WowGo AT2 Plus Electric Skateboard Full Review
AT2 Plus vs AT3
This is the all new WowGo AT2 Plus. The most intriguing aspect of the this new board is it's name. It's not AT3, nor is it the AT2 Pro. It is the AT2 Plus. As the name would suggest, the "plus" is usually indicative of incremental improvements over previous models rather than a completely new design. The original AT2 has done so many things right, especially at a sweet price point of just under $1000. So the question is, what are the improvements of the AT2 PLUS model and are the these improvements actually worthy of the $230 you would pay above the original AT2?
Factory mass production model
What I have in hand is the first factory mass production model. Most of the early reviewers actually received pre-production models, there shouldn't be too much differences except for the motor color which is red for the Preproduction model. But, I like reviewing the actual mass production model because what you see here in this video is exactly what you'll receive if you order today. So let's check it out!
Bushings
The board is ready to go out of the box and the bushings are tuned really well. I can tell WowGo as company put in a lot more effort into tuning the responsiveness of the AT2 Plus than the original WowGo AT2 as soon as I made my first turn on the board. The turning radius was sharp and responsive and the board was stable throughout the turn. I almost always recommend Venom bushings over the stock ones, as they provide game changing performance and stability to almost any double kingpin trucks. However, this board, The WowGo AT2 Plus is the first board where I felt like I didn't need to swap out the bushing...At all. On top of that, I didn't even need to tune the tightness of the trucks. It's shockingly just perfect. my weight is about 195 pounds or 88.5 kilograms so if you are lighter than me, the board maybe stiffer to you. But man I was surprised at just how well tuned and responsive the board is right out of the box. Kudos to the WowGo Team.
Acceleration
Because of the new arrangement of the battery, 12S of the AT2 plus over 10S of the older AT2. The AT2 Plus just feels noticeably punchier in acceleration even with the large AT wheels, making this one of the most best improvements for the AT2 Plus over the original AT2. And if you want even more acceleration, you can try smaller wheel sizes. Love these Cloudwheel street wheels, yes they make street wheels, they are incredibly small at 83MM. The ride gets bumpier and the top speed is reduced a bit. But oh man, the acceleration is sharply increased improved. As every launch forward packs a serious pouch.
Carving
As I carve into a turn, the maple bamboo deck also concaves into the turn, like a bow building up energy and then releasing the energy as you come out of the turn and push into the next one. This is the beauty of wooden decks, and I think WowGo has really perfected the formula here. The composition of the deck remains unchanged, save for the shape to be a bit different, more angular and a little bit longer. The underside batteries are compartmentalized into their own pockets, resulting in super flexible battery stack that compliments every flex from the deck above. I've tried a lot of boards and to this day, I still think WowGo holds secret formula and the number 1 spot for the perfect carving board. It's not too soft nor is it too hard. It's just flexible enough to dampen road vibrations but stiff enough to still reach higher speeds of 31mph.
Edges
Really subtle curved edges around the deck help you carve sharper but they do not interfere with comfort. many other overly aggressive edges can really hurt your feet during longer rides and flat decks can be difficult to push the board harder as the rider struggles to find a good grip without looking down. The edges of this board is in a really good place that settles in the middle ground between carving performance and comfort. It also acts as your foot placement marker so that you can easily detect and put your feet on the right spot without ever need to look down.
Wheels
This is what is beautiful about this board. You can use quite literally every type of wheels available for you out there. You can ride Street wheels today, ATs tomorrow, and Cloudwheel the day after? no problem as it would be a quick 5 minute job to swap out all the wheels. I will be testing out in future videos performances of other wheels on the AT2 such as Mad Wheels 105s, Cloudwheel 120s, 83mm street wheels, and the all new Momentum Hollow Wheel. So make sure you hit the subscribe and thumbs up button to please the YouTube Machine Learning Overloads. I'm Also running a free raffle to give away a set of the Mad Wheels 105s. These are my review units. All you have to do enter is to be a subscriber and comment on anything below. I will draw the winner on November 15th 2022.
Hands free
Most people don't mention this but this board is quite hands free. What I mean by that is you never need to reach down to turn on or off the board. Just turn on your remote and it turns on the board. This also Includes the included back lights, which are motion sensing, which means you don't need to bend over to turn them on and off like the shred lights. these are actually quite amazing additions to the AT2 plus. Because you would just grab your remote and go. and when you return from a ride you just turn off the remote and walk away. This feature is so nice to have when you take frequent quick rides. No more bending over before and after every ride to turn on the board and turn on the LED lights. This may sound like it's not a big deal, but trust me, once you have a board that have this feature, you'll miss it on every board that don't have it.
Remote
The remote looks just the same remote design that WowGo has been using for quite a while now. However, this one feels little different. The dial on the remote has the metal clicky feel as it returns to it's default position and the resistance feels less noticeable. This is good and bad, The good is that during long rides your thumb need less strength to maintain speed. The bad is that it's easier to over accelerate or break too hard as you are learning this board and its riding characteristics. I've already gotten used to it after 2 rides. But it's just something I wanted to surface.
Motor Size
A lot of people are quick to point out that WowGo AT2 Plus's Motor model number is 5330 which is very different from the 6368 motor of the original AT2. At a glance it seems like the motors have gotten smaller in the AT2 Plus, But that couldn't be further from the truth. WowGo switched electric motor suppliers from Dong Xing Wei motors in the WowGo AT2 to HobbyWing in the WowGo AT2 Plus to streamline the powertrain. HobbyWing has a completely different naming convention which gave the illusion that the motors have gotten smaller with the Hobbywing 5330-175KV motor but in actuality the real physical size of the 5330 motor is roughly equivalent to a 6360 motor. Now lot of technical viewers may say, well that roughly is the same size as the previous generation of motors in the original AT2. What are the improvements in these new 5330 HobbyWing motors over the 6368 DXW motors? We'll i'm glad you asked! The 5330 is actually a lot more powerful, it has a free spin of 8535 RPM while the 6368 has a free spin of roughly 6150 RPM. This translates to real world performance where the new 5330 has a top speed of 50 kph or 31 mph where as the older 6368 would be limited to 40 kph which is roughly 24 mph. This from my experience does feel very accurate as I had both the AT2 and the AT2 Plus. The AT2 Plus has significant and stronger acceleration and higher top speed than its predecessor. Make the 5330 motor the single most important upgrade in the AT2 Plus line.
Motor Power
Again, a lot of sharp eyed viewers noticed that the Motor power for the advertised original AT2 is 1500W and the AT2 Plus is 1300W. What's going on here? Why is the more powerful motor 200 less in wattage? Well, again, the AT2 Plus is still far more powerful than its older brother. What happened here is that the AT2 used maximum power that can be used by the motor, this is unsustainable for longer than just a few seconds. So it's really not meaningful to the consumer. The true rated power of the motors for the original AT2 is 850W. and the true rated power of the AT2 Plus motors are what is being advertised at 1300W, that's a whopping 53% increase in wattage. I really love WowGo for taking the leap here to advertise the TRUE rated power of the motors instead of the deceptive peak power which a lot of other advertisers in this space would use. And I wish more advertisers can follow WowGo's footsteps here, it's just a lot clearer to consumers if they use the standard rated power of the electric motors.
ESC
The ESC has been updated from the 9005 in the AT2 to 9028 in the AT2 Plus. This newly upgraded ESC can provide much more juice from the battery to the motors. For example, the 10S battery from the AT2 provides 36V output. The AT2 Plus's ESC can use an increased 43.2 volt output from the new 12S battery pack. The more juice you can output the better the acceleration and top speed.
Water Proofing
So the AT2 plus has all the necessary water proofing installed on the board. However WowGo choose not to advertise as a feature because this would push a lot of riders to purposefully ride in water and in the rain which will still ultimately damage the board, no matter how well the board is sealed. So yeah, don't sweat it if you run over a puddle. but just don't purposefully seek out water related activities as it will increase water damage risks.
Range
The estimated range on the website is pretty accurate. I got roughly 17 Miles of range on the AT wheels with 20 PSI. I like the soft cushioning feeling of low PSI wheels but that will eat up range. I am a heavier dude, I weigh 195 pounds, probably 210 with all my gears on and I live in a very hilly area. So I would say if you are lighter than me, you should get a lot more range out of this board. Though the last 20 percent of per the battery would see a slowdown in the top speed of the board. But that's expected from any board in production.
Difference
So what do you get for roughly $230 more on top of the original AT2 pricing? what incremental value do you get out of it? You get:
1) Larger battery at 604Wh in a new 12S configuration
2) More powerful HobbyWing motors at 1300W rated power over the 850W motors used by the original AT2 Plus.
3) Upgraded ESC that would be able to fully harness the power output of the new batteries.
4) Reshaped deck with the same proven material layers, but slightly longer and slighted more angular for a more modern look.
5) tail-lights that are motion sensing
6) Motor brackets to protect your board
7) Handle bar to mount on the front of your board.
8) and you get the Newly designed wheels hubs.
Weight
The AT2 Plus is the also the lightest longboard eskate n its class. it's lighter than the Altas and the Hurricane with the AT wheels on. And would be even lighter if we used street wheels. If weight is important to you, AT2 plus is the way to go.
Summary
The WowGo AT2 Plus is the true successor to the already perfect AT2. And it improved in almost every way possible while retaining the perfected aspects of the original design. I did wish the battery could be a bit bigger, but knowing batteries are the most expensive parts of the board, that would probably push the pricing of the board into unfavorable territories. The AT2 plus is still a value play, and in my opinion the best entry level longboard eskate you can buy at just over $1100. it carves and flexes like a dream and performs just as well as the much more expensive competitors. It's also is a comfortable ride due to the AT wheels and the flexible deck. And it is adaptable to any wheels out there if you get the cloud wheel kit. This is my top recommendation if you are looking for the best value in a longboard eskate today.
***Coupon Section***
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