0-Carb (Javelin Amarone) No Carbon Fiber - 6.35kg (14lb)

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2lo8
Posts: 551
Joined: Thu Mar 31, 2016 10:32 am

by 2lo8

I think I realized the reason why I feel like XR-200s aren't as stiff/strong of a rim. It has less to do with the lateral stiffness or anything, and more to do with the spoke tension drop, when a tire is fitted and inflated, combined with the slightly uneven spoke tension and bad tension balance in the rear, in the back of my mind making me constantly think weak wheel.

Replaced the seatpost again, and just bought another seatpost to replace that one. For some reason I am going through lots of seatposts on this frame. I have had some 5, soon to be 6 different seatposts fitted to this frame.

Ordered some more stuff from J&L, very hit and miss.

J&L is rather unhappy with me because I decided not to eat the cost for link housing which wouldn't fit in the endcaps, and he was telling me how no one else had problems and he installed it on his own bikes. I'm not sure what to say, the OD of the largest part of the links was greater than 5.20mm, the endcaps ID was 5.05mm, for 5mm housing, he didn't beleive me. I guess I could have installed it without endcaps, but why include endcaps that don't fit. It also wasn't particularly light. I already have aluminum brake housing, and it really wasn't any lighter than the shift housing not counting reduction in length. Thinking about Jagwire XEX-SL, but the kits aren't cheap, and savings probably not that great.

The ceramic J&L BSA30 BB is not good. It is very very light at 52g, but this is acheived through a smaller and narrower bearing, meaning less bearing load area and smaller load bearing balls. The seal that comes with it a rather poorly molded and has lots and lots of drag. There was also the rather major issue that the my crank washer/spacers OD was too large for the reduced size bearing cup. It might be that they intend for the seal to replace those washers. I don't think this is a real substitute for a proper BSA30 BB.

I have some J&L speedplay spindles for my pedal project, which were as expected, but the 3D printer I bought ran into problems out of the box, so it is off getting warranty repairs.

I bought one of the integrated top caps, which is under 5g. It's not quite the same design as Absolute black, although that should be obvious from the weight difference. I bought it more because I was thinking of removing some logos, and I think the Aerozine top cap is laser etched.

It should be down to under 6.5kg now. Haven't had much of a chance to ride due to tendonitis.
[14lb(6.35kg) of no carbon fiber]
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Klaster_1
Posts: 1390
Joined: Mon Aug 15, 2016 10:25 am
Location: Paphos, Cyprus

by Klaster_1

2lo8 wrote:
Sat Apr 21, 2018 10:25 am
Thinking about Jagwire XEX-SL, but the kits aren't cheap, and savings probably not that great.
Not sure if that counts as expensive, but my kit of XEX-SL off eBay was 30USD including shipping. The set has enough of shifting housing to fit an internally routed frame with a decent chunk left, good for at least one additional section. The weight is about 25.7g/m. My old SP-41 housing was roughly 33.8g/m, ~13g saved by going the XEX-SL: not much, but still better than other options.

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2lo8
Posts: 551
Joined: Thu Mar 31, 2016 10:32 am

by 2lo8

Thanks for the info. Expensive in the sense that I was guessing it was more than the $1/g I like to keep things under and I'm not in need of new cables. Maybe next time I change out cables.
[14lb(6.35kg) of no carbon fiber]
[2lo8.wordpress.com]
Your one-stop source for information and reviews on cheap eBay bike junk.

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Klaster_1
Posts: 1390
Joined: Mon Aug 15, 2016 10:25 am
Location: Paphos, Cyprus

by Klaster_1

2lo8 wrote:
Sat Apr 21, 2018 12:27 pm
I was guessing it was more than the $1/g I like to keep things under
Did you consider a PYC chain? It's exactly on the verge of 1$/g, saved me 32g over an HG600.

craciunptr
Posts: 114
Joined: Sun Apr 29, 2012 8:32 pm

by craciunptr

really love you got back to building this up ! Such a great project

Keep up the good work!

How do you find the performance of the groupset so far? Your reviews of the parts made me really question why you would pay for a top tier groupset.

2lo8
Posts: 551
Joined: Thu Mar 31, 2016 10:32 am

by 2lo8

I have bought a number of things from J&L. Some good, some not so good. I have eaten the cost on several J&L products that turned out to be bad, and I chose not to this time when there was an obvious manufacturing and compatibility defect, which J&L denied and blamed user error. After waiting over a month sending it back, it now seems like J&L had me return it to them with no intention of ever actually refunding me. I sent it by the mail service they told me, which apparently does not track in China. All I can say is buyer beware. J&L is very hit and miss, and after this I will most likely not purchase further products from J&L.

The item in question was the nokon-like link housing. The outer diameter of the links was, ~5.20mm, greater than the the ID of the endcaps ~ 5.05mm. In other words, the links would not fit in the endcaps.
[14lb(6.35kg) of no carbon fiber]
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Your one-stop source for information and reviews on cheap eBay bike junk.

dudemanppl
Posts: 1263
Joined: Fri Feb 22, 2013 5:09 am

by dudemanppl

XEX-SL is trash, not worth the money at all. I had zero braking power with them.

2lo8
Posts: 551
Joined: Thu Mar 31, 2016 10:32 am

by 2lo8

It's a good thing you weren't hurt. XEX-SL is shift housing and not rated for braking. Shift housing can burst when used as brake housing and leave you with zero braking power so it's very dangerous to use as brake housing. I'm using Odyssey Race Linear Slic which is an aluminum strand compressionless brake housing, actually made for BMX bikes.
[14lb(6.35kg) of no carbon fiber]
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JerryLook
Posts: 305
Joined: Thu Dec 07, 2017 2:18 am

by JerryLook

2lo8 wrote:
Fri May 18, 2018 9:10 am
I'm using Odyssey Race Linear Slic which is an aluminum strand compressionless brake housing, actually made for BMX bikes.
I’m looking at this brand brake housing. I noticed there is a race version and a regular version. Do you just have experience with the race version?

It looks like both weigh the same, from the info on their website.

I can get the regular for 10$ for one cable and housing, or 15$ for the race version.

Are you using the Odyssey housing with different cables, or are you using their provided brake cables as well?

Sorry for so many questions. I am looking for a lighter brake cable that is cheaper. I also came across people using unlined housing.
2010 Orbea Opal 54cm
5.97kg

jeanjacques
Posts: 349
Joined: Thu Apr 14, 2016 11:01 am
Location: France

by jeanjacques

Hello, an another alternative for alloy housing: Clarks Zero-G. Cheap and easy to find. Used it with cable disc brake (rear), no problem.

JerryLook
Posts: 305
Joined: Thu Dec 07, 2017 2:18 am

by JerryLook

jeanjacques wrote:
Sun Sep 09, 2018 7:46 pm
Hello, an another alternative for alloy housing: Clarks Zero-G. Cheap and easy to find. Used it with cable disc brake (rear), no problem.
Hey thanks for the info. I checked the Clarks brake cable kits out. It looks like I want the 7160 kit? It has the Kevlar housing, but I am confused what the cable material is. It mentions alloy in the ad? I would hope they use stainless cables.
2010 Orbea Opal 54cm
5.97kg

2lo8
Posts: 551
Joined: Thu Mar 31, 2016 10:32 am

by 2lo8

JerryLook wrote:
Sun Sep 09, 2018 2:39 pm

I’m looking at this brand brake housing. I noticed there is a race version and a regular version. Do you just have experience with the race version?

It looks like both weigh the same, from the info on their website.

I can get the regular for 10$ for one cable and housing, or 15$ for the race version.

Are you using the Odyssey housing with different cables, or are you using their provided brake cables as well?

Sorry for so many questions. I am looking for a lighter brake cable that is cheaper. I also came across people using unlined housing.
I'm pretty sure the blurb is wrong. It's supposed to reduce weight by 30%. The inner is meant for BMX so it has the wrong head for road. It only comes with one anyways, but since it's meant for a full length run with barspins, it had enough for a road bike.
[14lb(6.35kg) of no carbon fiber]
[2lo8.wordpress.com]
Your one-stop source for information and reviews on cheap eBay bike junk.

JerryLook
Posts: 305
Joined: Thu Dec 07, 2017 2:18 am

by JerryLook

So are you saying the one piece of housing has enough for front and back brakes on a road bike?

Did you happen to weigh the housing before you installed it?
2010 Orbea Opal 54cm
5.97kg

2lo8
Posts: 551
Joined: Thu Mar 31, 2016 10:32 am

by 2lo8

Really late reply, I forgot to weight it, I only remember it was lighter. If I remember correctly one piece was enough for my small bike. I should be able to get it to 14 pounds but this hasn't been my main project bike recently. I have some parts to swap out.

In other news, my pedal is coming along. Looks like it's going to turn out 40-45g each. Hopefully I'll get some sort of working prototype by April.
[14lb(6.35kg) of no carbon fiber]
[2lo8.wordpress.com]
Your one-stop source for information and reviews on cheap eBay bike junk.

2lo8
Posts: 551
Joined: Thu Mar 31, 2016 10:32 am

by 2lo8

After a number of redeisgns, I have something I can test. I'm not happy about the tolerances of the prints and am skeptical about the strength, but I think it's good enough to mount up and test to see how they work. The design is supposed to have 6 degrees of float, but it doesn't really work well due to poor tolerances. Bearing fit is also not great. Stack height is 10.5mm, 13.5mm with adapters. I could probably drop it another millimeter with a custom spindle. Having to build around already existing spindles limits some of my design options.

Weights are ~81g for the pedals and ~33g for 4-bolt cleats. Add 11g for screws that brings 4 bolt "system weight" to 125g or 170g with 3 to 4 bolt adapters and hardware. With lighter 3-4 bolt adapters and hardware, that would be closer to 155g. Weight could probably be brought down another 6-12g using plastic bushings instead of bearings but it feels like cheating.

It's difficult to compete with a lot of the really WW pedal systems because they seem to be willing to make too many sacrifices I don't like. Bushings instead of bearings, disregard for proper cleat placement, zero float, lack of really clipping in, awful unclipping motions etc. If I was willing to make the same cleat hole sacrifices I could probably do away with the 3 to 4 bolt adapter without much change in cleat weight. I have another related design that has more walkable cleats and would do away with the need for adapters so system weight might decrease, but pedal weight would increase to about 100g and the spindles I am working with are not the best shape for that.

It really confounds me how several of the super WW options are willing to forgo proper cleat placement on super premium products with extremely limited fore/aft adjustment and forcing the spindle half way between the front and rear bolts. It's tempting to cheat with bushings and cleat placement just so I can say I have 125g total system weight. Then again, I already have 125g system weight if you use a 4 bolt shoe.
[14lb(6.35kg) of no carbon fiber]
[2lo8.wordpress.com]
Your one-stop source for information and reviews on cheap eBay bike junk.

by Weenie


Visit starbike.com Online Retailer for HighEnd cycling components
Great Prices ✓    Broad Selection ✓    Worldwide Delivery ✓

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