Cheap Chinese carbon bars and titanium skewers. Any good?

Once again though, you have no idea whether the same is true for the manufacturer in the OP’s link.

They’re a very similar shape to Bontrager bars of a few years ago – an unusually abrupt rise. They’d be safer if they were the same product with a Bontrager logo on then? Or just less risky?

A member of my family builds Le Mans class cars down here on the South Coast. Id get him to out some bars together but the materials would cost more than CRC knock out Eastons for. Damn clever these Chinese.

They are, but I think Easton’s stuff is made in Mexico and Taiwan.

Once again though, you have no idea whether the same is true for the manufacturer in the OP’s link.

They’re a very similar shape to Bontrager bars of a few years ago – an unusually abrupt rise. They’d be safer if they were the same product with a Bontrager logo on then? Or just less risky?

WTF are you talking about? Are you trying to say these are Bontrager bars just because they are vaguely the same shape? I’m starting to doubt your sanity.

Damn clever low paid these Chinese.

Fixed

Whoah. I was to some extent with you right up to that point, where you revealed that you don’t really have that good an understanding of structures, or of composites. Then bending load on a bar does not require the carbon composite to take a bending load – the forces on the carbon walls of the bar are a tension on one side and a compression on the other, which results in a torque force in the bar resisting the bending load. This is a fairly fundamental principle of the use of composites – sandwich construction is widely used where parts are required to resist a bending force, as the foam or honecomb core separates the two sheets of composite material and results in a bending stiffness for the structure as a whole due to compressive and tensile stiffness in the composite. Clearly a hollow tube inherently has the same principle of two separated layers of composite.

2: Carbon manufacture is very labour intensive and quality control is critical to the strength of the finished product. We struggled with it in F1, so I’m not convinced mtb mass manufactured parts are going to be consistent enough.

Big, big difference between F1 and mass manufacture with composites. With F1 you’re making one-off or at best limited runs of parts. Not only is this an extremely expensive process, given that much of the cost of composites is in the moulds, but you’re also presumably on very short deadlines and don’t have the opportunity to test and incrementally improve the processes. Now I’m not saying that all composite manufacturers will be doing the best job, but they do have the time (and money, as development cost will be spread out over a large production run) to spend getting it right.

FWIW I’m a degree qualified engineer with a general engineering degree, hence have studied structures and materials (including composites), though I’ve never worked in that area. I have a hobbyist interest in composites, having owned lots of composite kayaks and done plenty of repairs and have made my own sandwich composite parts. I’ve owned plenty of carbon bars, all branded (though most by brands you wouldn’t have heard of), but currently have alu bars (KCNC, ie Chinese branded) as I use bar ends and they kept breaking the ends of the carbon ones in crashes. As I mentioned above I also have a Chinese branded seatpost on my roadie.

Oh, and I do agree with some of what moshi is saying (and others are coming out with some stupid stuff), but I’m clearly with the majority on here in considering that branded Chinese products (from companies with a track record and good customer service) are no more risky than western branded products.

I’m clearly with the majority on here in considering that branded Chinese products (from companies with a track record and good customer service) are no more risky than western branded products.

On a slightly different note, what about obviously fake products – things like the carbon bars labelled Bontrager or 3T that some times pop up for “it can’t be genuine” money on ebay?

More or less risky than unbranded/Chinese branded bars??

(I don’t have any, I’m just curious about the hierarchy of risk perception 🙂 )

WTF are you talking about? Are you trying to say these are Bontrager bars just because they are vaguely the same shape? I’m starting to doubt your sanity.

Of course not, I’m just saying that they could be the same product for all you know. You trust the Bontrager ones more because they have a sticker on, but you don’t know they’re a superior product.

More or less risky than unbranded/Chinese branded bars??

In my increasingly contradictory risk scale I say no. I’d rather have a product that a brand is prepared to put their own logo on, rather than trying to replicate something with a ‘known’ brand logo on. It’s potentially chicken and egg a little though – and that statement is in direct contradiction to my one above! I guess it depends which brands you trust – Superstar are very open about buying catalogue products from the Chinese and sticking their logo on. Easton (one assumes) aren’t doing that!

Quite often though the ‘fakes’ are the same as every other product, just with a Ritchey logo or whatever.

Are you really saying that if something is a total unknown it is therefore not a risk? You’ve got to be taking the piss right?

No, I’m saying that the risk of failure is unknown, because the quality is unknown on that particular bar, but you moved well on form that and were talking about Carbon in general and specifically Chinese carbon.

Since neither you nor I can know (at this point) conclusively whether that particular bar is any more or less likely to fail than any other branded bar.

What I’m trying to get at, and probably not managing to explain very well, is that you’re basing your assessment of risk on the bits you don’t know (origin, brand, construction etc.) not on the bits you do.

If it were revealed that that was actually an Easton Carbon DH bar (its not) with the stickers removed, you’d be a lot happier about using it, nothing about the bar would have fundamentally changed though, just your knowledge, but you’d revise your risk assessment.

In the same way if it were actually proven that it had been built by a Chinese worker with years of composite construction experience in a factory that builds composite goods all day long to a very high standard but can sell things at almost cost price due to no dealer, distributor, branding and retail chain, would you feel the same?

I guess my point is that Chinese != crap

And as I keep saying, at the moment, based on peoples reported experiences there is very little evidence to support the idea that cheap chinese carbon is any less reliable.

*if* it is so risky and the products are so poor, where are all the reports of catastrophic failure? where are the studies and tests proving it? <<< this really is a valid question!!*

I’m not saying they are great, I’m saying that in the absence of any thing to the contrary I’ll go on what I see and can verify myself.

On a slightly different note, what about obviously fake products – things like the carbon bars labelled Bontrager or 3T that some times pop up for “it can’t be genuine” money on ebay?

Who knows! (a running theme?), and repeated question, general consensus is that regardless of whether they come from the same factories as unbranded or OEM bars, they reveal that the seller/manu. has a different ethical viewpoint, you can’t know if this also extends into their ethics regarding construction and QC, especially as the Chinese have a very different viewpoint on ‘fakes’ to use.

On the one hand they could be the same decent bars they sell under their own brand, just with a copied Bontrager logo slapped on so they can charge more.

On the other hand they could be crappy, corner-cutting ruthless counterfeiters willing to do anything to sell soemthing bar shaped.

Having seen some of the fakes, the finish is almost as good as any other, and what limited visual inspection you can do doesn’t reveal any obvious difference, but that doesn’t tell you much at all.

* for example, with the Chinese lights threads, there’s numerous reports of the fakes with dodgy chargers and lower than expected/intermittent output, crap sealing etc.

There’s also reports of genuine stuff from China being very good, but there is a clear amount of evidence and first hand accounts building up.

*if* it is so risky and the products are so poor, where are all the reports of catastrophic failure? where are the studies and tests proving it?

It’s interesting that someone like Easton, with a huge reputation and involvement in various sporting disciplines (or are Easton Cycling something different now they’ve been sold off?), hasn’t done something to discredit these ‘dangerous’ products that are out there. One assumes they don’t see it as a genuine threat, not sure I’ve ever seen fake Eastons, so maybe their lawyers are good too!

I really would like to see someone take on the challenge of a proper test (multi-sample, multi-test) and comparison like that, preferably somebody independent rather than a major player but as long as the tests and data were sound and published.

Might put this to bed once and for all…then again, we might find something else to ‘discuss’ 😉

Industry information or industry scaremongering?

http://www.bikeradar.com/news/article/fake-bike-kit-costing-industry-millions-a-year-37212/

http://road.cc/content/news/113310-buy-fake-risk-death-support-slavery-%E2%80%93-says-bike-industry

dont forget that the main difference here is route to market. Lets for arguments sake say a carbon bar costs £4 to make, they are using the same R&D as Syncross who also happen to pay the same company in China to make their bars (for arguments sake as this is what happens)

Syncross bars
Cost from Mr Carbon Bars with his margin = £7 (for bare product)
Cost from Mr Carbon Bars with his margin = £10 (for paint/graphics added)
Shipping, tax etc = £3
Packaging = £3

So Int Distributor gets the product for around £16, however, they sell it to country specific distributors for £35 (as they need a margin to cover R&D, advertising, staff etc etc

UK Distributor wants their 50% cut so now the price is £53 at trade plus £10.50 in VAT.

Local Shop/Internet distributor buys it for £63.50 and as its P&A wants at least 40% so it sells for £89.99

Alternatively, Mr Carbon Bars knocks out an additional 1000 bars, this puts his costs down to £3 per bar, sells them to a local seller at £6 each who knocks them out on Alibaba at £15 posted seeing a 40% profit for himself, the same as the bike shop here!

That my friends is why stuff costs so much, not because its better.

And before you ask I’ve imported chinese stuff in the same way as superstar do or any others and helped select clothing for a range from a selection of factories that make troylee, 661 answer etc.

Oh and if you think thats bad, its even better for Sunglasses, every one wants 100% margin at every stage!

No conclusion to take from this but just for the record .. I’ve seen fake (or more accurately ‘style-aping’) frames being made in the same Chinese factory that makes some of the most reputed kit and frames out there.

This is the source of so much misunderstanding in this area, it’s a difference in culture that means IP and views of what a product ‘is’ are quite different. There’s more to it than fake vs real, branded vs unbranded.

Whoah. I was to some extent with you right up to that point, where you revealed that you don’t really have that good an understanding of structures, or of composites. Then bending load on a bar does not require the carbon composite to take a bending load – the forces on the carbon walls of the bar are a tension on one side and a compression on the other, which results in a torque force in the bar resisting the bending load. This is a fairly fundamental principle of the use of composites – sandwich construction is widely used where parts are required to resist a bending force, as the foam or honecomb core separates the two sheets of composite material and results in a bending stiffness for the structure as a whole due to compressive and tensile stiffness in the composite. Clearly a hollow tube inherently has the same principle of two separated layers of composite.

What a patronising statement. I’ve got a 1st class and masters degree in mech eng. plus 20 years experience working directly with structures, including carbon. So I’d say I know at least as much as you do about them. I certainly don’t need a patronising ladybird book lecture from you about how two sheets of carbon separated by a bonded lightweight honeycomb core make the the resultant structure so much stronger. I’m sure you know that such a structure requires a decent section to work efficiently, typically a quarter inch core. These carbon bars are not such a construction and the primary load is a pure bending load.

I’ve got a 1st class and masters degree in mech eng

BOOM, there it is again! Shame we don’t have signatures, you could just add that, everyone would know that you can’t ever be wrong then.

but I’m clearly with the majority on here in considering that branded Chinese products (from companies with a track record and good customer service) are no more risky than western branded products.

I have nothing against Chinese manufacture. I was just responding to the original question about a “carbon” bar of totally unknown origin

Then bending load on a bar does not require the carbon composite to take a bending load ..

The clamp is usually the issue.

bland (a few posts up) has the answer.

I’m off to aliexpress with £12.77 in my hand.

So are you basically saying then Moshi that you think the entire bike industry is wrong for using and choosing Carbon to make bars?

If it’s so fundamentally wrong as you suggest then that’s a big error, one we would also expect to be reflected by the failure rate.

Or perhaps despite your knowledge, there are actually people out there with a better understanding than you, or the alternative being that you’re just wrong and your fears are unfounded?

You seems to be swinging around between talking about carbon in general* and your specific thoughts about cheap chinese carbon**.

*which you don’t trust
**which you trust even less

If * is unfounded then perhaps ** is too?

No conclusion to take from this but just for the record .. I’ve seen fake (or more accurately ‘style-aping’) frames being made in the same Chinese factory that makes some of the most reputed kit and frames out there.

This is the source of so much misunderstanding in this area, it’s a difference in culture that means IP and views of what a product ‘is’ are quite different. There’s more to it than fake vs real, branded vs unbranded.

Its very true, small numbers of Chinese invested massively in Carbon technologies when we were still making everything out of billet alloy or welding steel pipes together. They have the technology, however they have so little clue as to what to do with it in terms of design its scary. This is where western designers come in and provide something amazing looking that they produce in their factory to the specific requirements. You see the chinese can do this and do it well, let them go their own way and design something themselves and thats where it all goes wrong!

The catalog may contain tubes of different shape, size, diameter, weave, carbon quality, inserts, clamps, bearing cases, etc etc, this is what they sell. Its then upto the bike company to chose who to give their design to for production. Fake or real, well some will be over runs on teh genuine product, other factories will have now sprung up that will be less reputible and they will copy others designs using their product as a mould.

BOOM, there it is again! Shame we don’t have signatures, you could just add that, everyone would know that you can’t ever be wrong then.

Does it piss you off that someone might actually know more than you about a certain subject? I tend to only comment on things I know something about. So what are your credentials to put me right? Hairdresser, insurance salesman, cheap carbon bar survivor?

Of course it doesn’t, it just amuses me that you’re turning it into top trumps when clearly you don’t really have any experience of this specific use case, and as amedias said either the industry is wrong (entirely possible, although why haven’t all the carbon bars out there broken? Or at least a significant proportion) or your experience perhaps doesn’t hold as much relevance as you want it to.

Aracer disputed your point, your defense was to list your credentials (so as to infer that that makes you right and him wrong). It makes you look silly IMO.

As I said previously I’ve never used cheap carbon bars or any other cheap carbon parts other than a frame and some rims, I’ve used lots of expensive carbon bars (and other parts) though!

I’ve got a 1st class and masters degree in mech eng

-1 credibility point each time you say this. Argue with intelligent comments and verifiable facts, not internet bluster and paper waving.

Or shall we all just state our qualifications and the one with the most wins by default?

Does it piss you off that someone might actually know more than you about a certain subject?

Does it cross your mind that you might not know as much as you think you do?
Or that your experience might not be relevant to the situation?
Or that it might be out of date with current techniques and capabilities?

So what are your credentials to put me right? Hairdresser, insurance salesman, cheap carbon bar survivor?

And trying to goad someone into out-qualificationising you as a come-back makes you looke even sillier.

Bland, it’s true that much of the actual lay-up design process is with the Chinese factories, not in all cases but more so than many may expect. My comment was more about not judging factories entirely on what they make for who, good and less-good stuff can come out of the same door. What the ‘brand’ brings is the understanding of what+why and good design and testing comes from that.
Costing stuff up based on route to market can representative but can miss out those other things that a brand brings to the end product (and the cost of it) and that’s where brand values can differ.

I really would like to see someone take on the challenge of a proper test…

This is a subject I’ve mentioned several times before and the reason I won’t buy magazines which copy & paste manufacturer’s press releases and call it product review.

I can’t read the reviews here[/url] as I’m not a Premier member, but I think it’s safe to assume that not a single one of them mentions any specific figures for deflection under load or stress cycles to failure.
It’s all vague nonsense about “impeccable performance and engineering” and “Solid, sweepy bars with just enough damping”.
Is it really just coincidence that the Chinese manufacturers don’t advertise in STW and never get their products reviewed?

So are you basically saying then Moshi that you think the entire bike industry is wrong for using and choosing Carbon to make bars?

No, I can understand why they do it i.e. competitive stiffness/weight ratio. Same basic reason it’s used in motorsport. I just don’t think it’s the safest option for a mass produced bar for your average weekend warrior. That’s my personal choice based on my personal experience and none of the drivel I’ve bothered to read on this thread has changed my opinion.

The OP asked for an opinion on buying a totally unknown carbon bar from a random ebay seller. I suggested it would be a risky experiment, but some of you guys seem to think it’s a good idea. Good luck with that!

All I read here between the lines here is reverse-brand-snobbery of the highest order and a gung-ho attitude toward experimenting with cheap unknown critical bike parts. No wonder they nickname this place singletwat!

As I said previously I’ve never used cheap carbon bars or any other cheap carbon parts other than a frame and some rims, I’ve used lots of expensive carbon bars (and other parts) though!

You seem to be condoning it though, or just arguing for the sake of it. Anyway it’s getting tedious this thread, time to move on.

Of course I’m condoning it, because I’m not so narrow minded as to think that unless it’s got an expensive logo on it there’s a risk it’ll explode and send carbon shards straight to your heart.

Thousands of these products get sold, if the failure rate was high there would be many many documented instances of it. There aren’t.

-1 credibility point each time you say this. Argue with intelligent comments and verifiable facts, not internet bluster and paper waving.

Or shall we all just state our qualifications and the one with the most wins by default?

You’re the one who was questioning my experience and had the cheek to try to patronise me with your own basic knowledge of structures. I guess I’m just pissing in the wind.

Is it really just coincidence that the Chinese manufacturers don’t advertise in STW and never get their products reviewed?

If you dig out a bike magazine from the mid to late 90’s you will find loads of adverts for parts from Chinese manufacturers, they were commonly advertising anodised alloy parts with terrible adverts, no easy way of buying them and pretty crap designs. These are the factories that then went on to produce items for the big brands and hence stopped advertising in such a way as it was fruitless for them. Instead they took their product catalogs to the big Taiwanese bike Expos and sold their skills to brands from the west, or the likes of Superstar/Planet X to make stuff for them direct.

Buying direct is a calculated risk, the bar that the OP linked to in my eyes is the best of a bad bunch as its not trying to be something it isnt so that suggests to me its an over run, however mine is going on an XC rig as oppose to a alps bashing machine

I’ve never used cheap carbon bars or any other cheap carbon parts other than a frame and some rims

Indeed only trust it on the trivial bits 😕

FWIW i tend to agree but it makes no sense logically

Of course I’m condoning it, because I’m not so narrow minded as to think that unless it’s got an expensive logo on it there’s a risk it’ll explode and send carbon shards straight to your heart.

Thousands of these products get sold, if the failure rate was high there would be many many documented instances of it. There aren’t.

Okay that’s enough of this thread for me. I’m done arguing about it with internet armchair engineers.

The OP asked for an opinion on buying a totally unknown carbon bar from a random ebay seller.

Indeed I did.
I was hoping to get some specific advice, but we seem to have wandered off on to Chinese manufacturing and ethics in general.
I’ve started another thread, but that’s fallen flat, so it looks like we will never know. 😥

Indeed only trust it on the trivial bits
FWIW i tend to agree but it makes no sense logically

I wouldn’t not use it for bars, just haven’t thus far. I’m eyeing up a seatpost at the moment as my (expensive) New Ultimate one is a smidge short, and I don’t want to pay £160 for a new one!

Okay that’s enough of this thread for me. I’m done arguing about it with internet armchair engineers.

Or, you could dispute what I’ve said with evidence, not your prejudices. I’m not pretending to be an engineer, armchair, chartered or otherwise, I’m just applying some common sense.

No, I can understand why they do it i.e. competitive stiffness/weight ratio. Same basic reason it’s used in motorsport. I just don’t think it’s the safest option for a mass produced bar for your average weekend warrior

Well weekend warriors as you put it would seem to be a great use case, if it’s stiffer and stronger than alternative materials then weekend warriors with low to moderate load scenarios would be a great place to lose some weight with no loss of strength or expectation of extreme load.

If you really think it’s not the best material due to inherent drawbacks then the place you really should be advocating not using it is in pro and competitive use, where the loads are higher and the risk of a failure greater both in physical harm, and in lost ranking are not enough to counter the small weigh penalty. Yet pro competition us is exactly where carbon is used most heavily, where it provides a genuine advantage.

if it was such a poor choice and a big risk all the pro teams would be falling back on overbuilt aluminium just for safety.

That’s my personal choice based on my personal experience and none of the drivel I’ve bothered to read on this thread has changed my opinion

But your experiences are not of carbon bars, cheap or otherwise, nor have you presented any reasonable justification other than ‘I don’t trust carbon’

Which is a fine reason, just stop trying to make out that it’s because you know they are inferior. You don’t.

The OP asked for an opinion on buying a totally unknown carbon bar from a random ebay seller. I suggested it would be a risky experiment, but some of you guys seem to think it’s a good idea. Good luck with that!

Did you read my earlier comments about taking that risk purely out of curiosity, as I was being open minded enough to actually have a look, rather than assuming all the unsupported here-say was right. I was totally prepared for them to break on the first ride. But they haven’t they remained surprisingly in tact despite some abuse.

All I read here between the lines here is reverse-brand-snobbery of the highest order

That’s a load of twaddle, if you looked at Njees bikes, or mine, or plenty of others you’d find plenty of posh branded stuff as well. You can’t accuse someone of reverse brand snobbery when they purchase and use some of the expensive branded bits as well!

It’s not about brand snobbery, reverse or otherwise, it’s about recognising that good products don’t have to be expensive or have a particular sticker on them.

You’re the one who was questioning my experience and had the cheek to try to patronise me with your own basic knowledge of structures. I guess I’m just pissing in the wind.

er, if you read the thread, I haven’t revealed anything about my knowledge of structures, basic or otherwise, and I don’t think I made any patronising commens? perhaps you have confused me with another poster?

I was questioning you because you were playing the ‘I’m an engineer so I know better’ card. I see no reasoned arguments, facts or verifiable data or evidence from your comments, but lots of ‘I know better, trust me, I’m an Engineer’.

I also have qualifications, but I’m not using them to try and put down other posters, and I won’t rise to you paperwork one-uppery it’s arrogant and unpleasant.

Or, you could dispute what I’ve said with evidence, not your prejudices. I’m not pretending to be an engineer, armchair, chartered or otherwise, I’m just applying some common sense.

I don’t see the point. You obviously think you know better and I can clearly see that nothing I say is going to make any difference. As for you applying some common sense, a lot of your posts in this thread imply a total lack of. But I’m certainly not going to argue about that either!

er, if you read the thread, I haven’t revealed anything about my knowledge of structures, basic or otherwise, and I don’t think I made any patronising commens? perhaps you have confused me with another poster?

My apologies, I did confuse you with another poster.

As for you applying some common sense, a lot of your posts in this thread imply a total lack of.

I’ll bite then. How am I exhibiting a “total lack of common sense”?

You obviously think you know better and I can clearly see that nothing I say is going to make any difference.

You’re probably right, because you’ve not got any first hand experience of the products being discussed, and you’re dismissing them entirely as dangerous, risky, whatever. As you have absolutely no idea about that I have indeed considered your opinion on this matter as worthless. Until you give any evidence to the contrary why should I, or anyone, give any credence to your opinion? And I don’t mean a piece of paper.