My Hope Hoops can take either, but I have 20mm adapters already: may as well go for the 20mm then?
White ones.
please take this opportunity to make a statement against the completely pointless 15mm standard.
however, the fact that bike-designery-types can spend their time designing a slightly different 'through axle' system is a clear demonstration that bike design has peaked.
sorry ahwhiles but you're wrong. all to do with paying the man as the man owns the patent hence everyone coming up with something slightly different. 15mm came about largely because of people like singletrackers and the press saying that 20mm is freeride specific and therefore way overbuilt for the likes of us!
I'd go 20 as with a little research it is a little stiffer but to be honest you wouldn't notice it in real world applications.
buy a tub of copperslip grease and use it regularly, the bearings have a tendancy to weld themselves to the axle as the anodising on the axle is only thin. the copperslip stops them reacting together and means the axle will work in the way it's designed to do.
exactly, bike designers are spending their time and our money designing their way around existing patents, not fixing problems.
example: the trek ABP is just a clever way to dodge the FSR patent.
bike design has peaked.
example: the big news of 2011 is 10 speed gear systems.
wow.
6 bladed razor anyone?
sorry Nick, i'm right.
Are you saying that the switch from 20mm to 15 negates the claims of the patent?
I thought the reason was that shimanos new fangled splined rotors were too narrow to get a 20mm axle through. Something like that anyway.
i'm not sure if the 20mm thing is covered by a patent, but the rockshox maxle is.
it wouldn't surprise me if the maxle patent was 20mm specific, and making a similar axle in 15mm form got around the patent.
anyway, designers have spent your money coming up with a slightly different QR through axle.
this is of course fine, it's a tiny bit lighter, and only a tiny bit not as stiff. but if this is what they're spending our money on, then i'm inclined to guess that it's because they can't find anything more important to work, and that's why i claim mountain bike design has peaked.
in reply to specialneedz - buy whichever you want, but you really won't notice any difference between the 2.
If you want pointless, what's with tapered head tubes?
Would you really notice a difference?
My understanding was that 15mm was aimed more as a QR replacement for travel XC and 'trail' forks (especially as they're getting longer in travel), while 20mm was still a standard for 'bigger' riding?
I believe 20mm is stiffer and marginally heavier but it's what I'm running, primarily to make switching wheels from bike to bike easier.
I'd go 20mm simply becuase it will be easier to re-sell your fork or find a wheel for it in a hurry if/when you pringle your hope one. Weight difference does exist but if hardly worth worrying about with a pro2 hub and newest 20mm maxles.
As an aside, as much as I like old fashioned shimano qr cup and cone hubs, the hope/halo/superstar way of making hubs that are 'future proof' with the use of easy-and-cheap-to-machine adapters and hollow axles is the way forward in light of all this axle standard jiggery-pokery.
I'm wishing shimano would release a high quality 7 or 8 speed cassette system as my 9 speed is constantly needing adjustment and seems too sensitive to muck and twigs getting in there. Cassettes wear out quick too. There does seem to be a bit of technology for technology's sake going on over the last 5 years. My most reliable bike of the 3 is the one running low end gears and brakes and budget components. If you bought a car or motorbike that needed as much maintenance as some modern mountain bikes it would be going back to the showroom. Maybe the manufacturers should be aiming for reliability over tech advances although a part that lasts a long time isn't good for their turnover is it?
no ahwiles you're still wrong. the way patents are written is around the working of the component/system not the specifics of size.
bike design has plenty more to offer but until the press and the public can get their collective heads round some radical change then it'll never progress.
yes the split pivot get's round four bar but then shock development has changed and improved so that single pivots work nearly as well. the split pivot negates the braking forces but keeps some of the simplicity and clarity of a single pivot.
if you look at the mondrakers and the newest dh lapierre, the gt dh bike the gearbox systems (in varying form), the materials that are now being used in both bikes and clothing/protection (not condoms), the use of led's which has vastly improved night riding. the way we holiday our tyres the disc brakes.
come on we have a fantastic sport and things will change but people in the design industry need to mtfu and make change happen. but we also have to accept bikes that look different and and aren't bl**dy single speeds.
My understanding of the 15mm axle standard is that at least part of the reason is down to Shimano wanting a thru-axle standard that would work with cup and cone bearings.
Regarding 20mm patents, I believe that it's only the fastening systems that are patented, hence Magura paying to use Rock Shox's, and Manitou and Fox each sporting their own take on it.
If you bought a car or motorbike that needed as much maintenance as some modern mountain bikes it would be going back to the showroom
This is certainly true for road going machines, but IME anything with an engine and designed for off-road applications like a mountain bike needs just as much maintenance.
nick, i don't care about patents.
if the best we're getting out of new bikes in 2011 is 1 more sprocket, a slightly different form of through-axle, and a conical head-tube, then i'm going to say that bike design has peaked.
that is my point.
(i own a mondraker - it's very nice)
15mm axles are pointless, I agree the industry has peaked with the technology at the moment, there's no drastic change just trying to fix things that don't need fixing. 20mm and 9mm QR are all we need and 1 1/8th and 1.5 inch head tubes are all we need. we don't need tapered and 15mm axles, there pointless, Shimano wanted a through axle that works with splined rotors. why don't they just make the splines bigger on the QR wheels so that they can take 20mm axles too, centre lock rotors still seem really pointless to me as well, did anyone ever have a problem with 6 bolt? 10 speed is a waste of time in my opinion too.
exactly, designers aren't fixing problems*, they're tweaking things to suit the latest 'directions' the sport is heading in.
if the sport changed direction - back towards light skinny xc race bikes, you'd see fewer bikes with big headsets and through axles.
you could say that 'choice is the new form of progress' - and i'd probably agree with you.
true progress renders the old technology completely obsolete - and that hasn't happened for a while.
Specific mountain bike geometry and components, aluminium rims, indexed gears, threadless steerers. THAT's progress, 1 more sprocket isn't.
(*they're aren't many - modern bikes are brilliant)
true progress renders the old technology completely obsolete - and that hasn't happened for a while.
exactly, I mean octa-link was meant to make square taper obsolete and HTII is meant to make octa-link obsolete, but square taper is still around and it probably always will be along with octalink. the sealing on such square tapers and octa-links are so much better than on HTIIs, and I cant tell the supposed stiffness increase with HTII,
110x20mm is a better way to do it for any bike i think. 15mm gets me riled, it's pointless and makes swapping wheels and forks a PITA now. but unfortunately it looks like the '15mm for trail and 20mm for DH' idea is being forced onto us as most if not all 2012 sub-160mm forks will be 15mm.
Arse. i like 20mm.
Tapered steerers however are a good thing, i hope they get more established.
"My understanding of the 15mm axle standard is that at least part of the reason is down to Shimano wanting a thru-axle standard that would work with cup and cone bearings."
20mm works fine with cup and cone too.
my problem is that progress often means price increase
seatpost get a regular one and qr for 30qui
fox new uppy downy one 500??? i reckon
v brakes 20 quid an end discs 150!
dont get me wrong advances have been great but it also ads complexity and an excuse to charge more
Did anyone else notice that fork review in MBR when they said twice in the article body that Fox 15mm was lighter than 20mm maxle lite, then quietly slipped in the actual weights and showed that the 2010 maxle lite was lighter? And now 2011 maxle lite is lighter again, while still stiffer.
The only thing I should say... If you took a hub the size of a Hope Pro 2, but designed it exclusively for 15mm or even QR, you could build it with larger bearings for longevity, or you could just downsize it. As it is the modular axle systems are great but they do favour the bigger axles since they can't give you some of the benefits of the smaller ones.
Still, I do wish 15mm would just **** off. And tapered head tubes too- no advantage at all over 1.5, only disadvantages, other than that they're the in thing and they arguably look better. Give me a coke can any day.
Not got the Rock-shox version, but the Fox QR15 is actually a superb piece of kit,tool free, secure, stiff enough for most use, and much quicker to use than either of the other standards.If you're happy with your 20mm set-up, then stay with it, but I wouldn't discount 15mm just because it doesn't match somebody else's front hub.
"the Fox QR15 is actually a superb piece of kit,tool free, secure, stiff enough for most use, and much quicker to use than either of the other standards"
Er... Have you ever used a maxle lite? QR15 isn't "much faster" than that, it's pretty much the same in use.
In fairness the Maxle is pretty quick too, but compare these to other bolt ups or QRs and you can see where i'm coming from,none of the sticky wedges that some of the Maxles have had in the past either(again, in fairness probably due to lack of cleaning/grease).
"most if not all 2012 sub-160mm forks will be 15mm"
I just spent my unused holiday money on a 150mm air-spring 2010 Rockshox Sektor fork with motion control, 1 1/8 steerer and 20mm maxle lowers - it weighs ~1800g and cost ~£350. It is going with some Superstar Switch hub XC wheels that weigh ~1850g and cost ~£150.
They are still making progress IMO.