In my last video, I told you why I feel the Meepo Hurricane is a landmark product for Meepo Board and how it out-specs many of its competitors, such as the Evolve Hadean.
Now let’s get into the detailed review.
Electronics
Like I said in the previous video, the Meepo Hurricane uses a 12S4P 726Wh battery pack made up of Molicel P42A cells – the best battery cells for electric skateboards today. There are other battery cells that are arguably “good enough,” but it certainly doesn’t hurt to use the best of the best – especially when it comes to the battery.
Because the battery capacity is so high, I decided to split the range test into two rides. With the stock all-terrain wheels, in total, I got 42.8 km according to the Ride app, and 37.3 km according to Meepo’s remote.
The Ride app’s measurements are usually pretty close to what I get on other devices, so I’m going to go with that number. I think the Meepo’s number was a bit off.
I’d also like to point out that my e-skate range estimator’s calculation was really close to what I actually got. According to my estimator, if I were to use the stock 90mm wheels, I should get about 70 km of range under the same conditions.
In any case, remember that range can be affected by many different things, such as your weight, how you’re riding, road conditions, etc.
The Hurricane comes with a 50.4V 6.5A charger. Since the battery is 16.8Ah, this board should charge from empty to full in roughly 3 hours, which is faster than most of the competition.
The only drawback is that this is also the heaviest e-skate charger I’ve used.
The Hurricane uses huge 6374 motors from Dongxingwei. You may have seen the wattage rating jump around in Meepo’s marketing for the Hurricane. The reason they settled on the arguably outrageous claim of 3500W per motor is because of Evolve’s claim of 3000W per motor for the Hadean’s smaller and less powerful 6368 motors.
When it comes to motor ratings, just ignore those numbers. Different brands can show completely different wattages for the same exact motors. If you want to compare which motors are likely more powerful, find out their stator sizes instead.
The new LY-FOC is the smoothest Lingyi ESC that I’ve used. But is the control as smooth and accurate as the Hobbywing ESC? And the answer is: it’s really close.
Accelerating and braking both feel really smooth and intuitive. The only time I feel a little bit of jerkiness on the LY-FOC is when I’m riding at a constant cruising speed in mode 3 or 4, and I try to increase that speed by just a tiny bit. It ends up increasing the speed by a little more than I want, and in that specific situation, I feel the Hobbywing is more precise.
But in any case, they’re close enough that I don’t really have a preference for Hobbywing over Lingyi anymore. In fact, I might even prefer the LY-FOC for three reasons.
First, the smart turn on. The board turns on if you just push it a little bit. This is in my opinion better than the standby mode because the board turns on more quickly. With Hobbywing’s standby mode, you actually still have to wait a few seconds for the board to turn on. But on the Meepo, there’s no waiting around.
The second reason is that when you brake at a full stop on a slope, the board will actually stay still instead of slowly roll down the hill. This is something that all cars can do but not all electric skateboards can do this.
And the final reason is simply that the Hurricane’s LY-FOC can handle more current than any Hobbywing ESC that I’m aware of today. So for situations like climbing hills, the Hurricane is likely going to perform better than any 2WD board using Hobbywing.
One more Lingyi feature that some people might like is that you can change the brake strength on the remote, just like how you can change the speed mode.
As for speed, this board is very fast. Meepo claims a top speed of 35 mph, or 56 km/h.
The acceleration is incredibly strong, stronger than all the 2WD production boards from my uphill battle video back in April.
If this video has been helpful so far, hit the like button!
Skate Parts
Let’s now talk about the skate parts.
The deck is 100 cm long, 26.5 cm wide, and made of carbon fiber. It’s not some gimmicky chassis with more than half the deck being plastic. It’s all carbon fiber.
This deck is incredibly strong and should be suitable for any rider’s weight. In one of their tests, Meepo drove a car over this deck and it stayed in one piece. And the most expensive component, the battery, remained safely enclosed in its aluminum shell.
Like most other 2-in-1 all-terrain boards, this deck is a double drop, meaning the standing area is lower than the truck baseplates for more stability. The drop depth is a significant 2 cm, but the board still retains 8.5 cm of ground clearance with the stock all-terrain wheels.
The grip tape design has changed a few times during the prototyping process. The version I have now doesn’t use foam grip tape, but it’s still very rough and grippy. I also like that the grip tape covers the edges and drop areas, because some other carbon fiber boards leave those areas uncovered and slippery.
The deck uses these large anti-sink plates, borrowing from Metroboard’s design. And the rear plate can be customized with your preferred number when you order the board.
The trucks are your standard double kingpin trucks for electric skateboards, just like Evolve, Ownboard, Onsra, et cetera. According to Meepo, the stock bushings durometer are 110A. I don’t personally like the stock bushing setup but I do have an aftermarket setup that I like. I’ll put a link in the description.
The wheels come in two options: 155mm pneumatics, or the pneumatics plus a set of 90 by 60, 78A urethane wheels.
Originally Meepo was going to include 190mm pneumatics instead of 155, but when Kieran asked experienced riders what size they prefer, just about everybody including myself prefer the smaller size.
Smaller wheels are lighter, take up less space, and perform better on streets. If you want bigger wheels for extreme off-roading, none of the all-terrain boards with double kingpin trucks are ideal for that anyway. They’re capable, but far from ideal. These boards are more for street use, and the smaller pneumatics are just more practical.
Portability
According to my scale, this board is 15.1 kg, making it the heaviest board that I’ve tried so far from the 2-in-1 all-terrain category. The additional weight comes from a number of things, such as the stronger deck, the aluminum shell protecting the battery, the 48 cells instead of 36, and the extra large motors.
While the portability is about the same as any other board from the same category, I do notice that it’s heavier. It’s not a board that I want to pick up very often.
Heavier boards are probably going to be come the norm. As these boards become more robust and more powerful, they’re going to become heavier. If portability is a priority for you, you may want to look into other categories of boards.
Appearance
This is the best looking board that Meepo has ever made and a huge departure from Meepo’s previous all-terrain boards.
I’m guessing the squiggly lines were inspired by weather models, but my first thought was Pewdiepie which makes the design even better.
The anti-sink plates look nice. I like the anodized orange arrow.
Hurricane logo looks nice.
I mean nothing particular about the design really stands out, but that’s kind of a good thing also. It’s a really powerful board that doesn’t scream for attention. You won’t be asked about it with strangers every single time you’re at a red light.
Aftersale
The Hurricane comes with a 1-year warranty. Meepo has localized support in the US that carries replacement parts, offers repair services, and can accept returns for US customers with a restocking fee. The same services are now being setup in Spain to cover the EU. For everywhere else, Meepo continues to offer support out of China.
Who is it for
This board is for people who find the Evolve Hadean Carbon’s $2900 price tag to be ridiculous.
Although the Hurricane is Meepo’s most expensive board at about $1600, it’s actually a great value for what it offers.
But just like how the overpriced GTR isn’t the Atlas’s real competition, the Hurricane’s real competitors are all the other Hadean killers that are also available today or coming soon.
Each of them have their own pros and cons, so there isn’t one board that is definitively better than another in terms of specs.
I think Meepo’s biggest advantage is going to be its localized aftersale service. Meepo has had localized support in the US for some time now but they’re expanding on it by working with a larger 3rd party provider. As I said earlier, they’re setting this up in the EU as well.
Another set of people who may be interested in this board are DIY builders.
The Hurricane is a great candidate for putting in a larger VESC-based ESC for those who want to fine-tune the board’s performance. With the screws and ports taken into consideration, you should have room for a speed controller up to 143mm long, 85mm wide, and 25mm tall.
As for the rest of the electronics, the motors, battery, BMS, and charge port are all ready to give you a lot more power.
If you were to source your own parts and build this board from scratch, you would likely spend over $2000.
Final thoughts
I quite enjoy using the Hurricane and I’m glad to see a good mass production alternative to Hobbywing’s ESC.
While this isn’t the type of board that I personally would use on a regular basis, this board will probably come with me on many downhill longboarding trips to pull people up the hill. Its powerful motors, battery, and ESC happen to be very suitable for that type of stressful task.
The CESL event last month also gave me new appreciation for this type of board. I now have access to riding boards on a gokart track. It’s quite far, but I’ll probably get some people together to ride there at some point.
Anyway, if you want to get this board, save some money by using my discount code, DKHURRICANE. Or you can use the link in the description. Using my discount also helps support this channel.
And if you’d like your name to appear in the credits for future videos, find out how here.