NIU’s electrical scooters, mopeds, and e-bikes have been successful with adults around the globe. Now the corporate is bringing that very same electrically powered enjoyable to a youthful viewers with the launch of a brand new children’ scooter often called the NIU NQi Mini.
The scooter takes the form of NIU’s in style N-series electrical scooters, however in a scaled-down format.
In truth, I occur to personal the scooter that that is primarily based on, and I can inform you that it does a reasonably good job of paying homage to the unique.
You’ll nonetheless discover the signature and often-copied NIU styling, together with that halo headlight and simply recognizable physique form, however there are actually a pair of detachable stabilizer wheels to helps youthful children study their stability.
The scooter additionally encompasses a considerably extra primitive energy provide, changing the lithium-ion batteries present in most of NIU’s international market scooters with a small 12V 4.5Ah lead acid battery. The corporate claims a run time of over an hour from that diminutive 54 Wh battery, although the excessive effectivity is probably going because of the sluggish high pace of simply 5 km/h (3 mph).
For a children’ scooter, that sluggish pace may simply be a good suggestion.
For those who thought this was simply going to be a bare-bones NIU look-a-like scooter, then you definitely’re most likely largely appropriate. However there’s nonetheless some respectable embedded tech corresponding to a reverse gear, working LED lighting, and even a music participant. The MP3 participant can pull songs off a USB drive or an SD card to belt out a child’s favourite tunes.
I don’t learn about your neighborhood, however I don’t see little children rolling round right here with a pocketful of SD playing cards loaded with their favourite MP3s. However hey, possibly that’s a cultural distinction.
Talking of a cultural distinction, most of you studying this text received’t have the ability to check out the NIU NQi Mini. That’s as a result of it’s at present solely obtainable in China, the place it has launched with an MSRP of 699 RMB (roughly US $103).
It’s not the primary time we’ve seen firms launch kid-specific electrical automobiles. The youth market has been a favourite of firms like Razor, which has created ride-on electrical scooters and mini grime bikes for youths.
Tesla additionally teamed up with Radio Flyer to launch the Cyberquad for Youngsters ride-on ATV, full with Tesla design mimicking the Tesla Cyberquad idea automobile.
Electrical bicycle makers have additionally created pedal-assist e-bikes designed for youthful riders, getting children began with throttle-less electrical bikes from a younger age.
Electrek’s Take
There’s at all times some pushback after we cowl EVs designed for youths, with the argument often being that they need to be on the market pedaling a motorcycle as a substitute of driving an electrical scooter.
I don’t disagree, however I additionally suppose that enjoyable toys like these could be beneficial for youths. Not solely do they assist educate stability expertise (if you take away the coaching wheels), however in addition they assist educate children about the advantages of EVs from an early age. Whenever you develop up with a quiet, stress-free, and zippy electrical scooter, it’s laborious to see a loud, smelly, and continuously breaking-down gasoline motorcycle as a optimistic factor.
So I say let the youngsters have their enjoyable, so long as they’re additionally getting some strong saddle time in on a “actual” bike.
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