Tilto: the DIY Segway

Segways are cool and plenty of fun to ride but they cost a bomb to purchase. Well, a hobbyist by the name of Marcelo Fornaso decided to put his smarts to the test and came up with his own version of the two-wheeled vehicle. But instead of following the build of the Segway down to a T, Fornaso chose to improve the design by allowing users to turn the vehicle without having to lean outside of the device’s frame.

And thus, Tilto was born. Tilto uses accelerometers and gyroscopes just like the Segway to make it go back and forth, however, it gets rid of the handlebars in favor of a tilting system to turn the vehicle. If users want to turn Tilto, all they have to do is tilt their bodies in the direction they would like to turn to, just like they would if they were on a bicycle. A pretty cool idea, though I doubt we’ll be seeing this device mass produced for everyone to use. Check out a video test of the Tilto in action:

George Wong
Categories: Transportation
Tags: DYI, segway