Scenery/Location Photos
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location721 views
Inside Pinion
n/aXXX is the Pinion service department. If you are selling 10,000 units a year and have one man doing your warranty and repair, it's fair to say that your products are pretty reliable.
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location696 views | 1 faves
Inside Pinion
n/aAll the design for the Pinion gearbox is done here in house and their plans for the future are more than interesting. In the near future they are looking closely at the cranks, hinting that a carbon crank may appear and they believe it can shave as much as 400g from the system. Ask them about the future and they are confident that if you demand, say, a little less than 100,000km from your drivetrain, it is entirely possible to get the weight on a par with a standard drivetrain...
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location525 views | 1 comments
Inside Pinion
n/aInside Pinion
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location638 views | 1 faves
Inside Pinion
n/aOnce you have a gearbox you need to find a way to fit it onto a bicycle. This too took many iterations to perfect - trying to reduce the weight, maintain stiffness and strength in the frame and make life as easy as possible for frame builders.
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location638 views
Inside Pinion
n/aThat said, they have to - the moulds for casting the magnesium casing cost around the half million Euros mark. It is an eye-watering investment for a company the size of Pinion to make, but it also makes a very clear statement about they want to do things - they come from the engineering tradition that spawned Porsche and Mercedes and the idea of doing something by half does not exist in that world.
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location641 views
Inside Pinion
n/aA look inside at the casting shows how much attention has been paid to every detail.
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location606 views
Inside Pinion
n/aThe evolution of the new C1.12 casing.
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location715 views
Inside Pinion
n/aThey did run through a few iterations before they were happy that the design was both as strong and minimal as it possibly coukd be.
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location728 views | 1 comments
Inside Pinion
n/aOnce you have your internal mechanism, you need a box to keep it in. This is the original, 3D-printed casing.
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location1172 views | 1 comments
Inside Pinion
n/aThe inside of the shifter assembly - this is the part of the gearbox that needs the most maintenance, the cables need changing ever so often.
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location697 views
Inside Pinion
n/aYou can use a simple torx key to cycle the cam through its movements to get a better idea of how it moves.
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location777 views | 2 faves
Inside Pinion
n/aOne of the challenges of a gearbox is the amount of torque that goes through it - with a standard chainring that torque is dispersed over a relatively large area that can be relatively inexpensively replaced. In a gearbox the sprockets are far smaller and replacing them is no small job. With a five year warranty and an expected lifespan of well over 100,000km, you end up with this kind of burly sprocket.
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location692 views
Inside Pinion
n/aEach position of the cam pushes forward a different combination of these pawls to lock the desired sprockets in place.
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location1075 views
Inside Pinion
n/aThis should be a test for engineering aptitude. If you can look at this and quickly understand how you would create something like this to drive the cam through those 18 precise combinations, sign up for your engineering degree now. For the rest of us, it is looks deceivingly simple, but to get your head round how you can create all those combinations is mind-bending stuff. Talking to owner, Christoph Lerman, he could see this in his head and it makes instant sense to him.
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location937 views
Inside Pinion
n/aBeneath those sprockets lies this adjustable cam - this is the part the shifter actuates to change your gear and it took a solid half hour of squinting and stupid questions to even start to understand how it works. The shifter moves the cam through 18 unique positions, sequentially, each of which locks one sprocket from each of the two groups to create a gearing combination. This takes you through from the smallest gear up to the largest, engaging different sequences of sprockets to create a very smooth progression through the 18 gears.
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location905 views
Inside Pinion
n/aThis two piece axle allows the groups of sprockets to move independently.
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location820 views | 1 faves
Inside Pinion
n/aThe axle has two separate parts to allow the two groups of sprockets to move independently.
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Denkendorf mattwragg: Inside-Pinion
in: Scenery/Location1167 views | 1 comments | 1 faves
Inside Pinion
n/aThe upper array of sprockets in the gearbox is the critical part of the system and once you start digging into how it all works, it is clear how impressive a feat of engineering it is. This group is made up of two spearate groups - the three sprockets to the left are the equivalent of triple chainrings, so there is a small, medium and large. The second group of six is equivalent of a 6-speed cassette - so between these two groups they combine to offer the18 gears in this gearbox.