lol o no i didn't just use felt as a brake hood

props to you young one. your balls must be huge to drillium the component which essentially initiates the stopping process on a bicycle

Lets not discuss size... Haha for now I'm still sceptical of the excessive drilled state of my brake levers, but hey, how are you supposed to learn without absolutely ruining something? Lets just hope early tests prove instant and we don't have a whoopsie at speed. I'll post an update of how to do the shift lever tune later on... The felt is a really nice good actually... It's made the grip area smaller (small hands) which I like, it fits nicer and best of all is 20 grams lighter!!!

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These look awesome. I guess my main concern would be the lack of material near the top end of the lever towards the pivot point. Down near the bottom it doesn't matter as much. Personally I would have left an increasing amount of material as I approached the lever body, but that's me. Before you know it you'll have done a few thousand km on them without noticing and then the next groupset will come out and you'll learn from what you've done and take the lessons across to tuning that

I'm really impressed with this whole project

Thanks oysters, i actually agree with you, if i was doing it over i would leave more especially around the pivot point... im contemplating a small re inforcement... Does anyone have any experience in getting parts from the SRAM spare parts catalouge?

see here for SRAM spares, i cant seem to find where to get the parts here in NZ, and i work in the field of cycling...

http://cdn.sram.com/cdn/farfuture/CCN8l ... _rev_a.pdf

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alrighty... put 500km on the new levers over the weekend (3 days thanks to a holiday), 155km race in blistering sun, you should see the tan lines, followed by riding home after the race (it didnt go well, angry ride home ) the next day a windy 3 hours, and the following day after my race was cancelled due to sleet, i rode nearly 300km home from the event is snow, rain, wind and all things we roadies dislike. I have discovered a small aesthetical issue with the felt hoods. after the 1000km I've ridden on them so far, they have slowly where the bar tape and hood meets have shifted up, giving the hood a silly shape onto of the bar like so...



its aesthetical which is why it annoys me, any ideas on remedying it? or is it just the shape that i cut it to, protruding to far up the bar and then being susceptible to shifting as the adhesion isn't super strong. Alternatively i could remove the adhesive section here and let it move?

Thoughts?

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With no personal experience yet with making felt hoods (I'd love to, I'm just too busy), I would think that the adhesion would be the main issue. For your next pair, you could take a picture(s) before/after so that you can tell how much it moves, and also how the felt changes over time. Try and take the pictures from the same angle each time, inside under the same lighting conditions (close the garage door, turn the lights on).

I'm pretty impressed that you've got 1000km on them so far, without any real worries.

they were shaped much the same as the originals, kinda swooped over the top all clean lined... ill make a new pair when i can be bothered...

its been a big week of riding and racing oysters... so big

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You ever think of using a cloth tape. When I used to play hockey we used cloth hockey tape and it worked great on Carbon Sticks. The crazy thing was that the more sweaty it got the better it stuck. Had a hell of a time removing it when I wanted to change it out. Had to cut it off with a razor blade. You can get it in red also.

http://www.ultimatehockeyonline.com/pro ... d-Red.html

Update on my work (related to the thread, aforementioned) -
Working with a new material now, putting 'felt' on the side and focusing on the newer material.
It's more luxurious, minor weight penalty to felt but still a dramatic weight loss compared to the original hoods.
More durable.
More consistent.
Also working on light weight options for refined mounting.
Black only, for now.

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Exp001

Hey prendrefeu , does your new hoods have adhesive backing ?

prendrefeu

Sounds exciting! Any thoughts as to whether you might branch out to other hoods down the track if your hoods for Red take off?

This sounds so yummy that I might have to invest in some Red levers (and gut the shift mech as I only really want the brake levers)...

pics prendre! pics please! im considering branching out as well, but for now i have other projects to finish. what is this magic material prendre?

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Had a thought, how much weight does felt absorb in water? I imagine it would be quite significant. Over the course of a very hot sweaty ride, or a wet rainy one, would it be more than that saved from going from rubber hoods?

How about treating the felt with say, silicon spray to reduce its water absorption? Might also increase its durability.

The felt can be made to be 'water resistant' easily - the burning technique works to harden the surface, and when it eventually does get wet it will dry quickly because it's so thin. If you're riding in the rain the extra grams on your hoods from water is the least of your worries.

The problem with the felt is that it will look pretty bad if you don't harden the surface: left plain the felt will pile substantially and look pretty bad after just one ride of use (if you ride on the hoods a lot, for example).

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For now, yes. It seems like it's a necessary thing. I'm working on this project on the side with a great friend of mine (fellow artist, creative tinkerer and trained as an architect like myself) - so we're applying the knowledge and skills we gained in arch grad school (aka, prison) to see what's possible. So the progress will be slow even though we occasionally have a few days of push in between the projects that pay the bills and keep clients happy. As I write this he's working on a method to avoid the adhesive backing or at least minimize it somehow (taking into consideration mass production issues), I'm meeting up with him tomorrow over lunch and we'll see where we are and how we can overcome some obstacles.

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Exp001