R&D

peter.kidwell said:

What are the R&D departments working on ? are we going to see for example
more Hub gears, 10 sp must be the limit for deraillier and chain line.
Weight cannot get much lower for frame or components.I suppose suspension
can develope.

Shimano have a patent for a 14 speed cassette.

I'd quite like tubeless tyres for the road if this meant they could
safely be fitted with tools. I've had enough of trying to squeeze
too-tight new tyres over the rim by hand.

"peter.kidwell" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

What are the R&D departments working on ? are we going to see for example
more Hub gears, 10 sp must be the limit for deraillier and chain line.
Weight cannot get much lower for frame or components.I suppose suspension
can develope.

PK

Says who? Shimano has already patented 14-cog gear clusters, and you
can buy a 14-speed internal hub from Rohloff right now. IMO, the only
thing "better" would be a continously variable transmission- and Jobst
has some very good arguements against it:
http://www.sheldonbrown.com/brandt/continuous.html .

IMO, bicycle "technology" peaked in the 1890's- you'll find that most
every supposed modern "improvement" was invented by then, and since
then it's been nothing but a case of steady refinement.

As to bike "R&D"- the vast majority of it is devoted to smaller and
smaller improvements in racing bicycles, some of which benefit
"average" cyclists, most of which does not. It becomes available to
the general public because it is what sells- never mind that racing
technology tends not to be beneficial (and many times is detrimental)
to the average cyclist.

IMO, it's far better to devote efforts to getting *more* people on
*more* bicycles in *more* places. But that's not engineering, that's
politics.

Jeff

In article <[email hidden]>,

peter.kidwell said:

What are the R&D departments working on ? are we going to see for example
more Hub gears, 10 sp must be the limit for deraillier and chain line.
Weight cannot get much lower for frame or components.I suppose suspension
can develope.

PK

An interesting question!

As always, racing considerations will drive a lot of road-bike
development, for better or worse. Even though many peloton bikes have
already hit the UCI limit, the quest for lighter-stiffer-stronger
continues apace in all bike components. The method to this madness is
that as components without a aerodynamic considerations get lighter, you
can make a bike on the weight limit more aerodynamic. Traditionally,
most aero bikes have been heavier in order to present a friendlier face
to the wind; soon you may see climbing bikes running deep-section rims;
why not if you can hit the weight limits regardless?

Mechanically, the two-piece crank/BB seems to be a keeper. Several
makers (Race Face, FSA) have come out with imitations of the Hollowtech
II design (which itself is an imitation of the Bullseye BMX crank/BB). I
think there may be some efforts put into making this part of the frame
stiffer, too.

Materials-wise, carbon fibre has infected road bikes like leprosy: it
started at the peripheries (forks, rear triangles, seatposts, wheels)
and has perniciously moved inward. Most major bike makers now offer a
mostly or fully carbon fibre bike (even Cannondale, arguably more
associated with aluminum bikes than any other maker, has carbon fibre
tubing allied to an Al rear triangle and "lugs" in its top road bike).
the consensus seems to be that carbon fibre is the best way to make a
really light frame, and its cost keeps dropping as production becomes
more commodified. It's pretty clear there's a lot of capacity in Taiwan
for making carbon fibre parts, now.

Jobst says the next major road bike interface that needs redesigning
(possibly the last? He's already happy with threadless stems and
cautiously optimistic about Hollowtech II-type crank/BBs) is the
pedal-crank joint. He has engineered (and implemented on his own bike) a
redesign using a conical interface between the pedal and the crank,
using a split washer to take up the space. It prevents fretting, which
wears the crank and is a major cause of crank failures at the pedal eye.
But the change Jobst has created has not yet been implemented. Unless
he's gone and patented the design, there might be a boutique market for
some machinist to advertise and sell this modification. In production, I
don't imagine it would be very expensive at all, and while it would
require a modified crank, it would be compatible with virtually all
current pedals.

There are lots of experiments involving tubeless road tires right now.
Shimano has already shown a set of road wheels for tubeless tires, even
though I know of no tire-maker actually selling them yet (they are being
tested in racing teams).

Maybe I should say where there will be no changes: wheel bearings,
spokes, rims, brakes, stems, forks, seatposts, seats, pedals, and frame
shapes will not undergo useful changes, though you may see more
deep-section rims as they get lighter and can be used to make up the
weight on bikes that flirt with UCI weight minimums. Having said that,
the hottest new clipless pedal idea (the Crank Bros. Egg Beater) was
invented only a few years ago, and has taken parts of the bike world by
storm (mountain bikers love 'em for their easy entry and mud-shedding).

Drivetrains are already so closely spaced that I have no expectation
racers will cleave to 11+ speed drivetrains anytime soon. It's easier to
add a third ring. I expect no other changes to racing drivetrains,
though Campy is testing an electronic-shifting system, akin to the
ill-fated Mavic Mektronic and Zap experiments.

On the mountain side, I see many more experiments in suspension design
in the future. Designers continue to push up against the fact that no
rear suspension has proven light or efficient enough to make XC racers
give up hardtails at all venues, though some do so by contract. It's an
immature field, though the recent entry of Ohlins as a design contractor
for Rock Shox (now part of SRAM) is interesting. There may still be some
room in mountain biking for an interesting new frame shape if combined
with the right suspension design, but the cynic in me notes that the
Klein Mantra is now a discontinued curiosity:

http://www.mbaction.com/detail.asp?id=187

Unified rear triangle designs (bottom bracket is unsprung weight) turned
out to have some odd pedaling characteristics, commonly derided as
"monkey-motion."

Klein continues to experiment while the rest of the bike industry is
optimizing variations on the four-bar linkage and adding "stable
platform" suspensions to everything:

http://kleinbikes.com/us/mountain_bikes/palomino/palomino_xv_disc/index.h
tml

That said, I expect no really exciting road bike innovations in the next
few years. I would say the last really exciting change was integrated
shifting, which I am partial to and which is quite useful in certain
racing situations. It is hardly necessary for most cycling: I commute on
a roughly 25-year old Bianchi with friction shifters. I have modified it
from period spec with a dual-pivot front brake and a 6v Hyperglide
freewheel (for my-other-wheel-is-in-the-shop reasons, it's using my race
wheel, which has an 8v cassette freehub at the moment).

--
Ryan Cousineau, [email hidden] http://www.wiredcola.com
Verus de parvis; verus de magnis.

Ryan Cousineau said:

Jobst says the next major [bicycle] interface that needs redesigning
(possibly the last? He's already happy with threadless stems and
cautiously optimistic about Hollowtech II-type crank/BBs) is the
pedal-crank joint. He has engineered (and implemented on his own
bike) a redesign using a conical interface between the pedal and the
crank, using a split washer to take up the space. It prevents
fretting, which wears the crank and is a major cause of crank
failures at the pedal eye. But the change Jobst has created has not
yet been implemented. Unless he's gone and patented the design,
there might be a boutique market for some machinist to advertise and
sell this modification. In production, I don't imagine it would be
very expensive at all, and while it would require a modified crank,
it would be compatible with virtually all current pedals.

That won't be possible because my modification was adapted to a
specific pedal shaft whose thread relief happened to be cylindrical
and could accept a custom made conical (split) ring. This will not be
possible as a product because thread reliefs are not sufficiently
uniform in length or diameter. The conical collet must fit fairly
accurately to work. It requires a design change to pedal shafts.

Quoted message said:

There are lots of experiments involving tubeless road tires right
now. Shimano has already shown a set of road wheels for tubeless
tires, even though I know of no tire-maker actually selling them yet
(they are being tested in racing teams).

This is not a step forward because patching such tires is more
difficult than tube tires. The impetus comes from MTB's and snake
bite flats. It ignores flats from intrusions (thorns, nails, glass).

Jobst Brandt
[email hidden]

On Sat, 06 Nov 2004 20:07:08 -0800, Ryan Cousineau
<[email hidden]> wrote:

[snip]

Quoted message said:

Jobst says the next major road bike interface that needs redesigning
(possibly the last? He's already happy with threadless stems and
cautiously optimistic about Hollowtech II-type crank/BBs) is the
pedal-crank joint. He has engineered (and implemented on his own bike) a
redesign using a conical interface between the pedal and the crank,
using a split washer to take up the space. It prevents fretting, which
wears the crank and is a major cause of crank failures at the pedal eye.
But the change Jobst has created has not yet been implemented. Unless
he's gone and patented the design, there might be a boutique market for
some machinist to advertise and sell this modification. In production, I
don't imagine it would be very expensive at all, and while it would
require a modified crank, it would be compatible with virtually all
current pedals.

[snip]

Dear Ryan,

Has anyone else tried Jobst's conical washer modification?

Carl Fogel

Ryan Cousineau said:

As always, racing considerations will drive a lot of road-bike
development, for better or worse.

Probably some of both.

Quoted message said:

Mechanically, the two-piece crank/BB seems to be a keeper.

Yuck. IMHO o' course!

<snip>

Quoted message said:

Maybe I should say where there will be no changes: wheel bearings,
spokes, rims, brakes, stems, forks, seatposts, seats, pedals, and
frame shapes will not undergo useful changes,

"Useful changes" is the key phrase. We will continue to see all sorts
of silly changes as the continuing experiment of supply side tries to
find answers to questions no one is asking. And we'll continue to see
rehashes of old technology such as clamp-on stems and compact cranks
(both used in the 1940s by French constructeurs), which may offer
varying degrees of benefit.

What we may see as a useful change is a move away from selling the
bike racing fantasy instead of selling bikes that are actually
suitable for normal people to ride. Positioned as an extreme sport,
bicycling is losing out on sales to people who are not extreme- about
98% of the country. So light bikes with room for fat tires and maybe
fenders, with the bars up about level with the saddle, wide range
gearing, functional integrated lighting systems, etc. which are not
cheesy "comfort bikes" but are actually high-quality rideable bikes.

On the extreme end, with the rising popularity of brevets and
randonneur type riding, we may see someone other than boutique
builders catering to this market as well as the "light touring"
market. Specialized, for example, has made some attempt at this.

Quoted message said:

Drivetrains are already so closely spaced that I have no expectation
racers will cleave to 11+ speed drivetrains anytime soon. It's
easier to add a third ring. I expect no other changes to racing
drivetrains, though Campy is testing an electronic-shifting system,
akin to the ill-fated Mavic Mektronic and Zap experiments.

Hub gears seem to be having an increasing presence.

<snip>

Quoted message said:

That said, I expect no really exciting road bike innovations in the
next few years. I would say the last really exciting change was
integrated shifting, which I am partial to and which is quite useful
in certain racing situations. It is hardly necessary for most
cycling: <snip>

Integrated shifting and clipless pedals were the last big innovation
in terms of the rider interface and the rider's direct experience of
cycling. Saddles remain problematic for many people.

Something I'd really like to see is the development of actual taste in
cycling clothing. I don't want to wear logos except of my club, and
not even those most of the time. I want shoes that don't look like
weird bowling shoes or lightweight hiking boots. I want less Lycra,
especially Lycra gloves- yuck. Functional sunglasses that don't make
one look like an Alien Bug from Planet Zlotron fighting against
Spaceman Spiff. The aesthetic dimensions of cycling are currently
about as tasteful as fat guys in Hawaiian shirts, black socks, sandals
and a combover.

"peter.kidwell" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

What are the R&D departments working on ? are we going to see for example
more Hub gears, 10 sp must be the limit for deraillier and chain line.
Weight cannot get much lower for frame or components.I suppose suspension
can develope.

PK

Not with Sheldons' Nanodrive:-)

I reciently saw an old "Munsters" show where Grampa invented a device
to transmit electricity through the air. Now if that could be done it
would eliminate the need for an electric generator at the bottom
bracket, which would go a long way toward an elctric infinately
variable drive.
Don't laugh, who knows what amazing breakthroughs may happen in the
comming years, John

In article <[email hidden]>,

Quoted message said:

Ryan Cousineau said:

Jobst says the next major [bicycle] interface that needs redesigning
(possibly the last? He's already happy with threadless stems and
cautiously optimistic about Hollowtech II-type crank/BBs) is the
pedal-crank joint. He has engineered (and implemented on his own
bike) a redesign using a conical interface between the pedal and the
crank, using a split washer to take up the space. It prevents
fretting, which wears the crank and is a major cause of crank
failures at the pedal eye. But the change Jobst has created has not
yet been implemented. Unless he's gone and patented the design,
there might be a boutique market for some machinist to advertise and
sell this modification. In production, I don't imagine it would be
very expensive at all, and while it would require a modified crank,
it would be compatible with virtually all current pedals.

That won't be possible because my modification was adapted to a
specific pedal shaft whose thread relief happened to be cylindrical
and could accept a custom made conical (split) ring. This will not be
possible as a product because thread reliefs are not sufficiently
uniform in length or diameter. The conical collet must fit fairly
accurately to work. It requires a design change to pedal shafts.

Well, that sucks. But I sense an opportunity! Since there is no sizing
in bicycle cleats, why not design an integrated crank/BB/pedal spindle?
You could use press-fit or some other appropriate semi-permanent
attachment. I am only sort of joking.

More seriously, offering crank/BB/pedal kits for a few of the most
popular pedal styles (say, a Look kit, an SPD kit, a Crank Bros kit, and
an SPD-SL kit) would probably cover the majority of the market, and
might still be commercially viable (you would only have to tool up three
or so designs to start marketing the idea, and you could expand into as
many pedal designs as made sense if the system proved popular.

Furthermore, and correct me if I'm wrong, it would be possible for pedal
makers to start offering pedals that were compatible with a standard
machined conical crank recess, but that came with a washer to retrofit
them to conventional cranks. This would require buy-in by the pedal
makers, but not at the expense of abandoning their current market..

I may be missing something, but the details of this problem seem to be
more marketing-oriented (mostly around the plan to produce an initially
backward-compatible system so that consumers do not feel in danger of
being orphaned, but without inducing fatal design compromises) than
design-oriented, and probably solvable.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

There are lots of experiments involving tubeless road tires right
now. Shimano has already shown a set of road wheels for tubeless
tires, even though I know of no tire-maker actually selling them yet
(they are being tested in racing teams).

This is not a step forward because patching such tires is more
difficult than tube tires. The impetus comes from MTB's and snake
bite flats. It ignores flats from intrusions (thorns, nails, glass).

What is the added difficulty of patching these tires? From my
motorcycling days, I remember patching tubeless tires from the outside
with a tool like a crochet hook and a plug of rubber, but won't a
conventional patch (or something similar) applied to the inside of the
tire carcass work as well?

In practice, MTBers running tubeless may use tire slime to give a
measure of puncture proofing, and most carry a conventional tube as a
field fix for a flat.

--
Ryan Cousineau, [email hidden] http://www.wiredcola.com
Verus de parvis; verus de magnis.

In article <[email hidden]>,

(John McGraw) said:

"peter.kidwell" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

What are the R&D departments working on ? are we going to see for example
more Hub gears, 10 sp must be the limit for deraillier and chain line.
Weight cannot get much lower for frame or components.I suppose suspension
can develope.

PK

Not with Sheldons' Nanodrive:-)

I reciently saw an old "Munsters" show where Grampa invented a device
to transmit electricity through the air. Now if that could be done it
would eliminate the need for an electric generator at the bottom
bracket, which would go a long way toward an elctric infinately
variable drive.
Don't laugh, who knows what amazing breakthroughs may happen in the
comming years, John

Yes, if only there was a conduction path between the BB and the rest of
the bicycle...some suitable, conductive material, like aluminum, or
carbon fibre, or even steel might do in a pinch...

There are already devices for transmitting electricity through the air.
Common examples: lighting, tasers, experimental taser-type systems with
ionizing lasers that create an amenable air-path between the target and
the taser moments before the electricity is sent out.

The limitation to electric drives in this application is efficiency. You
could do it right now, but it would be so inefficient compared to chain
drive it would feel like you were pedaling in pudding.

diesel electric hybrid trains use drive systems such as you suggest, but
their loads are so great that power transmission between the
not-sufficiently-variable-speed diesel engine and the wheels is more
constrained by transmission durability than efficiency. Jobst is a great
fan of train engine engineering (the design and implementation of the
trains; I don't know if he's a fan of the people who drive the trains or
not), and may well weigh in on this.

--
Ryan Cousineau, [email hidden] http://www.wiredcola.com
Verus de parvis; verus de magnis.

"Ryan Cousineau" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

In article <[email hidden]>,

peter.kidwell said:

What are the R&D departments working on ? are we going to see for example
more Hub gears, 10 sp must be the limit for deraillier and chain line.
Weight cannot get much lower for frame or components.I suppose suspension
can develope.

PK

An interesting question!

As always, racing considerations will drive a lot of road-bike
development, for better or worse. Even though many peloton bikes have
already hit the UCI limit, the quest for lighter-stiffer-stronger
continues apace in all bike components. The method to this madness is
that as components without a aerodynamic considerations get lighter, you
can make a bike on the weight limit more aerodynamic. Traditionally,
most aero bikes have been heavier in order to present a friendlier face
to the wind; soon you may see climbing bikes running deep-section rims;
why not if you can hit the weight limits regardless?

Mechanically, the two-piece crank/BB seems to be a keeper. Several
makers (Race Face, FSA) have come out with imitations of the Hollowtech
II design (which itself is an imitation of the Bullseye BMX crank/BB). I
think there may be some efforts put into making this part of the frame
stiffer, too.

I think this is a great bit of kit , the only but is the life of the
bearing/cups ie proportional to the size of the balls .

Quoted message said:

Materials-wise, carbon fibre has infected road bikes like leprosy: it
started at the peripheries (forks, rear triangles, seatposts, wheels)
and has perniciously moved inward. Most major bike makers now offer a
mostly or fully carbon fibre bike (even Cannondale, arguably more
associated with aluminum bikes than any other maker, has carbon fibre
tubing allied to an Al rear triangle and "lugs" in its top road bike).
the consensus seems to be that carbon fibre is the best way to make a
really light frame, and its cost keeps dropping as production becomes
more commodified. It's pretty clear there's a lot of capacity in Taiwan
for making carbon fibre parts, now.

Jobst says the next major road bike interface that needs redesigning
(possibly the last? He's already happy with threadless stems and
cautiously optimistic about Hollowtech II-type crank/BBs) is the
pedal-crank joint. He has engineered (and implemented on his own bike) a
redesign using a conical interface between the pedal and the crank,
using a split washer to take up the space. It prevents fretting, which
wears the crank and is a major cause of crank failures at the pedal eye.
But the change Jobst has created has not yet been implemented. Unless
he's gone and patented the design, there might be a boutique market for
some machinist to advertise and sell this modification. In production, I
don't imagine it would be very expensive at all, and while it would
require a modified crank, it would be compatible with virtually all
current pedals.

The New patented pedal from the Pasadena Bicycle Manufacturing Company , a
Side Mount Pedal system looks simple and effective

Quoted message said:

There are lots of experiments involving tubeless road tires right now.
Shimano has already shown a set of road wheels for tubeless tires, even
though I know of no tire-maker actually selling them yet (they are being
tested in racing teams).

Maybe I should say where there will be no changes: wheel bearings,
spokes, rims, brakes, stems, forks, seatposts, seats, pedals, and frame
shapes will not undergo useful changes, though you may see more
deep-section rims as they get lighter and can be used to make up the
weight on bikes that flirt with UCI weight minimums. Having said that,
the hottest new clipless pedal idea (the Crank Bros. Egg Beater) was
invented only a few years ago, and has taken parts of the bike world by
storm (mountain bikers love 'em for their easy entry and mud-shedding).

Drivetrains are already so closely spaced that I have no expectation
racers will cleave to 11+ speed drivetrains anytime soon. It's easier to
add a third ring. I expect no other changes to racing drivetrains,
though Campy is testing an electronic-shifting system, akin to the
ill-fated Mavic Mektronic and Zap experiments.

I have a 1921 Golden Sunbeam on it's original chain wheel ,chain & sprocket
all running in the little oil bath .
I recently did a 100 mile run on this bike.
Maybe some modern form of drive trian protection could be on the way ?

Quoted message said:

On the mountain side, I see many more experiments in suspension design
in the future. Designers continue to push up against the fact that no
rear suspension has proven light or efficient enough to make XC racers
give up hardtails at all venues, though some do so by contract. It's an
immature field, though the recent entry of Ohlins as a design contractor
for Rock Shox (now part of SRAM) is interesting. There may still be some
room in mountain biking for an interesting new frame shape if combined
with the right suspension design, but the cynic in me notes that the
Klein Mantra is now a discontinued curiosity:

http://www.mbaction.com/detail.asp?id=187

Unified rear triangle designs (bottom bracket is unsprung weight) turned
out to have some odd pedaling characteristics, commonly derided as
"monkey-motion."

Klein continues to experiment while the rest of the bike industry is
optimizing variations on the four-bar linkage and adding "stable
platform" suspensions to everything:

http://kleinbikes.com/us/mountain_bikes/palomino/palomino_xv_disc/index.h
tml

That said, I expect no really exciting road bike innovations in the next
few years. I would say the last really exciting change was integrated
shifting, which I am partial to and which is quite useful in certain
racing situations. It is hardly necessary for most cycling: I commute on
a roughly 25-year old Bianchi with friction shifters. I have modified it
from period spec with a dual-pivot front brake and a 6v Hyperglide
freewheel (for my-other-wheel-is-in-the-shop reasons, it's using my race
wheel, which has an 8v cassette freehub at the moment).

--

What does The v as in 8v and 6v mean -- sprockets ?

PK

peter.kidwell said:

...
What does The v as in 8v and 6v mean -- sprockets ?

PK

velocità? (=speed)

"Francesco Devittori" <frenkatfrenkdtcm> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

peter.kidwell said:

...
What does The v as in 8v and 6v mean -- sprockets ?

PK

velocità? (=speed)

If you followed the thread the question is refering to Tim Mc Namara email
and he isn't meaning velocity.
Pk

"peter.kidwell" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

"Francesco Devittori" <frenkatfrenkdtcm> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

peter.kidwell said:

...
What does The v as in 8v and 6v mean -- sprockets ?

PK

velocità? (=speed)

If you followed the thread the question is refering to Tim Mc Namara
email and he isn't meaning velocity.
Pk
I should have typed Ryan Consineau post

peter.kidwell said:

"Francesco Devittori" <frenkatfrenkdtcm> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

peter.kidwell said:

...
What does The v as in 8v and 6v mean -- sprockets ?

PK

velocità? (=speed)

If you followed the thread the question is refering to Tim Mc Namara email
and he isn't meaning velocity.
Pk

I read
----------------------------------------------------------------

Quoted message said:

...and a 6v Hyperglide freewheel (for my-other-wheel-is-in-the
-shop reasons, it's using my race wheel, which has an 8v
cassette freehub at the moment).
--

What does The v as in 8v and 6v mean -- sprockets ?
-----------------------------------------------------------------

I understand that 8v cassette freehub is an 8 sprocket (= 8 speed = 8
velocità) cassette.
I could be completely wrong but I don't see why

Zog-<< I'd quite like tubeless tyres for the road if this meant they could
safely be fitted with tools. I've had enough of trying to squeeze
too-tight new tyres over the rim by hand. >><BR><BR>

Don't expect a tubeless road tire, designed to stay on with 100psi+, to be easy
to get on.

Tubeless road tires..what a stoopid idea.

Peter Chisholm
Vecchio's Bicicletteria
1833 Pearl St.
Boulder, CO, 80302
(303)440-3535
http://www.vecchios.com
"Ruote convenzionali costruite eccezionalmente bene"

Jeff-<< IMO, it's far better to devote efforts to getting *more* people on
*more* bicycles in *more* places. But that's not engineering, that's
politics. >><BR><BR>

Agree completely. NOTHING being introduced now puts a non rider onto a bicycle
and keeps them there. The bicycle biz is aimed at those that already ride, not
those that don't.

I think a combination of scarce(and expensive) gas plus a concerted effort to
make riding safer on the majority of steets, via bike lanes, will be the only
thing that makes the 'bike boys' design and sell bicycles. In the US, the
bicycle is still a toy, a leisure time activity, not a 'vehicle'.

Peter Chisholm
Vecchio's Bicicletteria
1833 Pearl St.
Boulder, CO, 80302
(303)440-3535
http://www.vecchios.com
"Ruote convenzionali costruite eccezionalmente bene"

Ryan Cousineau said:

In article <[email hidden]>,

Quoted message said:

Ryan Cousineau said:

Jobst says the next major [bicycle] interface that needs redesigning
(possibly the last? He's already happy with threadless stems and
cautiously optimistic about Hollowtech II-type crank/BBs) is the
pedal-crank joint. He has engineered (and implemented on his own
bike) a redesign using a conical interface between the pedal and the
crank, using a split washer to take up the space. It prevents
fretting, which wears the crank and is a major cause of crank
failures at the pedal eye. But the change Jobst has created has not
yet been implemented. Unless he's gone and patented the design,
there might be a boutique market for some machinist to advertise and
sell this modification. In production, I don't imagine it would be
very expensive at all, and while it would require a modified crank,
it would be compatible with virtually all current pedals.

That won't be possible because my modification was adapted to a
specific pedal shaft whose thread relief happened to be cylindrical
and could accept a custom made conical (split) ring. This will not be
possible as a product because thread reliefs are not sufficiently
uniform in length or diameter. The conical collet must fit fairly
accurately to work. It requires a design change to pedal shafts.

Well, that sucks. But I sense an opportunity! Since there is no sizing
in bicycle cleats, why not design an integrated crank/BB/pedal spindle?
You could use press-fit or some other appropriate semi-permanent
attachment. I am only sort of joking.

More seriously, offering crank/BB/pedal kits for a few of the most
popular pedal styles (say, a Look kit, an SPD kit, a Crank Bros kit, and
an SPD-SL kit) would probably cover the majority of the market, and
might still be commercially viable (you would only have to tool up three
or so designs to start marketing the idea, and you could expand into as
many pedal designs as made sense if the system proved popular.

Furthermore, and correct me if I'm wrong, it would be possible for pedal
makers to start offering pedals that were compatible with a standard
machined conical crank recess, but that came with a washer to retrofit
them to conventional cranks. This would require buy-in by the pedal
makers, but not at the expense of abandoning their current market..

I may be missing something, but the details of this problem seem to be
more marketing-oriented (mostly around the plan to produce an initially
backward-compatible system so that consumers do not feel in danger of
being orphaned, but without inducing fatal design compromises) than
design-oriented, and probably solvable.

there's nothing grossly wrong with the current system. sure, some
cranks have failed at the pedal eye, but others fail at the spider or
elsewhere on the arm. if every single crank always failed at the eye,
/then/ it would be a design issue.

similarly, there's not a hard & fast rule about fretting being the cause
of eye fatigue. the orientation of the shoulder caused by any fretting
is not a stress riser in the orientation of maximum stress. sure, pedal
eyes may have fatigue appear to come from an area that's been fretted,
but that's not a definitive analysis of cause & effect.

as for "alternative" design options, why not consider a tapered thread?
these are used in fatigue applications because [if executed right] all
the threads get loaded, not just the first 3, and where a close seal is
important, which addresses some of the fretting issues, such as they may be.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

There are lots of experiments involving tubeless road tires right
now. Shimano has already shown a set of road wheels for tubeless
tires, even though I know of no tire-maker actually selling them yet
(they are being tested in racing teams).

This is not a step forward because patching such tires is more
difficult than tube tires. The impetus comes from MTB's and snake
bite flats. It ignores flats from intrusions (thorns, nails, glass).

What is the added difficulty of patching these tires? From my
motorcycling days, I remember patching tubeless tires from the outside
with a tool like a crochet hook and a plug of rubber, but won't a
conventional patch (or something similar) applied to the inside of the
tire carcass work as well?

In practice, MTBers running tubeless may use tire slime to give a
measure of puncture proofing, and most carry a conventional tube as a
field fix for a flat.

In article <[email hidden]>,

jim beam said:

Ryan Cousineau said:

In article <[email hidden]>,

Quoted message said:

Ryan Cousineau <[email hidden]> writes:

>Jobst says the next major [bicycle] interface that needs redesigning
>(possibly the last? He's already happy with threadless stems and
>cautiously optimistic about Hollowtech II-type crank/BBs) is the
>pedal-crank joint. He has engineered (and implemented on his own
>bike) a redesign using a conical interface between the pedal and the
>crank, using a split washer to take up the space. It prevents
>fretting, which wears the crank and is a major cause of crank
>failures at the pedal eye. But the change Jobst has created has not
>yet been implemented. Unless he's gone and patented the design,
>there might be a boutique market for some machinist to advertise and
>sell this modification. In production, I don't imagine it would be
>very expensive at all, and while it would require a modified crank,
>it would be compatible with virtually all current pedals.

That won't be possible because my modification was adapted to a
specific pedal shaft whose thread relief happened to be cylindrical
and could accept a custom made conical (split) ring. This will not be
possible as a product because thread reliefs are not sufficiently
uniform in length or diameter. The conical collet must fit fairly
accurately to work. It requires a design change to pedal shafts.

Quoted message said:

there's nothing grossly wrong with the current system. sure, some
cranks have failed at the pedal eye, but others fail at the spider or
elsewhere on the arm. if every single crank always failed at the eye,
/then/ it would be a design issue.

similarly, there's not a hard & fast rule about fretting being the cause
of eye fatigue. the orientation of the shoulder caused by any fretting
is not a stress riser in the orientation of maximum stress. sure, pedal
eyes may have fatigue appear to come from an area that's been fretted,
but that's not a definitive analysis of cause & effect.

The issue is, as I understand it, that the fret-marks act as fuses
(starting points) for fatigue cracks.

Quoted message said:

as for "alternative" design options, why not consider a tapered thread?
these are used in fatigue applications because [if executed right] all
the threads get loaded, not just the first 3, and where a close seal is
important, which addresses some of the fretting issues, such as they may be.

A conical tapered interface addresses the issue just as well, and is a
lot simpler to manufacture.

All parts of a bicycle are engineered well enough that they work for
most riders most of the time. But in some places, they are only a minor
redesign away from being much better. Hard, long-distance riders
currently consider square-taper cranks a consumable item. There is no
reason they should be so.

--
Ryan Cousineau, [email hidden] http://www.wiredcola.com
Verus de parvis; verus de magnis.

In article <[email hidden]>,

Francesco Devittori frenkatfrenkdtcm said:

peter.kidwell said:

"Francesco Devittori" <frenkatfrenkdtcm> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

peter.kidwell wrote:

>...
>What does The v as in 8v and 6v mean -- sprockets ?
>
>PK

velocità? (=speed)

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

If you followed the thread the question is refering to Tim Mc Namara email
and he isn't meaning velocity.
Pk

Quoted message said:

I read
----------------------------------------------------------------

Quoted message said:

...and a 6v Hyperglide freewheel (for my-other-wheel-is-in-the
-shop reasons, it's using my race wheel, which has an 8v
cassette freehub at the moment).
--

What does The v as in 8v and 6v mean -- sprockets ?
-----------------------------------------------------------------

I understand that 8v cassette freehub is an 8 sprocket (= 8 speed = 8
velocità) cassette.
I could be completely wrong but I don't see why

Francesco has it. I can't cite, but it's a common, pretentious way of
indicating the number of gears at the rear, even in English.

--
Ryan Cousineau, [email hidden] http://www.wiredcola.com
Verus de parvis; verus de magnis.