This motorized skateboard is controlled by hand gestures

A Maker named Aditya has created a prototype skateboard controlled by simple hand gestures.

“I was just sitting in our Robotics Lab doing nothing. And then I had this idea to make an automatic skateboard, operated only by hand gestures,” Aditya explained in a recent blog post. “I [then] started gathering the parts. We had some very high torque BLDC motors just sitting there, with 75KG/CM of torque each making it 150KG/cm. [We] also had a uC board with [an Atmel] ATmega 16 on it, [as well as a] few long wires, limit switch and a bunch of connectors.”

As the Hack A Day crew notes, the sensor for hand gestures is currently connected by a control wire, although Aditya expects to transition to a wireless RF unit at some point in the future.

Aditya says he first assembled the chassis before kicking off the electronics side of the project, which included a breakout board for the ATmega 16 mounted on the corner of the deck. The above-mentioned board is apparent tasked with monitoring an accelerometer for steering as well as throttle.

“The accelerometer had been abused in a previous project so he had to add an extra switch to bolster his available inputs,” writes Hack A Day’s Mike Szczys. “We were glad to hear that he also included a kill switch, since putting the control of those motors in the hands of a damaged accelerometer is a bit sketchy.”

Additional information about Aditya’s hand-gesture controlled skateboard can be found here on his official blog here.