joão leão develops the first open source electric skateboard made out of recycled plastic

designer joão leão constantly ran into plastic waste washing ashore on the beaches of porto; he was also constantly running late due to his endless commute on public transportation. so, he created a faster method of personal transportation using recycled thermoplastics as the main manufacturing material — the PET MINI electric skateboard. 

the project has been developed in the scope of the masters in product & industrial design of the university of porto, oriented by professor rui mendonça, in partnership with VIVALab, precious plastic and porto’s university workshops of the faculty of fine art’s and the faculty of engineering. leão’s design process for the recycled plastic e-skateboard began by first experimenting in the university’s workshops with the most common types of plastic waste available: ABS, PP, PET and HDPE.

leão took inspiration from the anatomy of an armadillo for the electronics enclosure by designing a series of modular pieces along the bottom of the board. this allows for both the protection of the electronic components, and also maintains the flexibility of the deck — giving it the comfortable ride necessary for the city. other commercial products lose the deck’s flexibility, making it a rough ride through different urban terrains.

the designer managed to build the PET MINI with under €500 in materials and prototyping. the finished skateboard weighs 8kg, and is only 75cm long. this makes it easier to transport and ride, with a top speed of 35 km/h, a range of 36km and charging time of 1-hour 50min. these characteristics make the PET MINI an ideal transportation medium for hip urban dwellers. 

the recycled sheets were built by the precious plastic team and their V4 machine. the mechanical parts, the components for the drive train, and the motor mounts were designed and manufactured locally at VIVALAb, and the pulley system was based on open design files available in thingiverse. the recycled deck was 3D CNC milled at VIVALab using inventables x-carve.

leão developed the PET MINI following his belief in the importance of creating participatory approaches to design. ‘we must rethink how we design and manufacture the products of the future through distributed approaches and bringing the user and industry closer to the design process.’ this opens the possibility to use open design as a development tool and digital fabrication (fab labs) as a manufacturing process, opposed to the normal industrial process.

the PET MINI seeks to inspire future creatives to experiment the broad possibilities of reusable materials. by using recycled thermoplastics and developing a variety of different products, leão aims to raise awareness of the importance of taking action to this global problem and how one key tool — such as digital fabrication and an open source philosophy — can boost innovative solutions both at a local and global level. 

this project was developed in collaboration with a local fab lab, VIVA Lab, a creative hub dedicated to the areas of education, design and innovation that is building a community for social innovation. the project was also developed with ‘precious plastic’, a project developed by product designer dave hakkens who is building a global community of hundreds of people working towards a solution to plastic pollution. 

product info:

product name: PET MINI electric skateboard

designer: joão leão

designboom has received this project from our ‘DIY submissions‘ feature, where we welcome our readers to submit their own work for publication. see more project submissions from our readers here.

edited by: cristina gomez | designboom