, I assure you it is worth the time to read it.
[tags]Self-balancing scooter, DIY Segway-style scooter, DIY[/tags]