Interbike ‘06 Report
Alright, I got off my ass, and I’ve got some sick info flowing from interbike this year. The usual caveats apply: If you want the new popular stuff from the big companies, go elsewhere. I saw it, ask me if you want to know, but I’m posting the coolest stuff I saw there, with a particular emphasis on the little guys and the coolest, most innovative stuff. This year, we’re organizing by company, because that’s how I organized it in my book of notes. If you don’t care to read the descriptions, just check out the gallery Let’s dive in…..
Alright, after my little disclaimer about the big guys, I’m starting off with raceface, a fairly big name. Oh well, sue me. I was infinitely jealous when I saw the blingity-blingity Dues XC polished stem. It would’ve looked sick as opposed to the black one I got for my ruffian. Raceface is also making road cranks and bars this year. Quite frankly, they are a bit heavy, and nothing special. Why are there so many companies out there who think ‘getting into another market’ means just copying. INNOVATE, NOT COPY, that’s how you gain recognition in a new market. Why, raceface, why?
Wowzers. Custom titanium snow bike, dubbed the “snoots”. The thing is a work of art. Everything was thought of on this bike. The coolest feature, in my opinion, was the fact that the fork and frame were both made to be completely sealed except for drain ports at the top and bottom. These drain ports are made so that you can actually carry white gas in the frame and fork. That means less fuel bottles to strap on. What a great idea. The front fork also accomodates rear wheel spacing, so you can actually carry an extra wheel with a freewheel and casette on it instead of using a specific front wheel.
Also of interest at the moots booth was the gorgeous “Uno” singlespeed with the breezer-style sliding dropouts Another cool little touch. I think the actual sliding parts are from paragon machine works, but the frame pieces are custom fabricated.
Salsa link
Nothing to see here, folks…. Just a carbon/scandium 29er called the “Mamsita”, and the beautiful Casseroll, which, besides having a cool name, is a pretty sweet looking cruiser.
Lynskey link
Lynskey is a company that you may not have heard of, and that’s because they’re brand spankin’ new. I was walking by, admiring their paint jobs, and got cornered by a guy with a thick southern accent who was pretty much ready to burst with excitement about showing me his frames. How can you pass that up? Here’s the short version of the story:
Lynskey family starts litespeed; litespeed sold to some big-ass parent company in ‘99; Litespeed becomes a company that is known as a ‘bunch of hillbillies in tennesse who play with titanium’ (at least according to “Larry”:http://www.ckcyles.com); quality of product tanks; Lynskey family decides that’s just about enough of that and takes a couple of their premier Ti builders with them; Lynskey performance cycles is born.
These bikes are beautiful. They are truly ‘fully customized’ They had an entire wall of customized frames. Sorry, I didn’t get any pictures from the show, but I was too precoccupied with how I was going to afford a fully-custom Ti bike… Just check out the site, you’ll be impressed, and then you’ll be broke…. mmmmm…. titanium…..
Crank Brothers link
Alright, this is another raceface incident of somebody needing a good smack in the face. Crank brothers is making bottom brackets and cranks this year. You ready for this: they are making ISIS cranks and bottom brackets. ISIS is dead. Sorry, you missed the boat on that one. The cranks are not particularly light, not particularly innovative, and they use a bottom bracket style that everyone is pulling out of so fast that they couldn’t find anyone’s BB they liked. So, they made their own. Yeah, nice, good going. Oh wait, I’m sorry, maybe the cranks are innovative, I mean they are an aluminum crank arm with a steel cover over them. Yeah, you heard it. What does the steel cover do? Nothing. Maybe somebody forgot to put the logo in the crank forging, so they had to make a cover to put the logo on. Stick to pedals. At least they put a larger cage around the candy’s this year so that you won’t break the cage as easily. Another non-innovative move. Dumb.
If you’re familiar with Princeton Tec at all, you know they make some sweet headlamps. Super waterproof, super-reliable, and a super-warranty. Well, they jumped into the fray of the mountain bike lighting world with an offering of super-high-intensity LED lights. They are offering them in a 1, 2, and 3 LED version. They all get a minimum of 6 hours of burn time (up to 10 with the low power settings), which means the batteries are a bit bulky, but certainly not any more than a niterider. The light is a very nice cool blue, and the 2 and 3 LED versions are BRIGHT. I don’t have an exact measurement of how bright, but I would say the 1 LED was slightly less than my Dinotte, the 2 LED was slightly more (with more spread), and the 3 LED was just about all you could ever want in a night lamp. I won’t try to compare with an HID directly, because I’ve only used one once or twice, but the 3 LED light would be plenty bright enough for tearing down a trail at high speeds at night. It sounded like the prices were pretty reasonable as well, I believe all of them were under 400, which for the 3 LED version would be a steal. Keep your eyes peeled, this is innovation, and if I know those light geeks from princeton, they’re on to something…..
Known for their classic, functional leather saddles, Brooks has upped the ante this year with some jaw-dropping grips. They are a series of leather rings which are held together with 3 shortened spokes and nipples running the length of them to compress them and keep them together. They are all made from the leather scraps from their saddles, and they were all over the show this year on multiple different companies’ bikes. They are a simple, beautiful, functional piece of equipment.
Phil Wood link
Phil was showing off a set of external bearings for x-type style cranks (is that the right name? I guess so…). The big problem with theses types of bb/crank combos right now is that the bearings aren’t replaceable, so when you’re done, you’re stuck. Well, Phil has an answer. Not only is he making some slick external BBs with heavy duty seals, but you can replace the bearings with a couple simple tools (which are basically two blocks of aluminum with some specific sized holes in them) and a vise. Bearings worn? Voila! New bearings in 5 minutes or less.
White industries has some slick new stuff. The first was a set of cranks which can use any combination of two rings. As you can see, the inner ring attaches and centers using five bolts which ride in slots coming out radially from the center of the crank. This means that you could run a 26 with a 48, or a 42 and a 48, or any combination in between. I won’t promise you can shift between the two rings, but that’s not really the point, is it? Options, it’s all about options.
They also had an ENO eccentric hub for singlespeed conversions with a disc brake mount on it. Wouldn’t the brakes be out of alignment? Why yes, they would, however, the hub comes with a disk brake adaptor which has a small eccentric in it so that your brakes rotate with the hub when you tension it. Any bike, any brakes, no chain tensionerm singlespeed. Sick.
Surly link
The unicycles were there again (called the Conundrum), but they also had a pretty sweet bike called the “Big Dummy”. The Big Dummy is a bike which is based on an xtracycle but you don’t need the attachment. The back of the frame is just xtra-long, and it takes all the xtracycle racks and packs. Pretty cool looking, although I think I would rather have a bob trailer….
Shimano (no link 4 you)
Alright, this isn’t really a shimano post, kinda… Basically, shimano is introducing a new set of components called the “alfine” component set. This is made to be a ‘classic’ looking commuter/cruiser set of components. So, to kick this new grouppo off, they had a custom cruiser/townie build contest. Fourteen custom builders entered the contest, and the top three were from ANT (link ), Rock Lobster (link ), and Old Man Mountain Bikes (link ).
Okay, this had to be one of the most unique bikes at the show. The bamboo frames are not new, but one with an Eccentric BB is, and the bars on this fixie? Well, they are bullhorn bars in every sense of the word. This is a unique ride, no doubt. You can order the frame, but they are still trying to come up with a consistant supplier for the bars. I hope they do, they’re freakin’ cool.
Alright, that was just about the longest post I’ve had on here yet. I hope there’s some useful info in there, and if anyone has any specific questions about something I may have seen at the show, definitely drop a comment and I’ll see what I can do. I walked every single booth at the show (didn’t stay long at some of them), but I tried to at least see what was out there, so let me know. Also, make sure to check out the gallery because there are a few pics in there that I didn’t talk about (like the sick paint job on the gunnar ruffian, or the sweet i-fab frames….).
Enjoy.
