Thrown off on first ride when board cut out "Battery Overcharged" 1,500 Paperweight or one time thing?

14 May 2016, 20:14 UTC

Hi all,

Was super excited for this thing after reading so many glowing reviews.

Followed all the instructions, charged it up and took it out, after about 10 minutes of riding the board just cuts out, I eat **** and after dusting myself off and picking the rocks out of my hands I discover the board is turned off, wtf?

Power it back on and the app says "Battery Overcharged" and says to leave it turned on and plugged in for a few hours. Ok...

My first thought was how absurd, this is completely impractical to even attempt riding if it will randomly power down due to some battery fault. I tried following the directions in the app to fix this error, but the board won't even stay turned on. Is the battery defective?

Where is the quality control in these products if they are failing in the first few minutes of use?

How do I fix this? Can I just return it? There is no point in owning a product when it is this unreliable and unsafe.

Thank you for any help.

14 May 2016, 22:07 UTC

@nikknak you have a warranty .. Let them take care of it.. Things like this happen here and there.. Don't let it turn you off..

14 May 2016, 22:29 UTC

@nikknak njcustom is right. You must have received a faulty board somehow. I have experienced some unexpected behavior from the OW occasionally, but I feel that 99% of the time I can trust it. Most of my wipeouts are my own fault. I have two OW's (5070 & 6272) and around 250 miles between them. Don't be too discouraged. When you get your OW back, make sure to protect your wrists and head and start riding dirt trails. You won't be disappointed.

14 May 2016, 22:58 UTC

Agree with these guys here. Could be bad battery. Maybe not. I have a few questions? You said you charged the battery upon receiving it? The board comes fully charged now. And if you started going down hill on a fully charged board, it will give you a big pushback, and if you arnt used to the feel of a pushback, you could end up on the pavement if you don't respond correctly. Hope that helps. But as far as the not turning on thing. I don't like that.

14 May 2016, 23:19 UTC

@njcustom

Things happening here and there is completely acceptable and understandable.

However, a brand new product that you are supposed to ride on randomly powering down and throwing you off after a few minutes of use on level ground is crazy. That is like the same thing as the front wheel on a brand new bike just falling off...To me that says very poor quality control, and the whole reason I purchased from OW instead of one of the numerous overseas knock offs is I figured OW would have a more reliable/safe/tested product.

I opened a support ticket, the OW still wont stay on more than a few seconds. The battery stats will read either 99%, 1%, or -1%, and then it shuts back off.

So I guess the only thing I can do is wrap it up and send it back and cross my fingers the next one works?

Nikk

14 May 2016, 23:25 UTC

@TonyGDTLA

Hi Tony,

I did charge it first yes, the quick start guide still says to charge it before riding it. I only rode at moderate speed on level ground, having never been on one before I didn't feel up to tackling any hills yet.

Honestly I have no idea what the pushback feels like since I don't think I was really riding it near any kind of limit.

It does turn on, but the light just blinks for a few seconds and then shuts back off. I wish there was a factory reset or something, but if the battery is truly borked I suppose that wouldn't help much either.

Nikk

14 May 2016, 23:47 UTC

@nikknak don't worry the next one will be fine.. Mistakes happen to the best of us.. Even large companies.. Im sure it just coincidentally broke shortly after you go it.. It happens..

15 May 2016, 18:35 UTC

@njcustom

I understand you have a financial interest in the success of this company, but after more research I am not the only person who has experienced this by any means, and I really am having a hard time understanding how a product goes out with these kinds of faults still a part of it.

I haven't gotten any kind of official response yet as far as how to return/replace this thing, and it actually turned on this morning so I figured I'd give it another shot, my mistake.

Died on me again, same thing, overcharged, had to haul the very heavy board a mile back to my apartment. I am ready to throw this thing into a river at this point.

I can't find any information on where to send it either, the support page doesn't have any information about the repair/replacement process.

15 May 2016, 18:43 UTC

Probably a faulty battery, as njcustom said, this can happen and it is not always detectable before real use.
FM will probably contact you back soon and they will organize the pickup of the board at their charge and so on.

15 May 2016, 18:50 UTC

I can see how frustrating this can be.
Faulty items can happen with the best products.
I wouldn't attempt riding it considering the nature of this thing.
It's the weekend and they're probably away till Monday.
Hope all gets resolved for you.

15 May 2016, 18:55 UTC

@sonny123

Yeah, honestly the only reason I'm so frustrated is because of how excited for it I am. Like having your Christmas present taken back :(

15 May 2016, 19:09 UTC

@nikknak

Well, these things can happen.
Hopefully, they'll get you taken care of quickly.

Cheers

15 May 2016, 19:43 UTC

@nikknak you're just upset man and I understand completely but it happens.. Believe me they don't want it happening just as much as you..

15 May 2016, 20:05 UTC

Sounds like bad luck. I've owned over ten boards. Out of all those boards I have had issues with only two and that was after months of riding them. Feel for you bro! Its sucks when you get a bad ass toy and it just happens to be the one that is defective. Hopefully OW will get your board fixed asap. These guys are right though, it just doesn't happen that often. @nikknak

16 May 2016, 18:00 UTC

Its a design feature for the board to cut out in order to protect the battery if you regen brake to the point where the battery senses an overcharge. If you're starting out at a higher elevation than where you're heading to you just gotta be aware of it and keep an eye on the battery level and do a little up hill sometimes if necessary to bleed off some juice. If you live high and travel low you'll get used to dealing with this condition and it will rarely happen. The good thing about it is you get a slight bit of warning enough to get low and it freewheels rather than locking up, so you come down on the back skid and aren't going to get too hard a fall out of it.

23 May 2016, 19:26 UTC

@SeaP90d

The OW rep people told me the same thing, but it also fails after riding indoors on perfectly level ground, and then reads overcharged. Waiting to hear back about the repair process now, but the other thread has over 200 posts about more boards randomly dying whIle riding.

I get that this is a board sport, but other boards don't FORCE you to crash by randomly dying or overcharging on level ground, which is why I am so boggled by this whole thing. How can a $1,500 product be this unreliable?

26 May 2016, 16:43 UTC

What other post is that you're referring to about the randomly dying thing? I've got two boards and ride everyday so I'm always interested in getting to the bottom of these things, my guess is its the foot pad sensors that go bad periodically, but I'd like to see the posts in case there's something new going on.