another day another box of aliexpress bike parts inside here
even cheaper this is a 200 pound 12 speed group set today's video is an unboxing and
first look at what you get when you order an l2 rx 2x12 from the 318 bike store
on aliexpress the answer is loads of bubble wrap bags no official packaging
and um even some bits of cardboard as well i think there might be oh there's a cassette in here 318
bike store is one of the most popular stores on aliexpress it is rated gold and has a medal and
it has 6 361 followers and 97.3 percent positive feedback start with the shifter this is an rx
elsewhere are actually the company who make the group set that was on my very very very very
cheap bike from ebay and uh it's quite a popular brand from east asia this is their high-end group
set i think this is the highest end one they do it is carbon and well it looks like this
which might look quite familiar it looks a lot like cam pack really like campeche apparently just
like sensor elsewhere do respect patent laws but clearly that doesn't mean they're not inspired by
existing brands despite the branding itself which actually looks more like shimano's typeface uh
the shape of these shifters looks very similar to campagnolo these are fully cable operated brakes
and gears they feel fairly nice they look fairly nice the uh material of the hoods looks quite well
made and there's a little bit of a grippy pattern on it in your hands they feel a little bit bigger
than the sensor ones that i've experienced before gears are operated with a small paddle which is
underneath the brake lever then you have a button to click down the other way then the outer lever
operates your brake they do package this pretty well there's a lot of layers of protection this
bundle comes with z-race brake calipers which are a different brand to elsewhere you'll find with a
few sellers on aliexpress that they mix and match parts from different companies these are fairly
well known brand called z-race and these are hydraulic calipers but they're cable actuated
so like a hybrid system the model of these is br005 you can buy them separately and they come
it's actually optional with disks they give you a host of different color options and size
options i went with black because it's neutral and 160 front and rear front mech l2 branded nice and
shiny feels premium they say it's a carbon group set and the material used in the shifters looks
like carbon on here they've tried to copy the color but it's actually just alloy but overall a
standard double front mech i don't know if you can see this on the camera but there's actually an 11
printed on the back of the front mech which indicates to me that's probably the same mech
that they use on their 11 speed group sets but it works fine with 12 speed system as well rear mech
long cage again carbonyl looking spring feels good i think the cage is actually carbon
jockey wheels feel smooth all your normal adjustments high limit low limit screw
cheat screw a little bit of loctite on them which is nice to see i actually think that's a nicer
looking mech than the sensor one i wonder what the maximum size cassette you can use
is might be difficult finding out that information but we will see 34 tooth cassette
uh and some parts for the bikes 11 34 cassette it was quite heavy uh as did the old one
but that is branded zed race although i thought for a second this was exactly the same as the
cassette that came with the sensor group set which i think is a cynics one but no there are some very
slight differences in the machine and this one's now covered in grease from now so am i 12 speed
chain also from zed race last time i got a chain from aliexpress didn't have any packing grease
or lube on it whatsoever which is very good for people who want to watch their change this one
has got grease on so if you were a chain waxing person maybe avoid these chains it doesn't say
how many links someone has forgotten to tick the box on the box but i'm sure it'll be enough for my
gear ratios so those are all the parts that come in the box i haven't got a crank set this time
because i've already got one on my bike and the bike i'm going to be using to test this stuff
well there's no point in removing the crank and putting exactly the same one back on so i'm just
going to leave it it is 12-speed compatible so everything should just go on and be fine
here we are at the wayne station of destiny and we're going to
weigh the parts one by one so you can do whatever you like with that information
107 if you know you know 106. 255 grams for the chain we'll probably take some links off
that though front mech is 98 grams rear mech 219 right shifter 209 grams left shifter 212
calibers of 323 grams and then cassette including the lock ring 387 grams like i said
it's quite a heavy cassette sometimes i feel like i want to mix and match a lot of these parts like
the group set parts are brilliant but the chains and cassettes that come with it
you know there are better options out there for not that much more money bear that in mind
there's always options now i've probably gone ahead and put fake campag in the thumbnail of
this video and it's actually a topic that i'd like to touch on is this really fake or is it just
inspired by now campagnolo were actually the first people to ever invent a front mech and the design
of these hasn't really changed that much at all is every company that makes a front mech copying cam
pack the answer i think is yes but i don't think it's a bad thing engineers and designers copy
stuff all the time and an analogy that i wanted to bring into this video is from the music world
some of you guys who've been watching this channel a long time will know i like my guitar i play a
lot of guitar and i own a few different guitars now this is a fender stratocaster one of the most
famous guitars in the world still made and played to this day in exactly the same form as when it
was first invented now this is a yamaha pacifica and this is a prs silver sky this is a shector
this is a vintage this is a honer this is a gnl this is a charvel and as you can see they all look
pretty similar and when i say pretty similar i mean like they are almost exactly the same
thing the same can be said for gibson guitars and their les paul model and a host of other
different guitar styles that were invented years ago now of course patent laws have come into it
whether it's bike parts we're talking about or musical instruments if you're a company
a designer or an engineer and you're looking to make a new product you have to make sure you don't
breach pattern laws so patents that have been bought by the original companies the original
designers in order to protect their design work usually you'll find there's small changes that
have been made to instruments or pieces of bike tech or whatever it may be small enough changes
that they can still produce and sell the products that's the situation we're in here it might look
like campagno on the outside but there's probably some changes to the mechanisms inside they've used
a different typeface they've respected the patent laws enough to not cause a problem everyone has
their own opinion on whether this should be done or not but i like to look at it through the eyes
of a consumer and as a consumer companies copying each other's designs and improving on them ends
up being a better situation for me products on the whole have never been better you can buy
an absolutely fantastic guitar for 150 pounds now you can buy a 12-speed carbon group set for
200 quid you can get a pretty decent smartphone for cheaper than ever now and it's all because
designers and engineers copy off each other one of the more interesting cases about stuff being
copied in the bike world is actually the sensor group set which i have on my other bike the guys
who work there are actually x-sram engineers so they've obviously been inspired by their own
work and they've kind of copied their work from themselves but i guess they did it on company
time in any case i'd be interested to hear your thoughts on this in the comment section down
below i'm gonna have a go and test this over the next few days i'll do a build video uh some of it
will be easy to switch over because i've actually already got the cable routing done in my bike i'll
also be doing a quick update on the sensor group set because i have now ridden it across europe so
well it's all still in one piece thanks for watching hope you enjoyed and see you guys soon