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An absolutely brutal read to slog through. Sorry! What I meant to say was that the subject matter of Orbea's deep dive failed to fully resonate with the intended audience, yielding a suboptimal reading experience, and failing to deliver a holistic win-win for big-picture strategic partners in the greater bike industry ecosystem.

Those interested, full substack is posted on Fox Factory's Q1 results. I'm not going to say "its a snooze fest" but there really isn't a ton to report on unless you are a finance mega nerd like me. The bike biz is at best flat compared to last year. The company didn't do anything groundbreaking from an operational or management perspective. I made the analogy that its a bit like watching a big giant boat turn - it takes both time and space to do that. We'll see where they end up by the end of 2027.

I have it in a few bikes. I WORK AT DT SWISS. I have not ridden o-chain. I live in Western Colorado and basically ride in the 10 degree setting all the time. When I go to the bike park, then I swap to the 20. On my e-bike, it is always in the 10 setting. On my PNW trip last year I swapped depending on where I would ride. Around here, trying the 20 degree at our techy trails, you do get a bit of a thud when riding technical terrain on the analog bike. I haven't noticed that...

Also agree! The order is Reduce, Reuse, Recycle for a reason.

Double upvote.

One thing missing here is the fact that with the proliferation of composite know how, there are more people around able to safely repair a wider range of issues. Rather than pretending we are recycling carbon bikes I’d love to see more frames designed in ways that facilitate repair. Repair is verifiable in a way that recycling is not, it is cost effective for everyone concerned, and it is as close as you’ll get to good for the environment. It probably flows on to other design decisions to ensure repair is viable (like bearing placement, etc etc), but designing bikes...

Long time lurker, first time poster here. For some background I’m an aerospace composites engineer and spent several years in Advanced Product Development with an emphasis on environmentally friendly materials. There’s so much to get into on this topic and if folks are interested I’d love to start a dedicated thread on materials and environmental impacts. The TLDR is, carbon fiber as a green product on its own is a fallacy. The raw fiber production may result in a certain level of carbon sequestering, but the process is still so energy intensive I wouldn’t call it an environmental positive. As...

Also looks like no Ochain on Jackson's V10, which would be a big change from his normal 16 degree custom Ochain setup. Either this is a freeride/bike park V10, or he has some hub magic going on. Wonder if this is a result of SRAM buying the chain of O.

Can we get a separate thread for requesting separate threads so it doesn’t clog up this thread?

The vast majority of the advancement of continuous carbon fiber reinforced thermoplastic materials is centered around aerospace. Carbon fiber reinforced bikes (mainly epoxy based) have "veered away" from aero materials - their processes and needs have evolved and are now somewhat different. So, thermoplastic composites (TPC's) have not been as targeted towards bikes. If you look at material test data, there are TPC's with similar or even better performance (strength/stiffness vs weight) than epoxy/CF being used now in bike parts (especially a property called "facture toughness"). But, these highest performing TPC's are higher priced in general, higher processing temp, and...

Yes, somebody will figure it out. The MTB business is notoriously tough. B/c thermoplastic CF can be done with robotics it’s one of the few technologies that can work in developed countries with high labor costs. The recyclability is huge bonus, they are the best tire levers I have ever used. Benefits in vibration damping and impact resistance.

Hi everyone! I’m currently conducting research for my university thesis on the transition to Thermoplastic Carbon in the mountain biking industry. I’ve created a short survey that only takes about 5 minutes to complete (6 sets of 4 statements), and I’m looking for just 40 more respondents. So far, over 250 mountain bikers have already participated! It would really help me out if you could take a few minutes to fill it in: https://fdm.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_2i2v4mHBH3wvgii Thanks in advance to everyone willing to help a fellow mountain biker with research towards a greener future for mountain biking! 🚵🌱

PB to scroll, Vital to read

Or Dario at the very least...

Nice to know I'm not the only one who visits both pages... I still think we need the PB guys on the Bikes Unaffiliated pod..

Cartert Bilawchuck is a 16-year old who made his own bike, it ended up looking incredibly polished - and rad ( it was a lock for Vital BOD of course too)! This deep dive edit is full of insights into the trials and tribulations behind pulling off such a project, I figure it should be of interest to the followers of this thread:

G-Out Project Pro DH Mountain Creek - https://www.vitalmtb.com/features/g-out-project-2026-pro-downhill-serie… and one of neko's 32 for the sake of triggering

Not to disrupt the 32" hub spacing convo but - I'm linking up with Specialized next week to ride/film a video on the new Demo 11. I want to focus this video more on getting everyone's questions answered about the bike since we will do a proper test of the bike later this summer during our DH Test Sessions. So if you have anything you want explained or answered, drop a comment here - https://www.vitalmtb.com/forums/hub/specialized-demo-11-what-do-you-wan…

Speaking of pinkbike, it's been down all morning ON THE SAME morning as the Department of War starts releasing classified docs on aliens?? Coincidence??