The trigger was not stuck — that was my first instinct when I was dealing with the issue on the water but there was no issue with the trigger.
Even if the trigger were stuck, the motor did not respond to commands to lower the speed. A stuck trigger would be easy to deal with at 1kph.
I’ve been in touch with Waydoo support but haven’t had any progress yet — they’ve asked for serial numbers.
Thanks for the info on the other instances where this occurred — crazy that this is such a common occurrence that a basic software fix should be able to solve.
If you’re in the United States it’s important that you report this to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, they can force Waydoo to fix the problem and do a recall. This is an extremely dangerous design flaw that could seriously injure a nearby swimmer. You can report the incident here: Public Incident Reporting - SaferProducts
Waydoo is required to report all of these incidents but it’s unlikely they’re following those regulations since they’re in China.
Ok, in my opinion they should get the controller from you and test it. I think standard behaviour is that it shuts down if it looses signal… So there must be something wrong on yours…
2 possible scenario I am thinking:
1- connection is lost but receiver keeps feeding esc with last throttle means fw is lacking basic safety measures
2- connection is there and water leaked in to remote circuits and analog inputs reads wrong values from hal sensor input due to conductivity of salt water which in this case turning off the remote should stop the board. Again firmware
I saw at least one story where the user turned off the remote when the board ran away and it kept going. This rules out a salt water shorted hall effect sensor input doesn’t it?
I totally agree. As a remote controlle developer this is my biggest concern. I did weekly long test runs with my 2 way communication protocol. So far no probelm and I doubt they will be any. This serious as we operate a 5kw blender. My reciver automatically turns off after 100ms timeout. This works flawlessly. Even if the controller could have any porblem the reciver always turns off. This simply is not responsible from waydoos side! Stay safe
Without having much technical understanding the simple premise of lack of any fail safe architecture seems to be the underlying issue.
Very concerning and ultimately means I can never go above a speed I feel comfortable “catching” it in the water should it malfunction and lose control again. Never mind needing to stay away from boats and people at all times. They should recall the product.
Well I’ve learned my lesson — I am sad to say that I took the board out again today and it lost contact with the controller 2 times. I was able to re-pair it while at speed using the power and negative button command and was able to regain control. Sadly, I lost control of the board again and was unable to get it to pair again. It continued out of control into a large bay until it eventually flipped over and I desperately tried to hang onto it. I was left 500 yards away from shore with the wind against me and had to be rescued by a dinghy and taken ashore.
This board is DANGEROUS. No recall will give me faith in this brand again. Given I will not use it again, I’m personally going to attempt to request a refund or dispute the Kickstarter charge if they don’t grant it.
wow, all I can say is wow. Which company is so irresponsible and lets people buy this thing. This is unacceptable you, should sue them. Imagine this thing hitting a swimmer out of control and the only thing you can do is watch. How is something so simple, but though so crucial overseen by such a company. I would never trust my life on such a board again! Good hand controllers are such an essential detail for efoils. That’s why I work hard every day to get mine finished now. I really want to give all of you the chance to operate your efoil responsible and safe.
Is Waydoo still in business? They fired their “co-founder”, the unanswered warranty claims are piling up, the runaway board issue has gone unfixed for months now, and I’ve seen 1 post from them in the past month.
The Waydoo battery packs seem to fail sometimes because the buttons aren’t really op for the task and therefore not being able to charge it or use it. They get wet inside and stop making a reliables connection and therefore stop working as a switch. I have replaced a few buttons now and opened about a pack or 8. All seem to have the battery lose in there and always one or two corner seals folded. The loose battery can easily be fixed and isn’t a real problem i just think a blob of silicone can solve that. So far even with the folded seal no leaks from the factory. (Hopefully they read this)
For now, one battery was underperforming and losing capacity after one season of use(first generation type). But besides that no real problems. The shrinkwrap waterproofing seems to work but they need to fix the battery in the case since the shrinkwrap will just wear through like happened here.
Arguing about the XT90 connector, that one is used in parallel they use both pins for the negative side of the battery so 180A (2x90) peak and 80A (2x40) continues. That means 4kW continues and the board is not pulling that so no problem. About the loose PCB end that shouldn’t be an issue unless it’s used in an esk8 that continuously rides on cobblestones. It would be nicer it was incased and better coated. But when you get water in the casing it’s game over in any case. Fixing this would mean fully potting the battery. And will only add weight and unfixable electronic waste.
The battery shown in the photos down here has water damaged. But not because of bad quality control, someone replaced a button but misplaced the seal (this one is hard to instal so I understand why).
Be safe with all of your batteries guys. These large lithium ion batteries are serious business.
Imagine this fire happening where your battery is stored right now. Goodbye house, car, boat, apartment! Or thank goodness you had the battery in a BBQ grill, or ammo can for safe keeping!
Safety is main reason i decided to use lifepo4 in my build…
Tay are much safer chemistry then lithum-ion, wont explode or burst in flames…
Also tay have much longer life span around 2000 cycles.
Yes lihiuim ion have little bit more energy density, but on heavy use on efoil tay will quickly lose capacity because shorter life span (around 500 cycles at best) and after a year you will have less energy density then in lifepo4.
Realy dont know why manofacturers like flite or lift and etc… dont use them…
Why do you aks if it´s another Waydoo battery burning. As far as I know the case where the garage burned down is clear that it was finally stated that it was not a waydoo battery…
But now we really see a lift battery burning live… Few more pics of burned Lift batteries in the www… But I think they all come from almost the same big battery suppliers in China. I´m shure neither Lift nor Waydoo do manufacture those themselves…So it´s a general problem for all companies… and that´s why they recommend to by those safety boxes from Zarges or www.battery-safe.com
