Birthday build: Filament road disc, clincher, 7kg goal

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AZR3
Posts: 998
Joined: Wed Sep 12, 2012 9:00 pm
Location: Az USA

by AZR3

Beautiful bike but if BB is out of spec I would not have accepted that! Why offer it if you can't do it correctly?

by Weenie


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Seedster
Posts: 672
Joined: Fri Jun 05, 2015 11:05 pm

by Seedster

Agreed. I would have trouble tolerating an out of spec bottom bracket. Getting it right is imperative to a lengthy ownership. The builder should compensate you or build another the right way.


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jever98
Posts: 1175
Joined: Wed Feb 18, 2009 12:02 pm
Location: Seattle

by jever98

Thanks all.

The BB point is something that I went back and forth on. Yes, it seems about 0.1mm bigger in diameter. I would probably not have noticed if I hadn't chosen a 1-piece BB design, which relies on good tolerance matches.

In the end it wasn't worth the hassle and aggravation to insist on it being fixed. The frame works very well and it's not super clear where tolerances begin and end.
----
No longer in the industry

Wingnut
Posts: 2196
Joined: Sat Jun 23, 2007 12:41 am

by Wingnut

I'm curious as to what the response was with regards to informing the manufacturer of the bottom bracket issue with the frame?

hambini
Posts: 580
Joined: Tue Nov 15, 2016 8:13 am
Location: Cologne, Germany

by hambini

Wingnut wrote:
Tue Jul 17, 2018 10:51 am
I'm curious as to what the response was with regards to informing the manufacturer of the bottom bracket issue with the frame?
I'm not the customer in this but I am the bottom bracket supplier. So here's the comments from my end. I am in the process of uploading a video about Richard Craddock's engineering practices because he is grade A clown. Read a few posts previously about his suggestion of blu tack?!? Crazy.

So here we go

Customer orders bike frame and one of my bottom brackets, the bottom bracket had to be a custom fit to accommodate the customer's specific crankset.

I made everything up and checked it and sent it off to Switzerland.

After one ride the customer emailed both me (Hambini) and Filament with a picture showing the bottom bracket had come out of the shell. I absolutely hate it when my engineering is not up to scratch and being dyslexic I always worry that I have made a mistake so I emailed everybody and stated the sizes I made the bottom bracket to. Richard emailed the customer (didn't bother copying me) with a picture of an arbitary piece of carbon tubing that he measured with an el cheapo vernier caliper and said it was 45.97mm and therefore within specification.

That was basically the end of his involvement for now and blamed my bottom bracket for being too slack.

I had to make sure that I didn't have any errors so I machined up a checking gauge to assess how big the bottom bracket on this bike was and mailed to the customer. He checked it in his living room and it went clean through the shell (ie 46.1mm). I checked my checking gauge on a CMM machine that is calibrated monthly and does the checks on F35 and Typhoon engines. Filament were challenged on this and his come back was the most diabolical thing I have ever heard

"It's cold in Switzerland and the checking gauge might have shrunk"

I machined an oversized bottom bracket and the customer's problem went away. Whilst it is probably not my responsibility to sort the customer's problem out, I did so anyway.

As far as filament goes. I then rang Richard Craddock up to have a chat with him. His basic engineering is frankly a joke. I don't know how he is in business, if he has engineering qualifications it will be form a mickey mouse college. Anyone who is in professional business and uses a vernier to measure to 0.01mm needs their head looking at and furthermore he has a "checking gauge" that he bought from some back alley machine shop that is allegedly 45.97mm that has never been checked. He doesn't understand the concept of ISO fits or GO/No Go gauges. It doesn't surprise me that his bike frame has a slack bottom bracket with his poor engineering practices.

I am on the training committee for some of the Aerospace companies in the Bristol (UK) area (Airbus, Rolls-Royce, MBDA Missile Systems) and we now use his bike frame as a case study of poor engineering practices and how to spot a bull**** engineer trying to pull a fast one.

Hambini
Hambini Aeronautical Engineer, Polluting YouTube since 2016 - views expressed are my own...

User avatar
ms6073
Posts: 4290
Joined: Fri Jul 23, 2004 8:24 pm
Location: Houston, Texas

by ms6073

Seems to me that Filament not only owes the OP an apology, but maybe some euros as well!
- Michael
"People should stop expecting normal from me... seriously, we all know it's never going to happen"

AZR3
Posts: 998
Joined: Wed Sep 12, 2012 9:00 pm
Location: Az USA

by AZR3

hambini wrote:
Tue Jul 31, 2018 10:40 pm

I am on the training committee for some of the Aerospace companies in the Bristol (UK) area (Airbus, Rolls-Royce, MBDA Missile Systems) and we now use his bike frame as a case study of poor engineering practices and how to spot a bull**** engineer trying to pull a fast one.

Hambini
:shock:

I’d be nice to hear from Richard about how he let that QC issue out of his shop but I don’t think that’s too likely

hambini
Posts: 580
Joined: Tue Nov 15, 2016 8:13 am
Location: Cologne, Germany

by hambini

In all honesty. Throughout my professional engineering career, I've made screw ups, my colleagues have made screw ups and suppliers have made screw ups. The vast majority of people openly admit they screwed up, apologize and we all move on. That doesn't happen with Filament, they screw up, do very little to correct it and then take the customers money.

Filament made no effort to check his bottom bracket was within specification.
He measures ridicoulously tight tolerances with a vernier caliper (and thinks it's acceptable)
Has a checking gauge that meausres a minimum (ie making sure the bottom bracket is at least 45.97mm), no maximum gauge
Has a checking gauge that he asked some third party engineering company to machine to a precise tolerance that he has never had checked, it could be 46.5mm, the fact is he doesn't know!

Then on the customer service front
When the prospect of his tolerances were brought up, he was totally stand offish, didn't reply to my emails
Doesn't offer any compensation

This guy makes my blood boil.
Hambini Aeronautical Engineer, Polluting YouTube since 2016 - views expressed are my own...

User avatar
kgt
Posts: 8749
Joined: Sun Jun 18, 2006 10:29 am
Location: Athens, Greece

by kgt

Oblviously some carbon tubes and a cool 'artisanal' paintjob do not make for a good frame. I wonder how much Craddock charges for his frames...
Last edited by kgt on Thu Aug 02, 2018 11:31 am, edited 1 time in total.

Wingnut
Posts: 2196
Joined: Sat Jun 23, 2007 12:41 am

by Wingnut

hambini wrote:
Tue Jul 31, 2018 10:40 pm
Wingnut wrote:
Tue Jul 17, 2018 10:51 am
I'm curious as to what the response was with regards to informing the manufacturer of the bottom bracket issue with the frame?
I'm not the customer in this but I am the bottom bracket supplier. So here's the comments from my end. I am in the process of uploading a video about Richard Craddock's engineering practices because he is grade A clown. Read a few posts previously about his suggestion of blu tack?!? Crazy.

So here we go

Customer orders bike frame and one of my bottom brackets, the bottom bracket had to be a custom fit to accommodate the customer's specific crankset.

I made everything up and checked it and sent it off to Switzerland.

After one ride the customer emailed both me (Hambini) and Filament with a picture showing the bottom bracket had come out of the shell. I absolutely hate it when my engineering is not up to scratch and being dyslexic I always worry that I have made a mistake so I emailed everybody and stated the sizes I made the bottom bracket to. Richard emailed the customer (didn't bother copying me) with a picture of an arbitary piece of carbon tubing that he measured with an el cheapo vernier caliper and said it was 45.97mm and therefore within specification.

That was basically the end of his involvement for now and blamed my bottom bracket for being too slack.

I had to make sure that I didn't have any errors so I machined up a checking gauge to assess how big the bottom bracket on this bike was and mailed to the customer. He checked it in his living room and it went clean through the shell (ie 46.1mm). I checked my checking gauge on a CMM machine that is calibrated monthly and does the checks on F35 and Typhoon engines. Filament were challenged on this and his come back was the most diabolical thing I have ever heard

"It's cold in Switzerland and the checking gauge might have shrunk"

I machined an oversized bottom bracket and the customer's problem went away. Whilst it is probably not my responsibility to sort the customer's problem out, I did so anyway.

As far as filament goes. I then rang Richard Craddock up to have a chat with him. His basic engineering is frankly a joke. I don't know how he is in business, if he has engineering qualifications it will be form a mickey mouse college. Anyone who is in professional business and uses a vernier to measure to 0.01mm needs their head looking at and furthermore he has a "checking gauge" that he bought from some back alley machine shop that is allegedly 45.97mm that has never been checked. He doesn't understand the concept of ISO fits or GO/No Go gauges. It doesn't surprise me that his bike frame has a slack bottom bracket with his poor engineering practices.

I am on the training committee for some of the Aerospace companies in the Bristol (UK) area (Airbus, Rolls-Royce, MBDA Missile Systems) and we now use his bike frame as a case study of poor engineering practices and how to spot a bull**** engineer trying to pull a fast one.

Hambini
All I can say is WOW...I'm in shock at this!

Thanks for the update.

sawyer
Posts: 4485
Joined: Fri Dec 15, 2006 7:45 pm
Location: Natovi Landing

by sawyer

jever98 wrote:
Fri Jul 13, 2018 11:20 pm
Update: 2000km report (tl;dr for some, probably - see below if you're interested in details ;-))
Image
(photo still with my crappy camera, sorry)

This build has taken a good ol' while to come together. I hit a couple of bumps along the way to completing it, but it's now up and running and I have put more than 2000km on the bike, in all sorts of conditions and terrain - from riding a local crit to doing a 240k all day epic around Mt Rainier. I'll try to give as honest of a review as I am able to :-)

Overall
I wanted to build a disc road bike that would replace my rim brake Pasculli, with the aim of arriving at 7kg ready to ride, with clinchers. The bike should work for me - 2m tall, close to 90kg, and should not compromise too much on usability. Having had a number of bikes over the past few years, and being an opinonated afficionado, I wanted to build the bike exactly as I want it, with lots of custom parts. I really enjoyed the process of agonising over every part, finding the right compromise for me between weight, usability, looks, and price, and getting everything together.

It took me close to 8 months to complete the build, from ordering the frame from Richard in August, to having it ready to ride in late April. Along the way, I hit a few road bumps, but overall, I must say I am pretty happy with the result.

Ride quality
I wanted the bike to be endurance oriented, with good bump absorption, and delivers fully on that. Compared to the Pasculli I retained the same stack and reach, but increased chain stay length to 420mm and BB drop to 75mm. I also increased the top tube slope to achieve a longer exposed seat post, to get some compliance out of the seat post whilst maintaining a compact frame triangle.

I would be lying if I said I can isolate the role of each component, but overall the ride quality is extremely nice: the 25mm Schwalbe Pro Ones ride super well at 4.5-5 bars, giving great grip and comfort and rolling fast. Bigger bumps are way more muted than on the Pasculli. The front end feels less stiff, which I thought I would dislike, but I never got a feeling of instability in the frame, even at high speeds.

The cornering response is more muted than on the Pasculli, making for more understeer. This took some getting used to. On a future bike I would like to try slightly shorter (415mm) chain stays, to see if that is the sweet spot.

Frame
Richard was a pleasure to work with in the process. He is still relatively new to the business and I asked some pretty special things, including an integrated seat post clamp, hidden fender mounts, a custom tool box to go at the bottom of the triangle, and a slightly complicated polka-dot fade on the inside of the fork and chain stays. He initially said he could deliver on all of them, but had to back track on the integrated seat clamp and hidden fender stays later on.

The frame came out very nicely: the paint job is superbly executed, the finish extremely clean, and I find the proportions of the frame with a bigger slope in the top tube and long exposed seat post work well for such a big bike.

In the vein of being honest about what didn't work well or what I don't like: I'm not the biggest fan of the narrow top tube combined with the chunky head tube. Personally I would prefer a top tube that flares out at the front and that makes for a more harmonious junction with the head tube. Two other points I like a little less: the insert for the rear axle is an eccentric nut that is installed as a slip fit. This means that if you rotate the nut, the rear wheel alignment changes. The nut moves too easily and Richard suggested using blu tack to secure it, which I thought wasn't appropriate for such a high end frame. In the end I used Activator + Loctite for press fits and have not seen it move.

The other thing that wasn't perfect (and I know I am being picky) was the PF30 shell: it came out over spec size. As a result, the Hambini bottom bracket I ordered moved. Hambini was super nice and made me an oversized one, but it kept me from riding for a while.

Wheels and tires
I got Venn TCD35s laced up with Sapim CX-Ray and Sprint spokes on Carbon-ti hubs. On the first set of rims I was unlucky - the front rim had a manufacturing fault and had to be changed very quickly. Since then the wheelset has been solid and I've become a big fan of the tubeless setup. The hubs are very loud - it took me a while to get used to it. Normally I prefer a quieter free hub, but it has turned out to be quite useful when coming up on people - you definitely don't need a bell.

Cockpit, seatpost, saddle
The Schmolke handlebar and seat post are superbly made and mega light. I love the finish on them and the comfort I get out of the seat post. The handlebars are definitely not super stiff, but sufficiently stiff for my needs, as I'm not a sprinter. I must say I'm not such a big fan of the Extralite stem - the T20 bolts are just annoying and I have the impression that it's hard to keep it from creaking. The Meld saddle is superb imho, works extremely well for me.

Cranks and power meter
After a short interlude with a quarq PM I went back to P2M and haven't regretted it - it works very well and harmonizes well with the debadged S-Works cranks.

Drive train
ETAP shifting has been almost as good as di2, though I sometimes get hesitation in the middle of the cassette. I may have to check hanger alignment to exclude that as a source of problems. On two occasions I had short (<30s) dropouts. Not sure why.
Personally, I prefer the ETAP shift paddles to Di2 buttons, the ergonomics work better for me, and the cable-free install is nice. Overall I'm very happy with ETAP. I experimented with Ashima rotors, but went back to SRAM Centerline, because the rotors did not play well with ETAP HRD - spongy lever feel and too much lever throw, as the rotors are extremely thin and have little contact patch.

Finally I'd like to give a shoutout to Hambini for his superb bottom bracket - it has been rock solid and is a beautiful piece of equipment.

So when it's all said and done and my new bike enthusiasm has worn off a little, I have to say I like the bike a lot and am extremely happy with the choices I made!

Thanks for reading :-D
Just amazing how forgiving some people are to their favourite custom builders because they are a "pleasure to work with ... " etc.

The BB and blu-tac thing are plain farcical. Seriously. Could you make this crap up. What if Specialized, Trek, or Giant recommended blu-tac. Or perhaps sellotape?

If true, it is just utterly laughable incompetence on the part of Filament.
----------------------------------------
Stiff, Light, Aero - Pick Three!! :thumbup:

jever98
Posts: 1175
Joined: Wed Feb 18, 2009 12:02 pm
Location: Seattle

by jever98

I feel I should chip in again, as the OP: yes, I have not been impressed with how the BB saga went, or the blu tack comment. In the end, I decided to cut my losses and enjoy the bike, because going after Filament for compensation would probably not have yielded much and just have made me feel more frustrated with my choice.

Now that I have a BB that fits and I have fixed the rear drop out insert (not with blu tack), I have had no problems. I enjoy riding the bike a lot, but would likely not order another frame from him as things stand.

Cheers
----
No longer in the industry

HenHarrier
Posts: 53
Joined: Mon Jan 01, 2018 10:34 am

by HenHarrier

Wow, that's a sorry tale. I've never dealt with Filament but fwiw (and sorry if off topic) I've had two bbs from Hambini to sort out creaking and ticking on two different bikes and he was great to deal with. Customer service is everything imho, especially when backed up with superb product.

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