Chris King - Interbike 2010

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Standards are never standard when they are introduced. They become standard when manufacturers start using them more an more as standard on their products and the industry 'agrees' that it is a standard.
But that does not make a piece of technology less relevant. Check www.pinkbike.com/news/12x142-explained.html>; for more info on 142x12.

 i'm sick of them. really, is it going to be THAT much stiffer or stronger or lighter or whatever reason you have for making stupid new sizes? its a money maker...cause then everybody has to buy into it.

 read the info on it... its to help align the hub with the frame when putting the through axel in

 That makes it even more pointless. I have never had trouble putting a rear on...

 its more to improve the 135x12 system, the flang spacing and the rotor mounts are all the same, just the clap area is farther out.

 clamp**

 Its a small improvement on 135x12. I did have frustrating moments when my hub wasn't aligning as my QR was, so when I got 142x12 on my Scratch, I was happy with the system. Just note that on my Scrath I also got adapters to convert the rear dropout to 135x12. So far as I have read, all bike manufacturers do the same when they sport a 142x12 rear.

 that and im thinking this way there is less pressure directly on the axle, where was now the hub/frame takes the force, just my two cents and what i understand from it

 Not so man. Some people have luck with them and they have blingin product with nice bearings, but the number one creakiest headset we get in the shop is Chris King. Way less problems come in with basic entry level headsets of other brands. And as for warranty, try calling their warranty department and see how far you get. I used to think Chris King was a good company before I worked at a bike shop.

 Hope should make a BMX spaced hub too!

 I agree on CK making BMX hubs. They'd blow G-sport, profile, and all that, outta the water! =P
They'd probably be like $300 per hub though. lol. As for the headset thing, bmx integrated headsets have had the split ring thing forever, how is this new technology?

 xxirocxx, they do presently make BMX hubs, but they're designed more for racing than street riding or jumping.

 yeah. i know about the racing ones. but a street one would kill everything. yeah it may be $300 or so, but it would be the last one you would ever buy..

 I knew they made them, I just phrased that wrong but I would love a BMX spaced Hope!

 I used to have a true precision stealth, absolutely instant, and I can honestly feel a little difference. to do the math:

average crank: 175mm
175mm times Pi = circumference
circumference = 550 mm

550/72 = 7.6

so that means you'll get a maximum movement of about 7.6mm before engagement at the pedals on a 175mm crank. it's something.

 It all adds up and there is no doubt that you can feel a difference, but I've heard that the Stealth hubs pay for their near instant engagement with a fair bit of drag. Is this true?

 I posted a video of the internals: www.youtube.com/watch?v=K76bQm6DOKI

it's tough for me to compare as I don't have the stealth anymore, I'm currently on a king wheelset with much lighter rims and tires.

if I did for whatever reason backpedal, the chain wouldn't slacken. I do remember it rolling pretty smoothly when mounted to the frame.

In hindsight, I should have used a much lighter lubricant when servicing the hub as disassembly was so freakin easy.

I bought that hub used for about $130 and it lasted me for 2 full seasons, I could have replaced the axle bearings and had a perfectly good hub.

from memory, the drag wasn't any worse than the king. it was a fantastic hub, aside from weighing a ton.

 bigtard,

Where have you been, I've missed you! I've been told by people that would know these things that CK has always had to pay for the Dia-Comp patent, regardless of using an O-ring instead of a split wedge. The O-ring was a conscious decision on their part and was still covered by the patent. While the move to include a split wedge in some of their headsets may look like it is happening because the Dia-Comp patent is/has expired, that isn't the case.

Just a bit of related info.

 thats possible but i don't personally believe it. regardless. that isn't the point i'm trying to make. the point is. the o-ring steerer tube idea is total crap.
so you're saying they're only putting a split ring in some of their headsets?
sooo... some of their headsets are still totally garbage?

 Correct, only certain models will come equipped with the split wedge. It will be available separately as well. Strangely enough, the King headset I had many moons ago on my Super 8 (I did say many moons ago) was noise free for the entire time it was on my bike, which was a long time. And that was back when I was quite a hack! Never marked my steerer tube either. But what I had an issue with was bearing life, they went south very quickly. Do they still do that crazy long bearing warranty these days?

 Wow, bigtard, simmer down a bit, lol. The King headset is great and it's hard to match against others. Plus, I have used better bearings from Japan then what King makes.

 Mike, CK has a 10-year "no questions asked" warranty on their headsets.

 10 years! That should be a big selling point for a lot of people. I know that they are expensive, but surely that should be taken into account. Do any other headset besides King's come with a warranty like that?

 Mike, here's what Cane Creek says on their website: "With the exception of the 110 series, Cane Creek warrants its headsets for a period of one year from the original date of purchase (headsets in the 110 family carry a warranty of 110 years)" so CK definitely has some competition in the "long-ass warranty" department.

tard, I have owned and installed more than 25 Chris King headsets in the past 12 years and not once have I heard them make any noise, no matter the amount of time they were on the bike. If you face your headtube, use the proper amount and kind of grease, and use proper Chris King headset cup press tools, one should have no issues with their CK headset.

 10 years no questions asked was questions asked when a trials friend snapped his king axle and asked,did king cover this no quibble no questions asked garauntee erm no.

 They have a 10-year warranty on their headsets, not on their hubs.

 They did used to carry a 10 year warranty on all parts.

 I am in agreement about the headsets. I work at a bike shop and guess what the number one creakiest headset is? Chris King. Try to warranty it and what do they say? Someone must have installed it wrong. If you have a warranty back it or don't have a warranty. Also had issues with their rear hubs coming loose. Warranty on that was useless too, customer ended up having to pay for parts that they admitted were defective.

 yep the warranty stands for fekk all when you actually get a problem with the head set , " it must of been installed incorrectly" is the common result

 Neg propping won't change the stated fact's.

 Imo propping shouldn't exist at all.

 It seems to suite you when need be though.

 If it's there, people will click it.

 I picked up a Stainless headset off of eBay and after facing my frame twice I still had issues with the top race interfering with the lower cup. I contacted CK about the issue and they said send it to us and we will look to see if it's out of spec. They sent it back with in a week with a new top race and lower bearing for no cost to me other then shipping one way. I even told them I accidently damaged the lower bearing while trying to remove it from my frame. Turns out, the set was fine all along and it was the frame steer tube that was to blame, they didn’t tell me that, I found out myself. CK stands behind their high priced pieces of crap products and they do it well in my experience with them. Every part on a bike that houses a bearing (minus pedals and suspension joints) CK makes, and I doubt that is because they make crap. I’ve never heard a King headset creek and I’ve used/installed many but what do I know.

 you guys who haven't heard your headset creak, are either
a) ignorant
b) deaf
C) full of shit
d) don't care anyways
e) super lucky

because
to be TOTALLY HONEST. almost every one of those headsets i've EVER seen. on ANY kind of bike. has creaked to some degree. maybe not when brand new. but soooner or later.
so once again seraph.
i think its pretty clear. you're not a very observant mechanic.
but most people aren't. and thats why most people don't hate chris king.
i do however know lots of people who support me completely on this.
smart people, engineers, people who hold serious positions in the bike industry. people you would respect. as its very clear i'm not one of those people. because of my sweet name, and my jackass behaviour. but its more fun this way.

 It's pretty funny, you're so full of shit it's coming out your ears.

Most people don't hate Chris King because they make some awesome products that last the test of time and are of an extremely high quality. Not everyone shares your opinion, ever think of that? If you claim to know "smart people, engineers, people who hold serious positions in the bike industry," why don't you give me some names? Because I could sure as hell name a few names of people in the bike industry who swear by King headsets.

 Just a thought but has to be said,if chris king had the design right in the first place why the change ? mr king blame's all other mfrs for an inferior design yet those designs worked without creaking,he also said that the internal headset was inferior but still produces them,mr king is here to make money same as all the others and if he was 100% behind his own products he wouldn't in all honesty change the design.

I have in all honesty nothing against king,what i am against is over hyped crap from people who have ridden one product from one mfr and claim it's the be all and end all and will defend it's honor no matter what,the design change shows that his o-ring design was flawed like it or lump it.

 Marquis, King still does not make an internal headset. They make the InSet, which is basically a low-stack regular headset, much like the Cane Creek XXCii Flush.

 i guess the other thing i'm considering is that our riding generally abusive environment, and that you can't disagree upon, may lead to a higher failure rate.
and i'm very willing to admit that they may work fine in other places, under other situations. as i know other respectable people who feel like chris king headsets work fine enough

the point i've always tried to make is.
chris king headsets have a loose fit on the steerer tube meaning there is play, and can mean there is creaking, they try to take up this play with a rubber o-ring and a plastic shim. this can work, but is not incredibly likely to work forever. and in adverse conditions, such as abusive riding, will not hold up without creaking.
the play, that everyone must agree is there. does lead to a worn groove in the steerer tube, especially carbon ones. this definitely leads to a stress riser and a likely place for the steerer to break. you certainly can't say this is a good thing can you seraph?

can you just not agree that a headset with a compression ring clamp on the steerer tube is a more solid situation?
it would seem that chris king has, as he has finally made the upgrade

 seraph, that was my respectful response to yours here's the other one you are clearly fucking stupid i'd love to see you try to dispute my respectful response. but you can't. because they're clear facts, that even chris king would no longer dispute. but we've proven you're stupid, because you're still standing up for a product that even chris king doesn't, so you probably will lets hear it

 Fairly sure cane creek had a patent on the split wedge, which has just gone out of date?

Shame they're still ridiculously expensive

 I've got a CK headset thats been on 3 bikes (two of which I replaced as I broke the frames crashing) and has seen 4 winters of very regular welsh riding. What have I done to it?

Nothing.

I don't think that makes it expensive at all when you spread the cost over the amount of time you'll have it for and how little you'll have to do to maintain it.

 buy cheap, buy twice. chris king headset works out to be cheaper in the long run

 I just can't afford that much in one lump, if I could do it so the payments were spread around I would buy one now, being poor sucks

 i know how you mean, if i could afford it id have one, but with no money around these days its just a new fsa pig everyonce in a while.

 HOLY SH!T is right. FINALLY! I have been bitching about this for years. Every dh/fr bike I have ever owned and put a chris king on always felt like the fork was loose even when it was waaay past tight. Some were better than others, but in the end the problem was always there.

 I've snapped eight sets of bars and a stem, crack headsets on mtb, i ride bmx now and stuff tends to bend not snap, but seriously run a £10 headset and save fort a king, lasts the lifetime off multiple rigs.

 I get how you can snap bars, but how the hell do you snap/break a 50mm or less long stem ??

 my bars hit a tree at about 20mph and didnt snap so you have to do something pretty bad to snap them..

 I was going around 25 mph on some flowy downhill stuff and then suddenly there was a tree! I was like holy shit how did I not see that I gotta start braking! BAM! hit it and did the hardest bar hump ever, owies and my stem was still intact so you must be a retard to snap a short stem

 @ oli, I in fact HAVE snapped a bar.. mind u it was a cheap one but none the less id rather pay more and not almost die again...

 Oli in a way I agree with you but in another sense for all of us weight wenies we want lighter parts, which is why so much designing goes into it, chris king makes one of the lightest headsets, and bars will snap/bend if you hit a tree because of going down the hill gravity is still pulling you hence you keep going in the forward motion if you hit a tree.

 lmao naw i just over shot and landed to flat ive never seen snapped bars from trees raping bikes

 i've gone through 2 sets of bars; 1 on a fairly big and sketchy drop that i took as a bet for 2 dollars and the other one was, well, long story short, well you know heli pilots they... lol jk nah, the other one was on a bike that was good for 1 huck. crappy tire

 lmao that sounds like it was some what fun on the second one

 @OilScale: I snapped a handle bar numbers of years back and was an inch from dying. The handle bar snapped on a landing and my body buckled to the side of the broken bar, with my neck flying past the remaining super sharp shard on the broken bar on the bike. 1 more inch to one side and i would have ripped my neck apart and probably have been toast. This is me after the crash www.pinkbike.com/photo/110

So yeah, why make things stronger? So people dont die. One in a million may sound like good odds, until that one is you. Keep evolving and make things stronger so you are safer and can go bigger.

 to the people saying that their CK has been on a bunch of bikes without issue... So have ALL of my Cane Creeks... Cane Creek warranty murders Chris King's too!

The patent is cane creek's (though, that may be true about the patent expiring) but They should have used the design from the beginning. I had a CK headset, it was awesome until i started to really put it through some abuse...

 a 10 year warranty for a headset is basically all you need (ck). by 10 years you will probably have a new bike anyway.

 yes but i have heard on many occasions king doesnt always honour the warranty...

 well that sucks. cant argue there

 Yup, buddy of mine bought one and about 2 months later the rotor mounts had hairline cracks in them, CK was f*cking useless for a warranty! so that was... 'bout $600 down the drain?

Don't even try to say overtorqued rotor bolts... Snap-On torque wrench doesn't lie!

 I snapped my bar in a bunny.

 ok yeah fair enough, its just i had never heard of it happening before

 @ infiltrator:

WTF are you talking about "FINALLY" they've BEEN a viable entity to DH bikes ever since they first offered their 10 year warrenty, let alone the Steel-Set, and the 1.5"!

 umm... the whole o-ring system and it's issues? It doesn't hold up to any real abuse
Maybe you never had them, but i did.

Now that they've implemented the split ring, that issue shouldn't exist anymore.

 BTW their 1.5 headset is one of the heaviest and has the tallest stack height of all the 1.5" headsets I could find/would want to put on my bike. So tall that I couldn't run my boxxer with a devo kit, even with the drop crown. Got a Cane Creek double xc flush fit and cut the weight way down and dropped my bars a ton. Really, I don't need bearings that are held to 0.0005" of run out and need very specific press fits and $400 worth of shop tools to install properly to maintain warranty. I like the king stuff and all, but I think that there are other components that are better suited for DH and FR use.

 Alls I'll say is when you've broken all the frames, forks and other stuff I have, then a 10 yr warrenty is extremely valuable on any part...

 hmm cane creek offers a 100,and 110 year warranty on their higher end head sets?

 yup, but the main difference is that Cane Creek will actually honor the warranty!

 ive already stated that like 4 times

 And yet the Chris King fanboys still don't get it

 they never will, any one who is a fan boy is from when it was king or nothing for high end head sets, if king were to drop some weight, drop their price, and just be logical and honor warranty i would buy one, untill then ill run my pig or a CC

 too expensive if you ask me, there is other stuff out there i would rather buy than these for way less, for dh its understandable to get good hubs but for dj it dosnt matter as long as they spin

 on the contrary many of us djers want NICE stuff may be your opinion but personaly i could go for a king hub if i could, but i would get a hadley if i were going to buy a high end hub

 we all want nice stuff, but im not gonna go drop a ton on a hub when i can get a decent ns hub for like 120 bucks

 for me i like the option to switch from geared and back, plus i just dont like NS? (my opinion) just like i settled for a hope proII ss, next bike i plan to either use a hadley or a I-9.

 if i had the money i would definatley go for one of those, but how cant you like ns? in my opinion some of the nicest parts on the market right now and my bro has never had a problem with any of his( i dont own any ns stuff i just ride his) so iv got nothign against them

 how cant i like NS? i just dont? too many people around me are NS whores and i dont like having the same shit as every one else, ad in that their front hubs arent convertible between 15/20mm for any one who runs a 831/float32/or f. serries fork your shit outa luck.


ad in i value engagement very highly and want more than just 30 POI

 Easy, you have a stem to lock it into place. The center bolt is for initial setup only and is useless once the stem is installed. No what I mean?

 If that's the case then it is like every other stem. I thought he was talking about something unique.

 A lot of frames are adopting the 12x142 axle size (Syntace X12 open patent), among them the new Trek AM/FR bikes.