Concept → Reality · Rewritten

The Hornet, a one-wheel superbike that never rolled

In 2008 an Australian design student won a competition with a superbike that balanced on a single wheel like a Segway. Two years later the renders went around the design blogs with a claimed top speed of 235 km/h. Nothing was ever built.

The Design Blog editors

Side view of a black Onewheel GT board with one wide central tire, resting on a wooden floor

A Onewheel GT, a self-balancing electric board with a single central wheel; a related product that reached the market, not the Hornet concept. AI-retouched from an image by AndrewHenkelman, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Verdict 2026

Still a concept

The Hornet stayed a set of renders by Liam Ferguson and was never built or sold. Self-balancing single-wheel vehicles did reach the market, but as stand-up boards and electric unicycles, not as hydrogen motorcycles.

Segway Ninebot S2 Electric Self-Balancing ScooterClosest thing you can buySegway Ninebot S2 Electric Self-Balancing Scooter7.4Design ratingMagnesium body with knee-bar steeringCheck priceOur design review ↓

The idea today

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The Hornet never left the screen, but these two machines use the same balancing principle at low speed.

  • Segway Ninebot S2 Electric Self-Balancing Scooter

    Segway Ninebot S2 Electric Self-Balancing Scooter

    Two wheels side by side that keep the rider balanced front to back, listed with a top speed of 11.2 mph and a range of 21.7 miles.

    Our design review

    7.4Design rating
    Form7.2
    Material7.8
    Detail7.4
    Longevity7.3

    The S2 keeps the Ninebot formula: two wheels on a magnesium-alloy body, steered by a height-adjustable knee bar rather than a handlebar, which keeps the silhouette low and compact. Segway specifies 10.5-inch tubeless pneumatic tires, IP54 splash protection and firmware updates through its app. Inverse found the look fairly understated with the effects switched off. The RGB wheel lighting and built-in Bluetooth speaker add showroom flash to an otherwise sober machine, and at 30 pounds it is a lot to carry.

    Strongest point
    Magnesium body with knee-bar steering
    Compromise
    RGB lights and speaker clutter the form
    Check price on Amazon
  • INMOTION E20 Electric Unicycle

    INMOTION E20 Electric Unicycle

    A single wheel carrying two tires side by side, which its maker says lets it balance sideways as well as front to back. It is the Hornet’s wheel layout in a form you can buy.

    Our design review

    7.3Design rating
    Form7.6
    Material7.0
    Detail7.3
    Longevity7.1

    The E20 puts two 14-inch tires side by side on one wheel inside a compact shell, with a carry handle on top and rubberized footrests with leg pads below. The housing is mostly plastic, and reviewers at The Gadgeteer found it picked up scratches after falls, while the twin tires helped at a standstill but made sharp low-speed turns harder. The battery gauge faces forward, where the rider cannot see it, and the warranty runs only 12 months.

    Strongest point
    Twin tires steady the first rides
    Compromise
    Scuff-prone plastic shell, 12-month warranty
    Check price on Amazon

Product images from the retailer listings, cut out and staged with AI.

  1. 2001Dean Kamen’s Segway PT, a two-wheeled transporter that balances itself with tilt and gyroscopic sensors, is unveiled in New York on Dec 3, 2001.
  2. 2003Bombardier Recreational Products shows the Embrio, a one-wheeled, gyroscopically balanced hydrogen fuel cell concept imagined for 2025.
  3. 2008A VACC press release, reprinted by AutoSpeed on Apr 22, 2008, names Monash University student Liam Ferguson, 22, as winner of the tertiary design category of the Target 2020 competition for his Hornet.
  4. 2010Design blogs pick up the Hornet renders, among them Ubergizmo in March 2010, which lists two 74 hp in-wheel motors and a top speed of 235 km/h.
  5. 2010Carsguide reports on Jun 10, 2010 that Ferguson has won the student-category James Dyson Award with the Amatoya, a fire reconnaissance vehicle.
  6. 2014Future Motion puts the self-balancing Onewheel board on Kickstarter on Jan 6, 2014 and ships it the same year.

What it was

The Hornet was a student project. Liam Ferguson, then 22 and studying at Monash University in Australia, entered it in Target 2020, a future-vehicle competition run by the Victorian Automotive Chamber of Commerce, and won the tertiary design category. The press release, reprinted in April 2008, called the design astonishing and described nothing else.

The details surfaced in 2010, when design blogs found the renders. They showed a compact motorcycle body wrapped over one very wide central wheel, with two small stabilizer wheels that held it upright when parked. Two in-wheel electric motors of 74 hp each, fed by a hydrogen fuel cell, were said to take it to 235 km/h. Balance was to work as on a Segway, with electronics correcting the machine as it moved. One Australian blog noted that the main wheel was really a pair set close together, which is how the design could claim a turning circle of zero. We found no sign of a working vehicle behind any of these figures.

Balancing on one wheel turned out to be the solvable part; putting a superbike on top of it was not.

Where the idea went

The Hornet had a close ancestor. In 2003 Bombardier Recreational Products showed the Embrio, a one-wheeled concept with a hydrogen fuel cell, gyroscopic balancing and small landing wheels that retracted at 20 km/h. Bombardier imagined it for 2025. It also stayed a concept.

Ferguson moved on to other vehicles. The 2008 release said he was by then an intern in Ford Australia’s design department and quoted him crediting the competition for it. In June 2010 Carsguide reported that he had won the student-category James Dyson Award with the Amatoya, a fire reconnaissance vehicle for a crew of two. We could not find any sign that the Hornet went further than renders.

Self-balancing on one wheel did reach buyers, in a smaller form. Future Motion put the Onewheel board on Kickstarter in January 2014 and shipped it that year. Its sensors and motor keep the board level under the rider, and the first model topped out at 13 mph.

What it means now

The Hornet got the control idea right. A motor that keeps a single wheel under its rider is now ordinary consumer technology. What the renders skipped is the package: 148 hp, a fuel cell and a hydrogen tank all have to sit above one wheel that also does the braking and the steering. We could not find a hydrogen one-wheeler on sale anywhere.

What exists is what you stand on. Boards and electric unicycles use the same principle, and at least one unicycle carries two tires side by side on a single wheel, which is the Hornet’s layout at a much smaller scale.

The original post, summarized

Our March 2010 post covered Liam Ferguson’s Hornet, a competition-winning one-wheel superbike concept with hydrogen fuel cell power, Segway-style balancing, a claimed top speed of 235 km/h and a zero turning circle. It is summarized here rather than republished.

Sources