Guilt and Neglect... Honey

Last night I had a dream...

Actually, it was probably leaning more towards being a low level nightmare. I was being talked at by one of those guys who hang around in skateparks, on bikes, but with the sole purpose of honing their relentless and uninterruptable, talking-at-you skills. You probably know the dude.

Anyway, the light was fading and I was cornered and this uncontrollably verbal bmx bandit, he was really going for it. He was spitting all over me as he ranted with this mentally imbalanced, manically enthusiastic expression on his face. Wasting the valuable final minutes of my session as he repeated his crazed idea that the Fly not-pivotal seat post was the best bmx part ever created.

When I woke, I was confused. His views where controversial at best. What was all this about? Why had my sub-conscious conjured this impossibly annoying yet almost realistic character? Upon reflection, I decided that it was my inner self's effort to have me face up to the feelings of suppressed guilt and neglect that I've been carrying around with me.

Guilt: that I pretty much shut this blog down a few months ago in more of a fade away, than a burn up kind of way - I'd always thought that was a shitty way to go out. Guilty.

Neglect: of the unposted jpegs of new the Fly Bikes bits that are still hanging around in my inbox. Why had they not been either posted, or deleted? Neglect.

So it seems that the only way to exorcise this imaginary nightmare man talking blindly at me about bmx parts, is for me to. . . . . .

Talk blindly at you about bmx parts. At least this one last time. Sorry.

I couldn't actually tell you for certain, but I'm pretty sure that the last few months would have seen the standard shitload of new parts let loose via internet, stoking the fires of capitalism and exciting teenage males all over the western world to part with their parent's hard earned in the quest to define themselves by the parts they ride.

But I'm not going to sweet talk you with all that, I want to make you feel really special. I'm going to take you to my private place and show you the "things in my inbox".

Pretend like it's the 11th of November and you've never seen this lovely piece of framesmanship before:

Ooohhh... yeah... it's the Luna. And it's purple (or white).

Please don't complain that this is old news - I don't care - this isn't about you. I'm exorcising, and you just happen to be on the other end of the cable. If you're going to get all needy and naggy, you may as well put your pants back on and leave.

You don't need the specs. I don't have time and they're fucking everywhere, including here.

If you do like that kinda thing though, here's an illustration showing the features of Fly's 2010 frames. It is here because I like technical illustrations and it's a particularly fine example. Hats off to whoever at Fly draws that stuff:

Next: 24th of November and and you may recognize this sprocket:


Circulo by name, circulo by nature. All in all a very sprockety sprocket. They do always have good photos though, don't they darling? 2.2 oz.

5th of December now. The Pantera was the second bmx frame I ever owned. This is the Pantera V4, it's covered with investment castings, it's red, and if you click the pic, it's almost like it's real:

Yeah...

So...

That's it. Thanks. And all the best.

American Metal

If you're a machine head, or even just somewhat mechanically inclined, you'll appreciate this:



There's a flipbook up on FBM with all the detail of their new Steadfast trails frame. The frame looks damn nice and has the added bonus of coming with a cast pewter headtube badge. But really I just wanted an excuse to lift that photo and put it here. There's just something about it isn't there? Precision metal, ready for some precision weldsmanship, and just a few hours away from being someone's object of desire. Nice.

And here's another nice one for the mechanically inclined - the making of a Fit DLR stem. Along with the precision metal, this even has the added nicety of couple of bad-asses doing there thing.There's Van Homan disregarding his personal safety and flicking the bars 6 feet up, as well as some anodiser doing the dip and filling his lungs with hydrogen and sulfuric acid fumes all in a self-less quest to feed the colour machine. Enjoy:

Zen Minimalism, Metal and Death

Well InterBike's out of the way and I managed to get through about 1/100th of stuff that was on show, but you can bet your titanium Ratchet axle that there'll be a flood of re-caps and reviews, reminders and re-launches coming up - so it ain't over yet.

I never did get round to saying anything about the morsels on offer at the Fly booth at InterBike and they've already posted up their re-cap. So you could check that here, or bear with me while I pick out the tasty bits:



So that's basically how it all looked - flat colours on white, simple graphics. Translated, the names of the frames and forks are Moon, Lakes, Mountains, Earth and Water. All very minimal and zen. But then, of course, there's the Pantera, which is more metal and death, but hey, you gotta stick with the classics.

That said, the Pantera forks are no more. And neither are the Tierras. Instead Fly'll only be making the Agua forks - the ones with the investment cast dropouts. And speaking of discontinued models, there was no sign of the Campillo frame on their stand either. I'm not sure whether or not this means my current ride is now officially an antique, but since it was one of the lighter frames going around (4.3 lbs) it'd be interesting in that it would be another manufacturer joining WeThePeople in moving away from lighter weight frames. Yeah, sounds doubtful.

Another fairly doubtful scenario is the mass re-emergence of brakes and that's just not going to happen until Fit's street kids put 'em back on. Regardless, Fly just keep pumping out brake related stuff - which is admirably untrendy:



Just a bunch of brake pads? Yeah, I suppose so, but apparently they're a different compound and are a bit fatter so you've got more rubber on rim, and they use a female bolt system to keep them looking tidy. Also the curved adjustment surfaces are integrated into the bolt and the pad so you've got a couple of less washers to faff about with. Incidentally Odyssey have just posted up some new pads and cables and are saying that the clear pads work the best for painted rims. So there you go.



Rigid straddle cable = less flex and easier set up.



Possibly the most boring photo I have ever posted, but anyway, it's a close up of their Spanish removable mount set up that Sergio explained in a web vid not long ago.



They dropped a new sprocket at InterBike as well - The Circulo. What did I tell you ... Zen.



The red stem pictured is a new topload stem. And like superstar they seem to be suggesting that you should run it upside down. Bottom load stems are officially hot right now.



And lastly, but definitely not least, a chance to have a decent look at the PC Ruben pedals. Fly are pretty much the last to jump on board with PCs, but at least they're not just hijacking a Wellgo and calling it Sliced Bread.

So in homage to the pedal, to the man, to the middle name of my first born, to no-footer to flatty wall rides (@1:11) and to Built to Spill:

WeThePeople 2010 Parts

Yep another flippin' WeThePeople book. This time it's the 2010 parts catalogue:

Probably the most noteworthy bit would be the new cassette - the Supreme Switch. It uses the Q-lite like the old Supreme, but you can switch the pawls around in driver so that like the Ratchet you can run it left or right drive. That's pretty much a win for the shops and distros, but the win for the kid who's going to ride it comes with the fact that there is a total of six bearings in there and 4 in the driver alone and that's got to equal longer bearing life. Doesn't it?. Despite the fact that there's a lot of bearings in a little driver, the weight is still down to a very respectable 16oz.


The Supreme Switch: Six pawls, six bearings, two drive sides, 16 ounces.

So they've got five frames all up and not a single mandatory sub 4.5 lb trend whore in sight. In fact non of them are even sub 4.8 which is admirably modest, but the Elektro has gone full born-again-virgin and covered up with an extra ounce or two. That said all bar the Elektro have a 13.22 rear end - and that is kind of slutty.

There are plenty of investment cast parts welded into the various frames and forks in the form of drop outs, bridges and seat clamps. But with the Mike Brennan / Max Gaertig Warriors frame not only do you get two pros for the price of one, but you get all the tricky bits including those dropouts which you would have seen already:



I'm loving the way the back end of this frame looks. The smooth curve made by the inside of the dropout and the curved bridges gives it a kind of old school looptail look, while at the same time using a technology which is new to bmx and an innovation in frame design.

If you were to say to me:

"This ain't no innovation, just a useless bit of fashion!"

I would probably say to you:

"But bro, they're creating 3D forms that are inherently stronger than a 2D cnc'd or lasercut design and moving the weld away from the stress point at the tip of the rear triangle. What's more they allow for tighter fit between the dropout and stay tubing that allows for a neater and stronger weld. If you'd pull your head out of your ass and you might smell the innovation!"

Then we'd have a punch up.

Klaus from WTP / Eclat actually has different things to say about them and you can listen to them here. But first you'll have to drink a warm glass of corporate milk.

According to a couple of little guys that I've had words with the set up costs for investment casting makes it an option only for the big guys, which is a shame, cause it would be interesting to see what other variations on shape and form would come up. There is definitely a lot of potentially to subtly change the look of a bmx frame by adding in some more interesting "designed" shapes or logo details for people to hate on. But remember... hate is great.

Bikes are Nice

Here's a little something from Fly on the new bits that they've got happening at the moment. Ideas are high, resolution is low:



Those investment cast bridges look particularly nice with different style for each of the models, though they do leave me with a little tinge of guilt since months ago I made the mistake of declaring that I was putting together a post about the investment casting technique that Fly and WTP have started using for for fork and frame dropouts. So now they've done a bunch of bridges too and I ain't done shit. Life's hard.

One thing that's distinctly missing from the layout above is the Fly cassette hub. You've got to wonder if it's hit the wall, cause none of their team seem to be riding it. There was that KP bike check the other day he was rocking Profile and Javier Ortega's got a bike check up on Transworld and he's riding a Mini too. I was really looking forward to seeing what angle Fly would bring to cassettes and how the hell they were going to get down to the 12 oz mark that they had put out there. So is it all over, or is it in an unmarked box headed for InterBike. Either way Javier's always got a nice looking bike for those that remain unoffended by the simple functionality of a brake:



Speaking of nice looking, when it comes to manufacturing precision machine porn, the Germans are going to win every time. They're just not that good at making cheap rubbish. You've only got to take a look at Svevo Bikes to confirm that. No new fangled T.I.G welded frames there. They've gone the full craftsman route and fillet braze their frames, which means that you end up with pretty much no visible weld bead:

Clean. But is this cleanliness enough for you to shell out US$850 (just a little over A$1000) for a frame? If it were, you would have to go full Bauhaus, let the beauty of the construction shine through and adorn it with nothing more than clear coat over the stone cold craftsmanship - wouldn't you? The Svevo frames hit the scales at 2180 precisely calibrated German grams. That's 4.8 lbs to you.

Final frame news for the day is that Colony have a few shots up of their new models for 2010. Whacky paint jobs are officially in:



If you would like to see a pic of all four pro models for 2010 you can search amongst the Flash web death here.

Americana

Pics of FBMs full range of 2010 completes are up. Specless as yet, but looking mighty fine. And... some of them even have stoppers.



Here’s a video check of two of the 2010 fit completes. Specs are at the end.



Odyssey are now doing their Vermont sprocket in 25 tooth. That’s not exactly big news, but I’ve always thought that was a fine looking piece of sprocket – maybe doesn’t translate as well to 25t, but what d'ya do?



On the Light v.s Heavy, Old v.s New front, In the Gnar have weighed in with some sensible words on the new T-1 GB frame. This is very un-American of me, but since I’m not American… I think it’d be cool to see T1 move more of their production offshore so they could put out a bit of post-weld heat treated trickery with a T1 flavour. But you see Australian manufacturing died years ago so we don’t get patriotic about that shit.

Impure Animals

There has been a Russ Bengtson sighting!

You might have heard of Russ, he runs a little site called SPRFLS. I always assumed he was some kind of bmx troll with a permanent half scowl, half snigger expression - turns out he's just a regular guy. Ben Ward snapped a pic in Odyssey's offices and has posted it up on his blog. There is a distinct absence of a scowl on Russ' face and, in fact, he has kind an optomistic look about him. Must have seen some nice stuff on Ody's drawing boards.

He obviously hadn't been surfing the Impurity Bike Co's website, cause the scowl would have been in full effect.



Impurity is a new company that is half based in Australia and half in Singapore and has a self-stated dedication to lightweight bmx components.

They've got a post-weld heat treated frame called the WTF! V2. (The V1 kind of snuck under the radar) It's light. Not the lightest going around, but pretty close at 1.8 kgs (4 lbs) and it's got a steep head, a short back end so it's ticking the whats-hot-right-now boxes. I don't know if riding like "a mouse on crack" is hot or not, but that's how they've described it. It might be accurate, but it's an unfortunate description in that crack smoking mice tend to be unpredictable, un-nervingly twitchy and prone to snapping without warning. Personally I prefer frames that ride like sloths on smack, but I'm gen-X and we're pretty much irrelevant anyway.



It's not an easy thing to start up a bike company and I imagine that it's even harder to build a name, build confidence and make a dollar. I haven't done it, but these guys have started, so good luck to them. And I suppose you never know, in 20 years time they might be the next Odyssey.

But for now they’re unknown brand, with an unknown product and their website is their only shot at building confidence. And lets face it, when you’re flogging light weight variants on products that could potentially split your face open, confidence is kind of important. I don’t mean to be a prick, but outside of their logo and header, their website ain’t cutting it.

But, on to the actual bits…

They’ve got a stem called the Ridiculite, which does exactly what it says on the box and weighs in at a160 grams or 5.6 oz. Just to put that in perspective, the next lightest freestyle stem that I can think of is Colony’s Official stem that is 245 grams or 8.64oz. So how do you drop a further 3 oz off what everyone else has managed so far? I think the pics the Ridiculite speak for themselves:

They’ve got some plain, no-nonsense bars and again they’ve gone in heavy with the drug references and come up with the name Twist ‘em Bars. Sounds like another unfortunate tag to me, but… you know… gen-X.

On top of that they’ve got a bunch of Ti nuts and bolts, a couple of pairs of forks, a beefy Ti peg concept and some fruity descriptions on their About Us page. So don’t just sit there like a tortoise on acid… hit them up.

And a shout out to Jimmy from Eject for the heads up on Impurity

Breaking News

Yes this is some news. About broken frames... and I'm sorry about that title.

Anyway, it comes via Pijin and basically it is that three frames have broken in comps over the weekend. One at the Masters in Cologne, one (@8:15) at NASS in the UK, then another at NASS. All three have just sheared off at the head tube. Nasty.

I'd heard a few stories of frames collapsing in exactly this way. But stories are one thing, to have three "on record" incidents, makes it all the more real. Not to mention making you wonder how many other frames bit-the-big-one in a less public way over the weekend.

I suppose when frames weights drop and drop like they have, you could say that this looks to be like the official bottoming out... ahem. The difficulty is that all the frames going around use a wide range of different technology and processes that means comparing by weight alone won't give you an accurate measure of strength. Heat treated tube sets v.s front triangle only v.s full post-weld, internally butted tubing v.s gussets v.s internally gusseted tubing, machined this, shaved that - a frame is not a frame is not a frame. Throw into the mix the possibility of poor welding and/or quality control and you're well and truly fucked!


Sunday's Ian Schwartz frame: keeping gussets alive and hearts out of mouths, 4.95 lbs

So you've got to be an engineer just to get your head around which frame to buy, but the information is out there. And you can be safe in assuming that if a manufacturer's description of a frame doesn't mention something, it ain't on there. Think of the description as their sales pitch - they're not going to leave out features that they've spent time and money putting into the frame.

I think the way Federal are doing things goes a step towards making life a little easier and is definitely something worth supporting. Apparently their 2010 frames will be coming out with three tiers of heat treatment options: Standard, Front triangle or Full Post-weld. That's on top of a butted and internally gusseted tubes - You know exactly what's going on and can choose the option that suits your riding... or the dollars in your pocket.


Federal's Notorious HT: Full post-weld heating, a bunch of other features, a respectable 4.6 lbs

In regards to these three breaks over the weekend: I'll leave the detective work on all the details of the frames to you, but it must definitely have some people feeling a little shaky. If you do happen to be aboard one of these frames, or if the whole thing is just getting you down, here's some light entertainment... pun intended.

S&M: Seats, Guts, Forks 'n Frames

S&M have got some new product shots out to coincide with all those rumours flying around, but I'll stick to the bits:



A very un-S&M looking plastic seat, the P-Rail. Well, it's unlike current S&M stuff anyway. They've hinted at it's 80's roots so I suppose they're ticking some style boxes there. If you can't handle the techni-colour there'll be a padded version too and I'm sure black will make the cut.



Then there is this little adapter they're calling the P-Guts, that'll let you run a railed seat on a pivotal post. It's not a bad idea and really simple, kind of makes you wonder why, or if, someone hasn't done it before. It'll probably cost almost as much as a new seat post, but at least you'll be able to run your seat right back and out of the way with a pivotal post - if you're that way inclined.



Pitchfork XLT Prototypes: Tapered legs and integrated race. Better late than never. In production at the end of July.



Last but not least, the re-issue of the Holmes frame and forks. The head tube and bb shell look pretty slick in their raw machined metal glory and apparently the dropouts pictured are going to be "doubled up". BUT, original geometry?

Same, same - 3 New Frames

Three fresh frames to have a look at. Take your pick.

1. MacNeil: Whitton III - Raw is the new black.



Top Tube - 20.75″, 21″
Rear Triangle - 13.65″
Head-tube angle - 74.5°
Seat-tube angle - 71°
BB height - 11.75″
Stand over height - 8.4
Weight - 4.55 lbs

2. Volume: Rob's Zombie



Top Tube - 20.5" & 21"
Rear Triangle - 13.75"
Head-tube angle - 75°
Seat-tube angle - 71°
BB height - 11.7"
Stand over height - 8"
Weight - 4 lbs. 8 oz

No surprises on either of them, specs are pretty standard. In fact not much difference between the two at all - 0.05" here, 0.4" there. Spanish on the Macneil, Mid on the Volume.

The WTP Warriors is a little more interesting:



It's Max Gaertig and Mike Brennan's new frame. It's not actually out yet and I ain't got the specs, but I can tell you that it comes with 21.3 tt option. And, just like Fly's new forks and their integrated dropouts, the Warriors' dropouts are investment cast. Which looks slick, but in terms of functionality, it moves the welds a little further away from the stress points in the dropouts. If you check the pics you'll see that the welds are much smaller than a regular weld. This is because of the tighter fit you can get between the casting and the seat / chain stays when compared to a regular cnc'd dropout. And a smaller weld = less chance of impurities in the weld = stronger weld = nice.

Designers Like Plastic

Not bmx, but it is plastic - and that's definitely topical. And apparently it's quite light, so it's checking boxes there. Regardless, it's interesting - in a kind of freak show way:



This thing proves how much designers love plastic and that they will attempt to make everything and anything from it.

The guy responsible for this is an industrial designer named Matt Clark. His idea was to make a bike that uses mass production techniques rather than the laborious techniques of notching, aligning and welding tubes of aluminium, steel or whatever. And to combine that with a cheap material such as polypropylene so you end up with a super cheap bike frame that you could pump out in the hundreds of thousands. Theoretically.



An internal ribbing structure of thermoformed polypropylene is heat welded into each half of the frame, then along with a reinforce polypropylene insert in the chainstays, the two halves are fused together to create a cheap and rigid (?) ride.

Definitely no bmx application and possibly no real application at all, but there you go - designers like plastic.

And thanks to Errol at Everyone for the link.

Eastern's cockroach tubing

Now this is tech.

This is like engineer pornography - a new type of tubing that'll be going on Eastern's 2010 aftermarket frames and a few of their completes. It's called, wait for it... XHeliX. I don't want to bring you down, but this amazing new word is pronounced, quite simply - Cross Helix.



I could just leave you with this quote I lifted from the comments on Eastern's post for the tubing: Phantom: "I don`t know much of this, but it seems so good", but I'll try and shed a little more light on it.

Of course, it's all about the weight. As you can see there are little ridges that run in opposing spirals down the inside of the tube. So the idea, i guess, is that you can have a thinner walled tube of an equal strength due to the reinforcement provided by ridges. The fact that they spiral along the length of the tube would also give a good torsional strength.

It'll be interesting to find out whether you can also get butted tubes of this design. That is: have a greater wall thickness at the end of the tubes where the welds are. Without butting you'd have less material at the weld point. But Eastern are going to put up some more info later in the week, so...

Just in case you didn't already feel like you're back at school, don't fall asleep yet. Cast your mind back to science class and take a look at the comparison below with the inside surface of an insect's exoskeleton. Pretty much the same principal. If it's good enough for cockroaches, it's good enough for me.

Frames - 5 Lightest

Seems like sub-4 is the new sub-5, which was the new sub-6 ...so on and so forth.

Here's the five lightest frames that I could dig up - all 4 lbs or under of course. I was going to keep it strictly freestyle and strictly production frames, but the KHE Ti is too whacky to leave out.
This thing is ridiculous, I'd say if you made a frame out of plastic it'll probably weigh about 2.2 lbs. KHE say it's a legitimate frame, but it must flex like crazy when you ride it. I used to have a pair of those titanium Eastern bars. They were light, no doubt, but they flexed like mad and snapped pretty quickly. Wonder why Eastern don't make them anymore. Or the Ti Reaper.
If you want it there is a little bit more info on KHEs little experiment

They turned up out of nowhere with super light frames. There was plenty of talk about them and it was all a bit suspicious if you ask me - an unproven company with the lightest frames around? Anyway now the talk is all about these frames snapping when someone so much as looks at one. If you're thinking of buying one of these frames, you might want to read this first.

These things should be a bit more reliable. Premium is made by Haro after all. This is from SPRFLS about the Lowpez Lt:

...so the tubes are double butted and drawn in a special way. then heat treated for 3.5 times longer than normal frames. haro guy said it would shatter before it bent... so you have that to look forward to!”

I think that KHE is totaly and madly obsessed by making extremely light bmx parts and this frame is one of them. Check more on it here.

It feels like this ugly piece of work has been around forever, yet it's still up there matching with all the other feather weights. You've at least got to give Eastern credit for being ahead of their time.

Originality?

Marketing bullshit. What can you say?
I actually have to write it a lot for work, so I probably hate it more than your average person.

Like everywhere, it's alive and well in bmx. And not just in the places you'd expect it. S & M have this little look book up with 3 new frames, a bit of marketing hype on each and all specs. According to the speil "Tony's (Cardona) frame is as original as his riding". Sounds really... original. Except that it has pretty much exactly the same geometry as Randy Taylor's frame.

Has eveything become so much the same that a having a different laser-cut seat stay bridge or 0.35" differnece in standover height is as original as it gets?

Screenshot: You can see the real thing here