(light electronic music)
- Welcome to Hot Tech
at the 2019 Taipei Bike Show, part two.
This show is massive and that's why we have
to do another video, couldn't fit it all in one video
but to fully appreciate how big it is,
I kind of really have to show you
like all the halls that are here.
First there's this massive hall, this outdoor demo area
where you can try out bikes.
This massive room and this massive one as well.
There's even another exhibition hall
but I just haven't had the chance
to get to that one yet.
Let's go find some tech.
(light electronic music)
I've just come across this company HYC
and they have an incredibly exciting new material
which could have massive implications
for the way that bikes are manufactured
and what they're made from.
See the problem with carbon fibre is as great as it is,
is that you can't recycle it.
Now, this new material promises to be recyclable
and it is well, kind of carbon fibre, it's actually
long carbon fibre reinforced thermoplastic composites.
I just read it off there.
Using these fibre pellets of their composite material,
HYC have made a sort of prototype bike here at the show
to show what can be done.
Now, these tube sections here have been extruded
and this head, tube and bottom bracket area
have been injection moulded.
In terms of the material properties,
they claim that it's well, light and stiff and strong.
very similar to that of carbon fibre
although they do admit that although the strengths,
very similar to carbon fibre,
the weight is slightly more but not much only
about three or four percent but they do say
that this is early days and they reckon
that by further optimising the material
and the manufacturing process,
they can reduce the way to get it
to be as competitive as carbon fibre
however, you know, it's not much.
The big advantage though is the manufacturing process
by being able to extrude and injection mould these pellets,
that's a much cheaper, a much more cost-effective way
and quicker way of manufacturing bicycle frames
than the traditional layup techniques
which you may have seen in the Look Carbon factory visit
that we did a video on
because traditional layup techniques are done by hand
and it's like assembling a 3D jigsaw puzzle
from loads of pieces of carbon.
It takes ages and then once it's been done,
it needs to be finished by hand.
It's painstaking sanding it down so that it can be painted.
What you have here is the end result of the product
once it's come straight out of the mould
or been extruded and it can be painted straight away
without any more surface treatment.
This again saves way more money and time.
The result of this is that several big brands
in the bike industry have shown a very keen interest
in this material and the manufacturing process
because it means they can potentially manufacture bikes
with shorter lead times at lower cost to them
and then the costs can also well,
the cost savings can also potentially be passed on
to the customer as well and the added bonus is
that they can be recycled making them greener too.
To recycle it, the material is just ground up
and then it turns back into these pellets
which can then be used
to make another bike or something else.
This could be a real game-changer,
but hopefully you saw it here first.
(light electronic music)
I love a lightweight bling set of carbon wheels
and the Fulcrum Racing Zero Carbons have been around
for a while but new for this year
are the Racing Carbon Zero disc brakes.
Now the rear has been completely redesigned
so it's gone from 17 mil internal widths to 19
which means it's best suited to gravel applications
as well as road you can have nice white tyres on there.
It's also tubeless ready now and the cool thing
about that is you don't need rim tape on there,
the actual rim as it comes is tubeless ready
which is really nice.
I also love talking about nipples and flanges
and there's reinforcement around the nipples
on the new wheels as well
with this nice sort of carbon piece here.
It's not there for aesthetics, it is there for a reason
to help reinforce where the nipple fits in.
There's also this oversized flange,
which means you can have a shorter spoke.
It helps stiffen up the wheel.
Now as beautiful as these are,
they're pretty expensive, 2,000 euros a pair.
So while this is the set we'll probably all dream of owning,
the set we'll probably buy
is the Racing 3 disc break over here.
The Fulcrum Racing 3 has long been
a popular upgrade wheel set around the 600 euro price point
and the disc brake specific version
follows the same path as the carbon.
Once you've gone from 17 to 19 mil internal rim
with tubeless ready and you don't need rim tape.
That larger flange is back
and you've got steel cup and cone bearings
instead of the ceramic in the more expensive one
but yeah, nice wheels.
(light electronic music)
Road cyclists love anything made from carbon fibre
that's a fact and Rydia is the latest company
to satisfy that appetite with this.
The first carbon fibre bottom bracket.
This is a 24-mil spindle-bottom bracket similar
to what you'd use instead of a Shimano hollow tech
and it weighs just 68 grammes.
Ceramic bearings too.
They also have some particularly tasty,
oversized pulley wheel systems, check this one out.
Its got a super record rear mech on it.
I'm just going to spin it up on the ceramic bearings,
There we go.
Probably be here a while.
(light electronic music)
I've just spotted this absolutely beautiful
Factor One Arrow bike in this stunning candy red finish
but the most exciting thing about this bike is
it's got Rotor's new 13-speed group set on there.
Now we first talked about this at Euro bike
where we spotted a prototype version of it
but it's now ready and it's apparently gonna be
on sale next month.
The shifters are pretty interesting on the new group set.
So the left-hand shifter, well, it isn't a shifter,
it's just a break, all the shifting's done on the right
and to move down the cassette, you do one click
and then to move up the cassette you do a double click.
It's it's quite compact, it's not as big at the top here
because similar to the FSA groups that we showed earlier,
the master cylinder is placed here rather than than here
but it's quite a nice nice feel and shape to that.
At the back on the cassette this is a 1039 cassette,
massive, but there's other cassette options.
I think it's even a 46 available as well.
So you can get really big at the back
and that's a 48-teeth chain ring.
Now in terms of the spacing
and how you fit this 13-speed cassette on the back there,
row to have a special hub that you need
and interestingly, when they sell the group set
in amongst time and it goes on sale,
there's going to be wheel options available to buy
at the same time in like a package deal
with the cassette to make sure
that you have a compatible hub and wheel set
for the group set.
According to Rotor, the claimed weight of the group set
is just 1785 grammes which is incredibly light
especially for a hydraulic disc brake group set
but of course I'll have to weigh it myself first
and check that they're telling the truth.
(upbeat electronic music)
Taiwan is the bike manufacturing capital of the world.
There's loads of expertise here
in making things out of carbon fibre
and that means at the Taipei Bike Show,
there's loads of companies you haven't heard of
making stuff for companies that you probably have heard of
and one company that does that is Gigantex
who have loads of experience in making carbon fibre wheels.
Well, if some of you may have heard of them
because they have been around since 1980
and they've got some really cool products.
So this is one of their wheel sets,
the catchily named WH198+CPO13
but don't let the catchy name dissuade you.
Available in both tubular and clincher versions
and the weight of the tubular version is
just 1100 grammes a pair.
I mean, they weigh nothing and they're really cool.
They got these carbon spokes and they're said
to be an incredibly stiff wheel.
Gigantex is really proud of their carbon technology
and also their spoke technology and they claim
that you can hold I think 200 kilogrammes of the end
of just a single spoke and it doesn't break
and well, think if that load spread
throughout all of these spokes
and you've got a very stiff wheel indeed
especially when they're laid up against the side
of the rim profile inline.
Similar in the design to what Lightweight does
but the price is nothing like Lightweight's price.
So Lightweights cost thousands of thousands of pounds,
apparently this wheel set is available for just 700 dollars
or around that price point.
So potentially, great value.
I know if I don't do it people will be upset
so here's a free-up sound check.
(bike wheel turning)
Sounds pretty good.
A bit of tech news is gonna be music to the ears
of John Canning's KMC
and now there's 12-speed chains that are gold.
Also, something else pretty cool over here.
They're doing custom chains as well.
So on request, custom colours are available
in both 12, 11 and 10 speed.
(upbeat techno music)
That's it for Hot Tech part two at the Taipei Bike Show.
I hope you've enjoyed looking
at some of this cool new stuff.
I'm gonna go home now so make sure you like the video,
thumbs up, subscribe, all that stuff.
I'm gonna walk home back to England.
See ya.
You can play some sad walking away music,
Incredible Hulk style now.
(sad piano music)
Tryin' for my lift.