Front mech’s and double/triple chainsets?

I don’t really care much about sticking an extra inch on my wheels, or having a tapered steerer either way – apart from the fact my current bike is 1/18th and 26″. For now though, I like my triple – that may change when I try otherwise.

Do we think front mechs will die on MTB’s, or will be forever with us?

I found four in my spares bin yesterday.

STW and the bike comics are not a representative sample of the UK MTB markert.

Not until you can get the same gear range from a single ring. I can see triples maybe falling by the wayside though given you can pretty much get the same range from a double.

I can see the attraction of 1×10 for skinny racing snakes going round the Surrey hills, but for fat old duffers slogging up a 25% gradient, I think a front mech will always be needed.

QR rear wheels.

135×12 rear axles for sure. That’s something that should be easily adaptor’d for but you know it won’t work out like that.

Another one- 27.2 seatposts on mountain bikes. There’ll still be a few on form-over-function things but dropper posts have done for them. Shame we’ll still have 30.9 and 31.6, that’s pretty absurd.

1x is ace but I can’t see it ever becoming the default. 2x makes more sense for most people than either 1 or 3 I think.

I think we are long overdue a new pedal thread “standard”. 👿

I found a trebchet, anyone got any better means of despatching felines?

I wish bottom brackets would figure out what they want to do and catch up.

I love my straight 1 1/8th 26″ QR singlespeed.

Maybe one day I’ll have some moolah and buy a Maxled out tapered beast of a 1*11 ndooro ‘ting, but no time soon.

I reckon spokes are fir the **** chop next.

Front wheels

i’ve not used a triple since the 90’s, they are already obsolete for me

My biggest concern is supply of decent straight steerer forks over the next 2-5 years.

It feels like it’s going down the 1″ route where your only option now really is to stick with rigid.

I just bought a new bike with QR wheels and 27.2 post!

I reckon tapered steerers will go next, in about 2 to 3 years time when they need to generate another spending boom and we realise that a 1.5in straight steerer is 0.95% stiffer, and faster (and easier to manufacture), than a tapered fork and all new frames will have 1.5in headtubes, meaning all forks will be 1.5in which won’t fit in your retro tapered frames and you’ll panic and buy a new bike.

My retro 1.5 bike will be fine, win!

It’s all very well on paper having the same range on a double but if you’re forever at the bottom of the cassette on the small ring and the top of it on the big ring it’s not very helpful.

I think the way to consider a triple is as a 1x with a granny for really steep hills and a big ring for tarmac/fire road descents. This is why I’ve just put a triple on my plastic 29er race bike as I can do XC on the 32 and long distance stuff moving around on the chainset. It’s not a huge weight penalty esp if you use a smaller cassette. Yes it rattles but I’ll take that over walking thanks.

135×12 rear axles for sure.

Mine pee’s me off. Forever coming loose.

As I have no desire to lose my range of gears for at best to save a bit of weight that I wouldn’t notice or at worst to follow the current fashion I won’t be binning front mechs anytime soon. Nor will most people going by what’s out in the real world.

I reckon tapered steerers will go next

Ah! There may be a real advantage to tapered steerers though. I dropped the front end off a motocrosser and sure enough, different sized bearings top and bottom of the steering head.

Of course, the law of sod kicks in now; the big bearing was actually at the top, so MTB ‘tapered’ will be replaced by ‘inverse tapered’ in a year or two.

the next deletion will be me bothering to “upgrade” to any new standards, pretty much decided that I’m gonna run my 26″ straight steered qr 9×2 & 9×3 bikes into the ground – think I have enough bikes & parts to keep me going for the next 10 years just need to find someone willing to swap a reba taper CSU for straight one 😕

I guess it depends on what the framr designers decide to do – Santa Cruz seem very muvh on the 1x bandwagon and have removed front mech capability from the new Nomad. Will they do the same on the smaller bikes in the future?

QR axles are pretty much dead aren’t they? They’ll need some new axle standards soon though as the current ones seem to have been adopted (although chaging 20mm through axles to DH only now is annoying). 15mm and 142x12mm seems fairly common now. Bound to be changed soon.

Bottom brakets need sorting out although BB30 does seem to be winning.

Bar sizes? 31.8mm has been adopted by many which probably means that 35mm will get a huge push soon.

I actually think the dropper post has been good because seat post sizes have become standardised. Great for frame swappers. And good that it’s killed silly sizes liked 30.0mm used by Kona who only Race Face and Thomson seemed to bother with.

And good that it’s killed silly sizes liked 30.0mm used by Kona who only Race Face and Thomson seemed to bother with.

Cove certainly used too as well. Very annoying.

Another one- 27.2 seatposts on mountain bikes. There’ll still be a few on form-over-function things but dropper posts have done for them. Shame we’ll still have 30.9 and 31.6, that’s pretty absurd.

27.2 posts are noticeably more comfy than the bigger ones, especially in carbon with a fair bit sticking out. I’d shim down a 30.9 if I had a bike that needed one. I can only think of one BW near me that’d benefit from a dropper, and thats a near vertical grass filed plummet that still wouldn’t be much fun (0 run out at the bottom)

And good that it’s killed silly sizes liked 30.0mm used by Kona who only Race Face and Thomson seemed to bother with.

Pretty sure my 90s Kona has a 27.0 .. think it’s Thomson only if that goes.. probably cheaper to replace the frame.

not a big fan of triples but doubles are a keeper, haven’t shimano just reinvented the front mech? Be a shame to never get to use one, briefly.

law of mech development, a new generation will have a 10% better action but 50% less lifespan, in 20 years time your bike will change gear via mind control and you’ll have to change mechs midride

I’m flirting with 1x? at the moment but only on niche role bikes, grannys are needed elsewhere.

Would love to ditch the all the new BB “standards”

90s steel Konas were indeed 27.0 but most were a little over-reamed meaning most 27.2s could be used or at least the ones that are towards the smaller end of 27.2 (which is most of mine)

QR axles are pretty much dead aren’t they?

Yeah definitely, virtually standard even on XC race bikes now, which was the last vestige of QRs!

1x drivetrains will continue to prevail, but I can’t see them ever being the only option, too much of a compromise for some. That said the number of bikes that are going ‘single ring specific’ is quite surprising, and the full spectrum too – Codeine, Nomad, Spesh Epic WC.

We must be due for a new chain standard. Half inch pitch has been about for a century or more. Shorter, smaller links would allow smaller, lighter (quicker wear) sprockets or sprockets with more teeth for closer ratios and more choice. Once the new standard is established someone will decide it clogs too easily in mud and develope something a bit bigger but still smaller than archaic old half inch pitch.

I really cant believe tapered has caught on. Its actually quite disgusting as the headtubes/steerers take so much more effort/energy to manufacture than straight ones and I would guess create so much more waste as well. Not to mention making things really difficult for small, low volume frame builders….and all for little or no advantage over straight 1.5.

I really cant believe tapered has caught on. Its actually quite disgusting as the headtubes/steerers take so much more effort/energy to manufacture than straight ones and I would guess create so much more waste as well. Not to mention making things really difficult for small, low volume frame builders….and all for little or no advantage over straight 1.5.

But the standard adoption of a 1.5 steerer would mean that it’s compatible with anything which is bad for sales of new forks and stems when you change your frame….

Disc mounts must be due an update too…they been standard / cross compatible for too long.

It’s here 🙂

http://spokemagazine.com/2014/06/11/trek-release-new-rear-suspension-platform-and-carbon-remedy/

New 148mm ‘open’ standard for rear hub spacing along with specific chainrings… ‘BOOST148’ 🙄

Press in headsets have got to be next.

None of the bikes either for myself or GF on road or off have pressed in headsets, all are campy style. Much much betterer

Press in headsets have got to be next.

Just when the world is moving to press in BB’s?

Judging by this photo of Nico Lau winning the Enduro World Series at Inners, triples will not die soon. Probably much bigger in Europe, where a lot more bikes are bought.

Provided you can still get hold of stuff I’ve no problem with standards which have been improved upon being replaced. I do have an issue with there being more than 2 options for stuff, though- BBs in particular are a bugbear of mine, and headsets- there should be one shape of tapered headset. Choose your bearing quality, buy it, fit to frame. Not spend hours looking through Cane Creek’s headset finder trying to figure out if your bearing angle is 36 or 45 degrees…

New 148mm ‘open’ standard for rear hub spacing along with specific chainrings… ‘BOOST148’

Got to love Americans and their marketing.

Love Rockshox forks, but vigorously dislike their emotional ads and spurious buzzwords.

“People said it CAN’T be done, but WE DID IT. WE REIVENTED STUFF THAT DOESN’T NEED REINVENTING. Complete with NEW SUPER-DYNAMIC THERMO-OVERSHIFT 3 (reg trademark, patent pending)!” 🙄

TrekUK have been having a tweet conversation about this 148 standard.

There’s user demand for stiffer 29er wheels, they claim.

As far as I’m aware that triple has had the teeth ground off the big ring to act as a chain guide.