Souped-Up Segway Hits Double Speed

For safety’s sake, a Segway tops out at 12.5 miles per hour. While that doesn’t sound that fast, if you’ve ever been on one of these self-balancing contraptions, you know that actually seems mighty fast when it’s just that tiny platform between you, the ground, and those oncoming cars. Well, someone over in Europe has decided to pimp out their Segway, and managed to get it all the way up to 40km/h (appx. 25 mph).

In order to achieve top speed, the modders had to replace the Segway’s standard wheels with much larger ones. They actually look like wagon wheels to me, but once it gets going, this thing is much faster than an old horse and buggy. I’m not sure what other modifications were necessary to break the Segway’s speed limiting circuitry, but it actually looks surprisingly stable at top speed. Here’s a video of the Super Segway tearing up the roads.

While that’s about as fast as you can make a Segway go with its stock motors, I’d like to see how fast someone could get one to go if they installed a jet engine or something with a bit more oomph.

[via Random Good Stuff via Le Journal du Geek (FR)]