Congratulations, are you happy with it so far?
Looking forward to your final result.
Did you have any luck with Yishun allowing you to share the pictures you mentioned before?
It's a good frame. We have a handful of other Chinese frames we are testing with at the moment, but the R068D is kinda the one I'm keeping personally because the geometry fits me best. It rides well, is comfy and handles speed well while cornering.
Some things below:
Bottom bracket hole was undersized by 0.02mm compared to what shimano specifies for bb86. So if fitting a higher end bb, this will need to be measured and corrected. I have a bore gauge and hone so this was easy, just time consuming.
The mating surface of the bb on the frame was not faced after paint. Not exactly an issue but I'd prefer to see this faced at least somewhat. Using a feeler gauge, I was able to get a 0.0015mm in at around 1/8th of the bb mating surface, the rest was flush, so actually pretty good.
Rear caliper mounts weren't perfectly faced super cleanly, although they were flat enough. Didn't make a difference in terms of assembly and the pads don't rub even with a 140mm to 160mm adapter but it's something I'd prefer to see.
We don't have any facing tools, so I did not attempt to face these freehand since sanding can make it a whole lot worse, plus the surfaces measured pretty flat and was a non-issue, but still I'd prefer these to be nicer.
Concentricity wasn't measured as this is then getting into specialist and quite expensive tools and it's outside the scope of this round of builds/testing.
No torque specs were supplied and were not supplied when requested. In fact, Kitty said she did not know the torque specs when asked. It's not a huge big deal since most bolts of respective sizes generally share torque ranges across the entire frame, but I found it strange that they did not know the torque specs to which they manufacture the frame.
The headset cap a few people here have sanded down does not need sanding. The split ring that sits in the bearing will compress down when the headset stack is compressed and remove any gap. I suspect people who have sanded it will have micro knocking in the steerer from an ever so slightly loose headset (which can be dangerous over time). The stems fit quite tight, so compression is a bit of a task and requires a bit of fiddling. This results in the headset cover appearing as though there is a gap if there isn't sufficient compression.
The front cap of the stem is alu not carbon.
The grommets supplied aren't really di2 grommets, they're more for hydro lines. I prefer a tight seal around the wires, so had to source alternatives.
The stem expander seemed okay and quite long, but we still used a Deda HSS 70mm one (as we do on all our builds).
The handlebars supplied were okay, but speeder's are way better (for me) in terms of shape. The top section is way deeper and the flare is bigger on the speeder bars.
The dropouts are solid reinforced carbon. This is a bit shit, the thru axles and wheels need to be perfectly clean every time they go on/off so grease doesn't attack the epoxy and soften the carbon (same reason you don't grease bearing seats in a carbon headset...). Plus I don't like the idea of thru axle threads going through a hole that isn't reinforced with metal. Can abrade over time if not aware of it. Plus I don't love the idea of 10Nm of compression without metal reinforcement. They assure me it's fine and the frame is sold in Europe direct and through few brands without issue, but I still don't like it.
The complaints above might seem like alot, but compared to other experiences with other brands, western big brands and chinese, this was actually a dream and it's quite good. Just being objective and realistic.
After presenting some of the above, Kitty urged me not to make any modifications prior to assembly and that everything had been measured prior to sending. Somewhat reassuring since the brakes and bb mated fine, but also concerning, especially regarding the undersized bottom bracket.
Will get a few photos organised at some stage.
