Top Three Finds - Interbike 2014

Sep 11, 2014
by Pinkbike Staff  
Kappius KH-1 Hub


Kappius


bigquotesKappius has been manufacturing hubs that look like they're from the distant future for some time now, although this is the first that we've actually featured them. I'm not sure why that is. After all, these things not only look incredible, they also sport some clever design features that set them apart from the hundreds of different yet all similar aluminum shells with bearings pressed into them and some sort of generic freehub mechanism stuck on the end... most hubs are pretty standard and boring. The KH-1 is not. The two most obvious talking points have to be the milled out carbon fiber hub shell and strange looking, cone shaped freehub body. What kind of cassette fits on that, you ask? Only the ones that Kappius modifies to fit, which includes either ten speed 11 - 36 and SRAM's XX1 and X01 eleven speed blocks, or a single speed setup. You can either send in one of your own to be modified to fit the KH-1, or Kappius can sell you a new and already modified cassette for the same MSRP of a standard version. Kappius goes to all this trouble in order to move the hub's bearing stance out as wide as possible, which they claim makes for a more rigid and reliable hub. Oh yeah, the hub's pawls are also magnetically sprung (no pawl springs to tire out, no contamination issues), and there's an incredibly quick, 1.5 degree engagement interval. The 265 gram rear hub fits either 135 QR or 12 x 142mm rear ends, and the matching 110 gram front hub can do QR, 15mm, or Lefty forks. As you probably guessed, these bad boys ain't cheap: $699 USD for the rear (plus the cost of a cassette if you need one), and $299 USD for the front. - Mike Levy




Shimano's Virtual Reality Booth


Shimano VR


bigquotesI'll admit that my knowledge of virtual reality, and video games in general, stops somewhere in the mid-90s, right around the time Nintendo released the Virtual Boy, a table mounted gaming system that promised an immersive, 3D experience. That system ended up being a commercial flop, thanks to its high price and odd red graphics that made it feel like you were inside of a submarine, but twenty years later the concept of virtual reality still hasn't lost its appeal, which is why Outdoor Demo attendees were flocking to Shimano's booth.

Using six helmet mounted cameras, Shimano was able to put together a video of a mountain bike trail being ridden that included footage from all angles. When viewing this footage through an Oculus headset (Oculus and Shimano are two separate, unrelated companies), it was possible to check out the scenery in all directions thanks to a motion tracking device and the headset's stereoscopic lenses. Look up, and you'd see the sky; turn around, and catch a glimpse of the rider behind you. There was even a set of handlebars that had been set out to make the experience feel more realistic. The video will eventually end up on Shimano's website, part of the marketing campaign for their 2015 XTR group, and the headset was simply a means of showcasing it in a slightly different way, but it was still quite fascinating. Anyone who's spent more than a few minutes on an indoor trainer knows how mind-numbingly boring they are - could this be the answer to making those mid-winter spin sessions a little more tolerable?
- Mike Kazimer





Rotor Q-Rings


Rotor Q-Ring Interbike 2015


bigquotesThe next innovation destined to hit the mountain bike industry has been in serial production for over 12 years. Rotor asymmetrical chainrings are not new to mountain or to road riders, nor is the concept itself, but thanks to SRAM's successful one-by drivetrain revolution, their time has come. Before all you old-timers stop reading and begin crying out loud about the ill-fated Shimano Bio-Pace chainrings back in the 1980s, take the time to read a little farther down the page. For about a decade, asymmetrical chainrings have been winning major races under cycling's greatest names. Like Schwalbe tires among downhill racers, Rotor and its closest competitor, Osymetric, asymmetrical sprockets have been one of the most commonly blacked out non-sponsored components on ProTour road racing bikes and it is estimated by some that they are used by 40-percent of the riders. Many champion Triathlon and World Cup XC racers uses them as well. Rotor has done its homework, and its claims of increases in power output of almost seven percent are also supported by Osymetric - and by experienced pros who live by their power meters.

Modern asymmetrical rings are designed like cams, with specific diameter variations designed to match the leverage rate and muscular efficiency of the human leg as it pushes the pedal around the crank's axis. While cycling's oral historians have preached that we all should be pedaling perfect circles, the concept is laughable. Sure, we have taught ourselves to pedal round chainrings with legs that were intended for walking and running, but step outside the narrow confines of traditional cycle-thought and it doesn't take a bio-mechanical scientist to understand that modifying the leverage rates of the pedal circle to better-match the kinematics of human locomotion would lead to more efficient and powerful pedal strokes.

Barring the usual push-back from cycling's luddite luminaries, the main reason that asymmetrical rings have not been embraced by the likes of SRAM and Shimano is that their varying diameters wreak havoc on the front derailleur action. Only a safe cracker can fine tune a front mech to shift an asymmetric two or three-by crankset and, presumably, the Big Two drivetrain makers chose perfect shifting over a potential improvement in efficiency and power. One-by drivetrains and the introduction of the narrow-wide tooth profile, however, have changed that game. With no front changer to fiddle with, those barriers no longer exist. Asymmetrical chainrings are the next logical performance improvement for mountain bike drivetrains. Rotor has handed it to us on a silver platter. The promise of a wider speed range and easier, more powerful climbing - exactly what one-by riders need - would be foolish to pass up.
- RC


View entire Interbike 2014 product photo gallery.

Author Info:
pinkbikeaudience avatar

Member since Jul 22, 2013
3,460 articles

125 Comments
  • 96 4
 I just found a new way to watch porn.
  • 108 2
 On the Shimano booth at Interbike? That certainly is a danger w**k.
  • 19 32
flag wolf-amongst-lambs (Sep 11, 2014 at 5:23) (Below Threshold)
 Danger w**ks rule... (back of the bus is #1)
  • 3 0
 Virtual reality in Vegas? Nah.
  • 6 11
flag slidways (Sep 11, 2014 at 6:02) (Below Threshold)
 next step, hooking at baby up to a reactive bike so it feels like your riding the trail. Love it.
  • 17 1
 The Japanese invented bukkake. I'm in.
  • 13 0
 Porn? blah, I say Mario Kart!!!
  • 1 0
 I smell fallout references coming up...
  • 1 0
 People have been working on combining porn and Oculus for a while.
  • 14 0
 I hereby patent 'Cockulus'
  • 24 1
 Magnetic pawls is a great idea, just took my Pro II apart to find half the springs had snapped!
  • 11 2
 the freehub body gets chewed on pro 2 as well even if you use a high quality cassette
  • 12 34
flag WAKIdesigns (Sep 11, 2014 at 4:50) (Below Threshold)
 toldownhill - you must generate torque of a... sorry, dick mode off... I mean, it sounds strange to me what you are saying, I consider myself as a relatively strong rider, I ride hard gears 1x setup with 175 crank arms, 36t front and as long as I use spider-style cassette, like XT, 1070, I have no issues with hope aluminium body. I had minor body-eating problems with SLX.
  • 34 1
 @waki, you must have chicken legs. Nearly EVERY hope hub I see (which tends to be a lot) has some form of "chewing" even with XT cassettes. It's usually only a small amount to be fair, from the 15 and 17t, but most require persuasion to be removed.
  • 9 0
 true dat slackboy - i run the same set up as you waki with a 34t at the back, the aluminium freehub that came with it took 20mins of blood sweat and tears to seperate from the cassette after 3months of hard use, i replaced it with a steel one and still its full of serrations and takes a bit of fiddling to seperate. i admit though that i use the cheaper deore cassettes..
  • 3 2
 My XT cassette has chewed my Pro 2 free hub body quite badly, I also run 1x and, in short burst, would say I can produce a fair amount of torque. The marks are more severe than the superstar hub with SLX cassette I used to run.
  • 9 3
 Is magnetic pawls such a great idea.

Most materials lose a % of their magnetism when exposed to physical shock, knocks, constant vibration, and you know I'm just not so sure I'd want my hub full of things just dying to suck any metal particles towards them.

Time will tell of course.
  • 1 1
 Well yeah, the smaller cogs don't distribute the torque- they are still individual. It isn't the price of the cassette that keeps it from marring the FH body geez.
  • 10 2
 eatridegrow.tumblr.com/post/66698401057/this-sucks

Hope Pro 3.0 RS with Ultegra cassette
  • 3 2
 @ bikescientist: More expensive cassettes have carriers that put multiple cogs on one unit, therefore greater distribution of force. XX casssettes have only 2 points of contact with the freehub body, but they are larger.
  • 3 2
 @everyone a freehub body is a wear item unfortunately.
  • 2 2
 yeah i have used cassette that have carriers for all except the last 3 on a ten speed with 34t front and 175mm crank on my xc bike and the freehub body was chewed to death. same set up of downhill bike and freehub body is even worse
  • 4 1
 A Hadley hub, with it's titanium freehub body, will last you forever. Plus you have the choice of 36 or 72 points of engagement. They're not as loud as Hopes, if that's what you're going for.
  • 2 2
 Hope Pro 2 here Waki, no issues... Maybe guys aren't socking down the cassette tight enough..... I know they notch - but so badly the cassette won't come off I have not had it happen.
  • 6 2
 HADLEY
  • 3 2
 "No pawl springs to tire out"...technically magnets do lose their strength after a while, and at what ratebdepending in several circumstances.
  • 1 3
 @maxlombardy. haha, I know- I was simply stating that it isn't a function of price. The XT cassettes have 2 spiders and I guess 3 individual cogs. I guess they figure that the smaller cogs are used at lower rpms and less torque. On a road bike I suppose that design makes sense.
  • 3 2
 Gone through number of aluminium Hope free hub bodies - all with severe notching despite cassette lock ring set at 40nm, and anti-seize on the splines, plus always spider style cassettes. Typically removed with chisel and hammer to rotate the cogs out of the notches

Worse on my pro iii mono road wheels with ultegra cassettes.Caused creaking and rough shifting as cogs not held 100% secure and timing ramps now out of position.

Hope good enough to replace the first two FOC, third time gave me steel body foc, but its added a huge lump of weight to what was previously a light weight hub Frown
  • 3 4
 Hope isn't the only company making alu freehub bodies, how's DT Swiss in that respect?
  • 3 1
 use a sram cassette with hope hubs as the carrier for the cassette is aluminum. Using steel bodied cassettes on aluminum hope hubs will always wreck them.
  • 2 1
 @trueeast

All my hope MTB hubs were using SRAM pg990 cassettes with spider and still the gouging on the small non fixed cogs Frown

Best option for alloy free hubs is american classic with steel reinforcement strips, but they patented that smart idea!
  • 1 1
 Thanks Hampstead Bandit another nugget of knowledge. Cheers bro!
  • 1 0
 Waki I run dt Swiss. Chewed up.
  • 13 0
 Wouldn't an oval chainring also reduce chain induced feedback on suspension, as the loading would be more even? Obviously the shifting mass of leg would still induce some bob, but this would help.
  • 5 2
 In HS I rode an old 1990s road bike to work and school with the biopace oval chainrings, and I can say from experience that they are more efficient.
  • 6 2
 im not trying to dick in, but i had always heard that they destroyed riders knees for some reason? i also remember how much chain suck there would be with the biopace
  • 8 2
 narrow wide biopace with clutch - problem solved
  • 14 2
 I'd think you couldnt use a clutch derailuer, you would be fighting it every revolution. Doesnt sound efficient unless I'm missing something..
  • 12 2
 @Gvnick: the total chain length doesn't change with a oval chainring. You can run them on single speeds if you want. As you pedal the same number of teeth remain engaged.
  • 6 2
 whydomylegshurt ^^^ is correct.
  • 5 5
 Interesting. I'd think if the same number of teeth stayed engaged and chain tension stayed constant, that would be an indicator that nothing was accomplished. I'm not disagreeing, it sounds awesome if it actually works.
  • 4 2
 @gvnik perhaps you should learn about lever arms.
  • 1 0
 Biopace helped screw my knees up. Are these actually available in narrow wide? I always wanted the Rotor cam crankset to help with my knees. They discontinued making those. Is it because these do a similar thing?
  • 3 0
 Bio-Pace was originally designed to smooth out the pedal circle for road bikes after Shimano did extensive research on pedaling dynamics and discovered that even the best riders don't pedal in circles. The "ovalized" sections were timed opposite to what present asymetrical chainrings are: with peak power arriving when the smaller, "easier" section of the ring is pulling chain. This caused the leg to speed up, and as the cranks came through the "dead stroke" area, the larger segments of the chainring would momentarily slow down the cranks and thus convert the inertia of the rotating foot and leg into pulling power at that brief moment.
  • 15 0
 Does this mean my BioPace chain rings are awesome again? I have triple setup on the Univega.
  • 2 0
 Well thank goodness I did not sell all my Biopace chain rings from triathlon days. Got a few in the shed, will have to dismantle the wife's wind chimes, so they will soon be in my Buy/Sell. Smile
  • 9 0
 Why arent software companies like Rockstar or Neversoft developing DH circuit games & VR Booths for pro training? Just saying.. It might even sway me into buying a console..
  • 10 3
 Because no console is powerful enough to push an oculuous and run a video game at the same time. PC gamers dissected an Xbox 1 and a PS4 and discovered five-year old technology in both, and no way are you gonna get that much performance out of silicone that old, and how many of us want to shell out $1000 for a PC strong enough to do that when we're not gonna use it half the year? Especially when we could get a cheaper computer and spend the extra $600 for a new set of I9's or CK's.

Tech support rep/ PC enthusiast moment there, sorry. Back to bikes now...
  • 4 0
 Cost and market. Wc riders get paid near nothing, you would have only a handful of riders on over 100k, teams don't have lots of cash to throw around.Equally MTB has so many variables, unlike race cars you have to be able to jump and corner the bike by leaning over this adds another factor that race cars don't deal with as far, a car does not need to rotate at a 50 degree angle to corner, tracks are obviously much less flat and corners vary as does terrain so there are lots of variables here, arguably more than motor racing. All this said while f1 teams have million dollar simulators consumers can buy one built by cruden for about 200,000 euro. Really the end of the day the money to develop it is extensive and the return on investment wont be worth it, no one would buy it except for someone loaded, I doubt any team could afford such tech. It would be amazing if it happened. At best they can use this virtual reality now and hopefully upload their practice runs from the day. console level gaming wont be sufficient enough, at best it could be used to memorizing track lay out at best but that doesn't tell you much about anything else.
  • 2 3
 Sony is developing the Oculus to be used with the PS4. They already have two games in development.
  • 5 3
 Sorry LindLTaylor, your wrong,

the graphics chip in the PS4 and Xbox One is based on the GCN (Graphics Core Next) Architekture, like AMD's current PC Graphics Cards (The PS4's chip has 1150 Shaders and 72 ROP's (XBOX1 768 48 ) which makes it comparable to a r9 270 and because stuff is better optimized for the consoles than for PC (and you have less driveroverhead and so forth..) the new/current consoles should have enough power to run a virtual reality headset. You wont be able to run a simulation with it though, as the processor is only a Jaguar based AMD CPU.

And Sony is developing their own Virtual Reality Headset called Project Morphius (dont know if i spelled that right)
  • 7 2
 Where did you read that? If they're really running an R9 270, I may have to rethink my dislike for consoles, but every site I've read that's investigated the graphics cards has found it to more closely relate to, say, a Radeon HD 5400. I hope I'm mistaken, though.
  • 1 0
 shaders but what about bandwidth and clock speed? is that comparable to the R9 270?

That aside the system is bottle-necked by the disc reader. If it was a downloaded system you than have the issue that the ps4 only runs sata II so it is immediately limited in its transfer rate, Although people are still gaining benefit from putting a SSD in the system is way under whelming than it should be. So even if the graphic card was capable you run into other issues if you want something so detailed as a simulator.

hoping they will release a later version with sata III and trim support.
  • 1 0
 Sata III doenst preform better with normal HDD's then does Sata II. So it wouldnt make a difference if the PS4/XBOX1 had SataIII.

And having your game on an SSD is a little bit faster than on a HDD, but its only very little and you wont notice a difference except when benchmarking.

And you cant compare bandwith on a PC Graphics Card to the consoles, because the CPU GPU and (V)RAM sit on one board (they even share the same memory).

Oh and both the PS4 and the XBONE run the graphics clocked at 800Mhz.

Although since everything is way better optimized on the consoles (think about it - they just have to optimize for 1 CPU/GPU) so it actually makes more sense comparing the picture of the consoles to those renderd by a PC.
If you look at comparisons for games like Watch Dogs you will find Tests saying the PS4 offers the same Picture as the PC Game with High/Ultra settings but without the AA/AF.

Sorry if I made any mistakes, explaining such technical stuff in englisch is hard for me Cool
  • 1 0
 Now, you're wrong on the hdd and SATA front. I have a 7200rpm wd black drive that gets bottlenecked if it gets plugged into a SATA II port. Same on the SSD/HDD front- my SATA III SSD easily outguns that same SATA III hard drive by at least twice the speed, and it's a cheap SSD too.

I took the liberty of comparing some real world benchmarks on the Ps4 to the r9 270. The ps4 gets maybe 75% the performance of the r9 270. That's still considerably better than I thought, but considerably worse than you were saying it was.
  • 1 0
 Sure the SSD is faster than HDD. But you wont notice that in games, it may prevent the occasional texture-lagg and shorten loading times, but it wont improve your fps (atleast not noticably). Id im sorry SATA II will not limit your drive in real world applikations.
  • 1 0
 The videos of real world testing show marked improvement with a SSD even on sata II, we are only talking load times of course, but for many gamers this is a worth its weight. Load times are a pita especially those in game loads that tend to be long from area to area. Because people are replacing the ps4 drive with SSD already and they designed the HDD to be exchangeable it is backwards to put in a SATA II. The average decrease in waiting time seems to be about 30% of a SSD, if Sata III was enabled you coudl expect times to be much faster than they are.. As you are probably aware most people seem to be compromising with a hybrid drive but the 8GB flash is not enough for the PS4, after a while you start getting roll over. Yes this drive is faster than the traditional drive but its far from ideal.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=InermmePbd4

game loading, while most games are fairly close and other tests tend to show only a few seconds too. Overall most tests show the SSD to be about a 30% improvement with hybrid in between. But with sata III enabled it should be much faster. Its a jump from 3gb/s to 6gb/s.. I will note that most other tests use the 840 pro not the crucial.
  • 7 0
 I run Rotor chainrings on all my bikes and have run the Osymetrics on a road bike. I watch a lot of Pro Tour road races, and I would guess that perhaps 5% of the peloton is running non-round rings. 40% is a gross exaggeration, likely by an employee of Rotor or Osymetric. Also, it is basic science that the non round rings cause crank-based power meters to read high, because you don't have consistent angular momentum in the pedal stroke--your feet accelerate and decelerate within a single revolution. In independent lab tests with wheel-based power meters, which will read correctly, there is not a statistically significant increase in performance (eg.http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3990898/). Funnily enough, in the tests done by the manufacturers, though, there is a significant benefit.

Having said all that, I like the way they feel, and the basic concept makes sense (it just has not been proven by any independent source to work). Shifting does suffer relative to round, so 1x drivetrains are great. Rotor makes 1x rings with narrow/wide profiles that work fine for MTB, but they require a special spider so the whole package gets pricey and is limited to certain cranks. I particularly like them for mountain biking because if you get hung up on a root or rock as you are at 12 and 6 o'clock, you are pushing an easier gear to get over the obstacle while you are in a weak position. It also makes sense to me that at lower cadences, the non-round rings would have more benefit.
  • 2 0
 Of the various articles I perused thanks to your link, none of them appear to use a large enough sample size to actually determine if their results are statistically significant or not. Also:

"The slight tendency towards improvement in power output when using the oval Q-rings (increase of 2.5–6.5 % relative to circular chainrings) suggests that Q-rings could result in slight improvement during on-road cycling performance."

If they had a large enough sample and they generated this gain, then for pros/racers, this is big. I took a speed and agility PE class in college with a guy that had worked with the Dallas Cowboys, NBA teams and pro tennis players and he claimed that top sprinters train to increase leg lift by a little as 1%. So 2.5-6.5% would be a big gain for a racer. Food for thought.
  • 1 0
 this statistical analysis is intriguing. weevil, I am interested in why the sample size is not large enough? Please cite the theory behind your claim.
  • 1 0
 They did the test with 14 participants, with a relatively homogeneous sample. It's way too few to draw any conclusion. What works for them might not work for the average joe or the top racer, or it might actually work better for them, we don't know. A much bigger sample would iron out the differences between the participants and show a much more global (and reliable) average.
  • 6 1
 " Asymmetrical chainrings are the next logical performance improvement for mountain bike drivetrains."

Couldn't agree more.

I actually run a three-by Osymetric setup which performs wonderfully well, especially on climbs. And it's not that tricky to get a good front shifting out of asymmetrical rings.
  • 3 2
 shimano biopace
  • 9 3
 i wonder if a regular chainguide will still keep a chain from dropping when the smaller part of the assymetrical ring passes under the guide
  • 2 3
 I imagine those using this will not be overly concerned with pedalling efficiency as they will probably be pointed down most of the time. That said, my narrow/wide and clutch work like a charm as I bash over roots & rocks and do jumps on my hardtail.
  • 5 1
 These are actually made for pedaling efficiency. The smaller part of the ring gets you through the weak spot in your pedal stroke faster. They likely won't work well with a guide either, the position of the chain moves alot as the teeth cycle though since a 34T ring is like 38T in spots and 30T in others, you'd have to set up the guide for the larger size and I'd bet there'd be a big gap. I'd bet you see these alot more in XC 1x drivetrains with a clutch.
  • 2 0
 I had a friend cobble together a fixed gear town bike awhile back. The cranks at the bike coop were biopace. I thought no way will that work for single speed. My mind was blown when it kept tension without issue. I still dont understand it.
  • 1 0
 I meant that people using chain guides aren't overly concerned with efficiency, hence the expectation that gravity types probably won't care about these much. Whether they work with a chainguide well is a bit of a moot point probably won't have any effect on sales.
  • 2 0
 All should be fine with a bash ring sandwich!
  • 3 0
 I own and regularly ride 3 bikes: a park/FR/DH bike, an AM fullsus and a hardtail for getting a beer from the local shop. For the past 2 years I've been planning to rebuild my good old AM bike, as to update it with the more contemporary piece of MTB technology. Now, every time I decide to finally do it, there is an Inter-/Euro-/other-bike expo, and I see all this awesome revolutionary stuff and I think - nah, I can wait a bit more till this amazing enduro specific stem cap hits the market, and then the next one, and the next one. .. Lately, I've been thinking - enough! I am going to do it right now...

Damn you, Q-ring!
  • 3 0
 I wanna see someone wearing that Occulus while riding rollers!

Note to Rotor: I keep trying to buy your rings, but they don't fit my equipment. First your 2x setup had too much extra material on the inner ring and wouldn't clear my BB shell. Now I'm running RaceFace's awesome Cinch system, and there is no ring for it. Rotor, if you make something that fits my bike, I will buy it!
  • 1 0
 Abolute black have there own version only 104bcd at the moment but spiderless versions coming soon
absoluteblack.cc/oval-104bcd-chainring.html
  • 3 0
 That VR setup is exactly the kind of thing I thought Oculus would be great for - watching a 360 degree POV footage of a pro smashing a trail in Whistler from the other end of the world. Can't wait.
  • 33 1
 I'd still crash.
  • 1 0
 They need to do footage of rampage and some mad nutter riding crankwerx or something, would give most of us a headache spinning that much!
  • 1 0
 Seriously. I would love to see those top level FR events from that point of view.
  • 1 0
 Those hubs look sound sic, if the magnetically sprung pawls work as good as they sound. Esp ko slippage, like I had on a King once cost me 2weeks off bike and a big hole in leg, they were supposedly unslipable! Id be in. Magnets sound like great solution.
  • 3 1
 Assymetrical rings? What a load of gimmicky crap. Way to push it PB. The next logical step would be internal gearing, not some wonky egg for a sprocket. Dumb dumb de dumb DUUUUUUMB!
  • 3 0
 But it's the chainring a narrow wide design?
If not then I think they missed a key point
  • 3 0
 Very good point. Other than that they pretty much sold me on the idea. And yeah, I was one of the old timers laughing about the resurrection of biopace. Smile
  • 4 0
 yep - they do a narrow wide version
  • 5 0
 yup they are narrow wide. and i've been running them for months and they make a huge difference and its instantly noticeable. The only downside to them is that once you put one on your main bike you can't help but change all the other bikes to them as well!!!!!
  • 1 0
 Yup - it's already been spotted by our guys www.pinkbike.com/news/interbike-day-two-randoms-2014.html
  • 11 0
 That crushing moment that you realise you've become an old timer....
  • 1 0
 I had a rotor chainring on my downhill bike for a while. Cant complain about it really - it made it easier to accelerate when your feet were in the wrong position and you were in a harder gear than you should have been. I guess in a sport like downhill where every nanosecond counts it would be helpful....
  • 1 7
flag poah (Sep 11, 2014 at 3:10) (Below Threshold)
 for £75 they can keep the extra 7% power
  • 2 0
 its not just the power though it reduces fatigue feels way smoother to pedal quicker acceleration etc etc i guess like all things it comes down to how much it matters to you. I race a lot of 4x so the extra snap outta the gate makes loads of sense to me. And pooh its same as all new tech yeh its expensive to start with but meh you either wanna try these things or you don't
  • 2 0
 Serial production for over 12 years? Looks like they finally hired a marketing manager... Engineering first doesn't happen much anymore these days.
Nice concept though. Worth a try.
  • 1 0
 Interesting that so many roadie/TT/tri guys run them. They must be doing something right, maybe they just haven't bothered marketing to mtbers til they assessed how disruptive the 1x craze would be.
  • 1 0
 @pedaladdiction, so You are using this or similar ring? It works for gate start disciplines? I mean, You probo still have to run a chainguide in 4x, dont You nowadays?
  • 1 2
 @yxbix have you been living under a rock? clutch mech and narrow wide means no need for chainguide never dropped a chain running no guide and i've raced it in hard tail on dh tracks! @martinbr nice concept? its been in production for ages and is working as is being ridden by pros all over the place its far beyond a concept bio pace was all wrong rotor have proved it works if done right.
  • 2 0
 in a way, yeah. Ever heard of Estonian MTB scene? thats because there is no such. Nice to know about your experience anyway.
  • 4 1
 why the negative props for thinking £75 is too much considering a race face NW can be bought for £30? pinkbike crazies
  • 2 0
 I ran a 34t Q-Ring for about 9 months back in 2013. I ran an upper guide and it worked well. It is definitely more efficient and puts down more power. Sometimes it felt like too much as it is easy to spin the back tire on loose surfaces. The teeth did wear down pretty fast, so hopefully the new ones hold up better. It's a perfect match for XC racing or those looking to save energy. I might give it a try again as my Mach6 came with a 30t.
  • 8 3
 Who buys 1k hubs?
  • 6 0
 People who have enough money -> not me Wink
  • 13 2
 mostly all of people from 10k bikes planet
  • 2 0
 it's expensive, but f+ck I want to try it !(and keep it for sure )
  • 6 0
 No worse than dt swiss 180's
  • 3 2
 Who pays that much for a fucking shitty 15mm qr standard. That's garbage 20mm is stiffer with a negligable weight difference.
  • 3 1
 Kinda sucks to see all this new 15mm stuff these days. I still don't see an advantage over riding 20mm
  • 2 0
 Tell us how you REALLY feel, t-turi-mullet. ..
  • 1 1
 I don't know that I could ever feel comfortable with oval chain rings. Much like the lefty fork, looks matter. If it looks or feels weird, you are much less likely to feel comfortable riding it.

Plus, as a kid growing up with bio pace, I seem to remember that it did climb better but it felt uneven ( sort of a power on/ power off crank rotation) when ever you upped the rpm on the cranks: flat riding and downhill.
  • 1 0
 Yes oval rings make sense for human kinematics / muscle output / etc, but riding them is annoying as hell. They'll never be mainstream.
  • 2 0
 Shimano's Virtual Reality Booth - shut up and take my money
  • 1 0
 and mine !
  • 2 1
 Leave it to Shimano to make armchair mountain biking a reality....
  • 9 0
 @clouseau armchair mountain biking is what we already do on PB all day...
  • 1 0
 A modified XX1 cassette....I can only ask 'why?'... Why make things that work more complicated??
  • 2 0
 Any info or opinion on those Q-rings for gate starts?
Very interested
  • 2 0
 Each ring has 3 bolt locations to either delay or get ahead of the bigger part by a couple of degrees. I tend to spin less and keep traction where others don't. The longer push phase does that.
  • 2 0
 Dude come have a sesh on mine at norwich track and see what you think.
  • 1 0
 So when do Shimano and Sram start making the one-by drive train with a asymmetrical chain ring?
  • 1 0
 video games and bio pace chain rings. hahahahahahhaaaaaaaa. how innovative!
  • 1 0
 Now the question is: will they make oval rings in narrow-wide?
  • 1 0
 They have?
  • 1 0
 Is there an SC booth? Howz the rat doing, PB?
  • 1 0
 Fullbug ^^^Got out of the hospital in Europe Thursday and flew home. Six weeks absolutely no weight bearing, but the operations went well. - From Kathy Sessler at Interbike.
  • 1 0
 Thnx for the update, rc! Great news.
  • 1 0
 You guys seem to have failed to find the carbon springs!
  • 1 0
 Guys, please - no one produces an asymmetric chainring.
  • 1 0
 Oculus?
#lawnmowerman







Copyright © 2000 - 2024. Pinkbike.com. All rights reserved.
dv65 0.047185
Mobile Version of Website