Building a Balancing Scooter

Balancing lateral scooters, like the Segway%u2122 are often thought to be technological miracles, but it is not actually very hard to build a balancing scooter. I built the one described here for my own amusement, and to help me understand the control theory behind it. (I work a lot on balance, mostly for walking humanoid robots.)

I put this scooter together in a week using off the shelf parts. Altogether it cost about $2000, or $2500 if you include the “one-time” costs of buying development kits and parts I ended up not using. It doesn’t need high-tech special components. Wheelchair motors and RC car batteries work fine.