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Re: Best and worst overall quality/value components/tools/gear from AliExpress? Looking through my orders, I realize just how much bike stuff I've bought on Aliexpress...  might as well contribute my experiences. I'm not going to review the genuine name-brand (pretty much all Shimano) components I've bought, as those are known quantities. The subsections below are in no particular order, as I'm just going through my order history to compile this list.

Best of the best to very good

Very good to good
  • Generic front light: I think this is the same one sold by "Offbondage" (lol) and a few other stores, but this one doesn't have branding which is why I went for it specifically. Nice and bright with a flashing mode, has a good bar mount, USB C charging. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256804897699962.html
  • OG EVKIN HB010: good shape, reasonably light, external cable routing for easy setup. I have this bar on my commuter and it works well. Only reason I don't rate it higher is because the first one I had snapped when my bike fell over in its stand - can't really fault it for that but my other carbon bars have survived their bikes tipping over. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256805458531947.html
  • Generic bike baskets: I use 2 of these on the front rack of my commuter for light but bulky cargo loads. Not super well-made but they do the job and fold down for storage off the bike. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256805376389581.html
  • Sunshine cassettes: I've had 3 of these; 2 11-speed (11-36 and 11-42) and one 12-speed (11-46). They shift fine, not quite as good as Shimano but that's to be expected. Very heavy though. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256803959318100.html
  • AVID HS1 brake rotors (definitely copies): 6-bolt only, but they don't warp because they're thick, they brake well, and they're incredibly cheap. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/2251832609689188.html
  • Nipple holder: makes the process of lacing a wheel much nicer. For 3 bucks, well worth it. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256802890581426.html
  • ZRACE Blade MTB crankset: simple fitment and steel axle, same as Shimano hollowtec cranks. Reasonably light, graphics aren't too obtrusive and the included chainring is surprisingly good. I have found that it creaks a bit when it gets dirty but it's so easy to pop off and clean that this isn't a major issue. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/2255800868849020.html
  • Spcycle M05 frame: size medium in glossy red color came in at 877 grams - amazing! Despite the weight, it's been a very solid hardtail for my not-very-extreme needs. Only drawback is the rear driveside dropout is too thick for the stock hanger so I had to file down the hanger to make room. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256802796251755.html

Good to meh
  • TOSEEK 143 saddle: the shape works fine for me. The construction quality is decent but the middle unsupported section tends to sag a bit too much imo. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256805099852978.html
  • ZTTO MTB cassette: shifts ok, not nearly as good as the Deore cassette I was using on my previous MTB groupset. But this cassette is amazingly light, the claimed weights are accurate, and I think at least some of the shifting issues I have are down to some derailleur hanger issues on my MTB frame. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/2255800094553452.html
  • IIIPro centerlock disc rotors: they don't warp which was a major improvement on the Dura-Ace rotors I was using, but after about 500 miles they developed a squeal I couldn't get rid of even with brake cleaner and sanding their surface. Swapped to Campy Ekar rotors and have been very very pleased with them. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256804105057808.html
  • ZRACE Hardrock crankset: I've used two of these. One has lived on my gravel bike for 1,500 miles, has been beaten up, fully submerged multiple times, been put through singletrack riding and 1200 watt sprints, and is basically brand new. The other one had the axle and driveside crankarm separate and develop play within 100 miles on my commuter where it never saw any abuse. So... ymmv. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/2252799820023948.html

Meh to bad
  • Ridenow TPU tube: I only use these as backup tubes on my road bike. The one time I had to use it, I was riding close to home with a friend and he punctured with no spare tube, so I threw this in his tire and it flatted within 5 minutes. Fortunately I was able to ride home and bring him a butyl tube! I tried patching it when I got home but it failed with 3 different patches.. So small and so light, but this really is an option of last resort in my saddle bag. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256803826508749.html
  • Sensah SRX Pro: The shifting was very good, but the clutch on the derailleur was so weak that it dropped my chain several times a ride. I quickly replaced it with a Deore rear derailleur + JTek shiftmate which worked ok. The braking was ultimately the dealbreaker - see below - but I kept the shifters around on my commuter bike, paired with a SRAM Force 1x rear derailleur, and the shifting was great and the braking much better with rim brakes. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256802576089351.html

Just plain bad
  • Juintech F1 brake calipers: I just could never get these to brake all that well. I tried different pads, rotors, preload adjustment, etc etc etc; ultimately I was descending a notoriously steep and winding local road and I nearly lost all braking power, even after stopping and letting the system cool down for almost 10 minutes. I ordered 105 hydraulic shifters and brakes the next day and they're infintely better. Don't bother with these or other cable/hydro solutions, just go hydro. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/2255799928780428.html

November 01, 2023, 05:34:35 PM
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Re: Best and worst overall quality/value components/tools/gear from AliExpress?
Do you know the reach and drop measurement of these bars?

Just measured them and they look to be about 75 mm reach and 125 mm drop.

November 02, 2023, 09:34:43 AM
1
Re: Best and worst overall quality/value components/tools/gear from AliExpress?
I'm surprised you listed the Juin Tech F1 calipers as bad. I have mine setup on my road bike and they work just fine. I do nothing but climbing and descending as well and I've been lazy to swap over Ultegra R8020 hydraulic shifters I have. Though I'm using higher tension gold brake cabling and semi-metallic finned pads that were released in the last few months. It's made a huge difference in performance.

I got the Juin Techs in large part because of their positive reputation; I used Jagwire compressionless housing and Shimano brake cables and did all the tweaking I possibly could but they never even came close to the modulation and power of even the cheapest hydro brakes I've tried. I wasn't kind to them in operation either; I'm quite fat and the brakes were on my heaviest bike, and most of the roads around me are in the mountains and descend 2,000-4,000 feet at a time with gradients of 8-20%, and they're often winding too so there's not much downtime for the brakes to cool off.  The particular descent that caused me to get rid of the Juin Techs was Magnolia road (https://pjammcycling.com/climb/238.Magnolia%2520Road) which I use as the ultimate stress test for my braking components.

November 03, 2023, 05:16:07 PM
2
Re: Best and worst overall quality/value components/tools/gear from AliExpress?
Did you happen to get the weight on these?
Unfortunately not, but they aren’t exceptionally light or heavy. Probably in the neighborhood of 200-220 grams or so? Hard to remember, it’s been a year since I got them.

December 22, 2023, 12:07:58 AM
1
How to run Di2 and a dropper post on a Flyxii FE-02 (and possibly other bikes) I like electronic shifting, but I don't like DOT fluid, which means I have to use Di2. On my road bike, it took all of 10 minutes to install 105 Di2, but on my gravel bike I very much like also having a dropper post, which makes installation of the battery a problem. My goal with this post is to describe how I solved this problem on my Flyxii FE-02 frame, but the process should work for many other frames.

You will need:
  • Internal cable routing tool and an old cable (or just 2x cable routing kits)
  • A frame with a headtube large enough that you can a fit Di2 battery in while tilting it into the downtube
  • Bubble wrap and tape
  • Zip ties, with a length approximately 2.5-3x the diameter of the downtube of whatever bike you're working on

The process
  • Drop out the fork and remove headset bearings. Remove all hoses/cables from the downtube to prevent the Di2 wires from getting snagged or tangled. Remove any cable routing guide near the bottom bracket; the holes this leaves will be valuable for cable routing.
  • Route the cable routing tool through the top or bottom of the headset, whichever direction is easiest to insert the battery from. If you have 2 cable routing tools, use one for the front and one for the rear; otherwise use the tool to route an old brake or shift cable from the headset through to the rear derailleur. If possible, route these under the bottom bracket.
  • Wrap the Di2 battery in 3-4 layers of bubble wrap and tape to keep it in place. I used silicon self-fusing tape but any durable tape should work. Wrap several zipties around the battery in different directions. I used 8 zipties, spaced a quarter turn apart (i.e. 2 pointing in each direction).
  • Attach the Di2 wires to the cable routing wires (I used a little strip of packing tape which worked fine) and the battery. Pull the wires down into the downtube - make sure to do this evenly, i.e. pull the front and rear wires the same amount. It should be pretty easy to do this up until the battery has to go in the downtube. Lever the battery into the downtube, putting a little spin on it to get the zipties in a sort of spiral pattern.
  • Pull the battery down the downtube - this should be pretty easy until the bottle cage rivnuts are encountered. Your rear (and maybe front) Di2 wire should be long enough to be pulled out the bottom bracket cable routing holes and a bit more force can be used to pull on those to get the battery down past the rivnuts. Eventually the battery should make its way down almost all the way to the bottom bracket.
  • Finish routing the Di2 wires and tape them to the frame. Shake the frame to make sure the battery is secure and doesn't make any noise. If it does, you can push out the battery back through the headtube with a long, thin dowel or some other tool. Take a light that fits in the headtube, shine it down the downtube, and look through the bottom bracket holes to make sure there's enough space to run a brake hose and dropper cable.
  • Route brake hose and dropper cable as normal. I found this easiest to do by using the aforementioned light in the headtube, and carefully pulling the magnetized end of the cable routing tool past the battery. Doing this blind wouldn't be fun. After they get past the battery, I recommend routing the brake hose below the bottom bracket and the dropper cable above it, but this is more frame-dependent than anything.


Things that don't work:
  • Fitting the battery down the seattube below the dropper. This is what I tried first, but the battery has to sit down far enough that it blocks the port for the front derailleur wire, so the battery has to be shifted to the side to make room. Unfortunately, this blocks the needed space for the dropper cable, and also fouls on the rivnuts for the seattube bottle cage and derailleur mount. I got my battery stuck in the seattube and had to route 4 brake cables through the bottom bracket, up through the seattube past the battery, and use the heads of the cables to pry it loose. 0/10, would not recommend.
  • Putting the battery in the downtube without zipties: there needs to be a lot of bubble wrap to prevent the battery from moving, but little enough bubble wrap to allow it to be inserted into the headtube and get past the bottle cage rivnuts. I don't think this is possible, and if it is, it's far more practical to use zipties. Just for fun, I tried it, and the battery got snagged on the rivnuts and I had to fashion a tool to yank out the battery. Again, not recommended.

January 06, 2024, 12:50:13 AM
3
Re: Buying CFR696 From Flyxii That’s an FE-02 which, as has been pointed out, is not a 696. I own this frame (pretty sure I ordered it from the exact same link) and it’s been a super solid frame for a heavy-duty gravel bike.
February 29, 2024, 04:04:01 PM
1
Re: Buying CFR696 From Flyxii
I read one user complain about flex. Any other issues with the frame I should be aware of?

I honestly haven't felt any flex; I'm not often putting down 1000+ watts, but I do a lot of punchy climbs on loose dirt where I have to rely on a rigid frame to deal with low cadence grinding in the saddle, and this frame has been totally fine there.

The main issue for me has been toe overlap with the front wheel - this was especially bad with 700c x 50mm tires but even with the 650b x 52mm ones I'm running right now there's still a few cm of toe overlap with my size 43 shoes. The other main issue has been cable routing through the driveside chainstay - it's extremely narrow, save for a channel along the bottom which is barely wide enough for shift housing, so be careful when putting anything through this area as it can easily become stuck (and I can tell you from personal experience, you don't want to spend two hours with a bent spoke trying to fish out a stuck cable...)

March 03, 2024, 11:14:00 AM
1
Re: Flyxii FE-02 Build I've had my FE-02 since October 2021 and have put almost exactly 1,500 miles on it. I initially built it up with 700x42mm tires which handled well but weren't wide enough for the riding I do on this bike, so I swapped to 700x50mm Gravelking SK's which measured about 52mm on 25mm internal rims. This was good volume but put my center of mass too high for comfortable handling, and toe overlap with my size 43 shoes was also really bad with this setup. Currently I'm running 650b with tires still measuring about 52mm, and this is the best compromise for handling and tire volume I've found thus far.

Wheels/tires aside, the geometry is very stable without being too upright, which I like; it's definitely not on the progressive end of the spectrum with respect to headtube/seattube angle or anything, it's much more similar to my road bike than my mountain bike. The handling isn't as razor-sharp as my road bike either, and I wouldn't use this as bike for primarily road riding - I've had my road bike wheels (700x32mm tires) on the FE-02 for winter riding and the handling didn't really change from its 650b setup. Not that the handling is bad, I am using it right now as my main winter ride since it has full length fenders on it, just that I don't have the same sense of being one with the bike that I do on my Tarmac SL6.

Lastly, the construction quality of the frame/fork is very good and I've not had any issues running cables/wires/hoses through the downtube; the chainstays are REALLY narrow so care must be taken not to wedge internal cable routing tools in there (it sucks to get them out....). I've even been able to run a dropper post on it with Di2 - see my post history - and doing this would be even easier with mechanical shifting since there's no battery in the way. The dropper really enhances the ability of this frame to tackle rougher downhill terrain and I find myself using it a lot during regular descents too, as it offers a comfortable yet very aero position. I've ridden this bike on some truly dreadful terrain, including completely offroad bikepacking out in the woods where me + luggage + bike weighed close to 120 kg all told, and it's performed great. The frame isn't light but you get durability in return, it seems.

Overall, I'd definitely recommend this frame if you're in the market for a burly, big-tire-clearance gravel bike.

March 24, 2024, 06:52:34 PM
2
Re: BSA bottom bracket backwards?
I'm wondering if there is any reason why I can't take the left bb cups and put them on the right side? Same for right side cup. If the threaded inserts are indeed on the wrong side then the threading should work. no?

Should work as long as you're using a crankset standard with identical bearing sizes left and right- it's basically like taking the bottom bracket assembly as a whole and rotating it 180 degrees. But I would sooner raise a warranty claim - if QC didn't catch such an egregious error, what else might they have missed?

April 30, 2024, 10:11:41 PM
1
Re: Recommendation for a side load Carbon bottle cage These impressed me enough that I'm using them on my road and gravel bikes: https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256805834827357.html
May 03, 2024, 12:59:52 PM
1