Interesting Aliexpress finds! - good deals, interesting stuff, new products etc!

[mirphak]

They look seriously awesome, but my worry is how they will look under sunlight. Garmin in this is excellent.

[Wet Noodle]

Yes that's plenty. For reference all of australia is 3GB.

Doesn't it require offline map files of some sort? These can be huge for some places.
I have easily 15 GB of map files on my phone (not counting POI lists) and that only covers Germany and some of its direct neighbours.

[kbernstein]

Doesn't it require offline map files of some sort? These can be huge for some places.
I have easily 15 GB of map files on my phone (not counting POI lists) and that only covers Germany and some of its direct neighbours.

What app? Some seem to have better compression. OSMAND (which is probably the closest they would use) for western switzerland, french rhones alpes, franche comte, alsace, aosta and BW, including wikipedia, terrain, contour and standard maps is under 2GB for me. The equivalent on mapy is 4, and on offlinemaps it was closer to 10 iirc but I deleted it

But keep in mind cycling maps are often just roads and a couple POIs if you're lucky, they don't have all this detail so as long as you don't want an entire continent or manage them before travel it should be fine.

https://www.userbeam.de/ Check the file sizes

[maza]

What app? Some seem to have better compression. OSMAND (which is probably the closest they would use) for western switzerland, french rhones alpes, franche comte, alsace, aosta and BW, including wikipedia, terrain, contour and standard maps is under 2GB for me. The equivalent on mapy is 4, and on offlinemaps it was closer to 10 iirc but I deleted it

But keep in mind cycling maps are often just roads and a couple POIs if you're lucky, they don't have all this detail so as long as you don't want an entire continent or manage them before travel it should be fine.

https://www.userbeam.de/ Check the file sizes

I'm not sure what tiny island you're confined to but I wouldn't want to download new maps every time I travel somewhere. And redo once getting back home! Let alone taking a computer with you to download maps while on the go when cycling to new area. 4GB is not enough even for small portion of Europe. IIRC Garmin ClimbPro data included all of Europe is about 20GB.

[kbernstein]

The "tiny island I'm confined to" was mentioned, northwestern switzerland and neighboring regions. 4GB is almost enough to fit all of germany and all of france, the 2 best mapped countries in the world. Do you ride in a different country every week?

Surely you mean 20MB because the only garmin device with more than 16GB is the new 1040

[maza]

The "tiny island I'm confined to" was mentioned, northwestern switzerland and neighboring regions. 4GB is almost enough to fit all of germany and all of france, the 2 best mapped countries in the world. Do you ride in a different country every week?

Surely you mean 20MB because the only garmin device with more than 16GB is the new 1040

So far this year yes - every week in a different country. However this week not planning to go anywhere so gonna break that. Like you said 4GB is almost enough for just 2 countries, but still not enough. Installing maps is so annoying I couldn't imagine doing it 10 times a year (with 5 visits to areas outside your home). Feel free to use whatever you want, but 4GB is very small amount in regards of map data.

[Wet Noodle]

What app? Some seem to have better compression.

That may be part of it. I use Openandromaps' maps for Locus. There, Germany alone is over 4 GB after unpacking, I think (for comparison, userbeam says ~2 GB) . Never cared as I have the memory anyway, but I wouldn't want to buy a new gps device today with as little as 4 GB.

[jonathanf2]

Just for the heck of it, I bought this integrated flared bar:

https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256804683742226.html

I just installed it last night. It seems adequately stiff and well made. I'll give it a proper run down this week. It still feels more road oriented for me.

For real gravel flare, I use this one on my gravel bike:
https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256804683890720.html

[jonathanf2]

Sub 150g for the 11-28t and sub 163g for the 11-32t 11 speed road cassettes. Alloy big cogs though, so probably best for race applications or if you don't do much climbing.

https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256806294879687.html

[kbernstein]

I know tracevelo recommended against aliexpress cleats as they are not fiberglass reinforced and don't last long, but does anyone have a positive experience with some? My cleats probably should have been replaced 2 years ago but I'm still too cheap to buy the real look ones

[jonathanf2]

I know tracevelo recommended against aliexpress cleats as they are not fiberglass reinforced and don't last long, but does anyone have a positive experience with some? My cleats probably should have been replaced 2 years ago but I'm still too cheap to buy the real look ones

I just bought a bunch of Look Keo cleats off Pick 3 & Save for $1.99 USD a pair. Cleats are high wear items, just have a bunch of spares in reserve!

[Skiesare]

For me, aliexpress.com links on this forum sometimes end up in a wonky redirect that doesn't work properly, while aliexpress.us links do what they're meant to do (it may be different based on your location).

https://aliexpress.com/item/1005006457498617.html -> redirect that ends up on the AliExpress home page
https://aliexpress.us/item/1005006457498617.html -> gets me to the product page

If you right click on that first link and paste it into a text editor it looks like this;
"https://redirect.viglink.com/?format=go&jsonp=vglnk_170616735001211&key=b27c327a33221fbd44a77db81ff6b4d1&libId=lrsvyliw0103g1ix000ULffz65kf6&loc=https%3A%2F%2Fchinertown.com%2Findex.php%2Ftopic%2C3910.1275.html&v=1&out=https%3A%2F%2Faliexpress.com%2Fitem%2F1005006457498617.html&ref=https%3A%2F%2Fchinertown.com%2Findex.php%2Ftopic%2C3910.1290.html&title=Interesting%20Aliexpress%20finds!%20-%20good%20deals%2C%20interesting%20stuff%2C%20new%20products%20etc!&txt=https%3A%2F%2Faliexpress.com%2Fitem%2F1005006457498617.html"

What you need to do is copy the link by highlighting the text and then paste it into the address bar. I have no idea why this is happening or why it only effects some links and some people.
Hope this helps.

[nickobec]

Ride Now Tyre inserts https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005006293217490.html and elsewhere

been riding withe Vittoria tyre inserts on my gravel bike for over a year. Very happy with them, even used them to limp home after I could not plug a puncture in the dark.

Only problem is they are expensive at least 50AUD for one, so jump at the chance for a pair less than that, for my road bike. I understand they can be challenging to fit. Will keep you updated. But they do look and feel very similar to the Vittorias.

[Jet the Panda]

Thomson Elite 27.2 Seatpost:
URL: https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256806133158968.html
Review: 8/10
Details: I haven't installed it yet, but I've owned genuine Thomson seat posts in the past and this one looks identical to them.  It didn't come with a Thomson bag, which is why I've knocked some points off.  Otherwise, though, this looks to be a solid replica with no issues.

Is the seat post CNC'd? When you rub your fingernail up and down on it can you feel the ridges?

[Wet Noodle]

Is the seat post CNC'd? When you rub your fingernail up and down on it can you feel the ridges?

Ridges don't tell you whether something was made on a CNC machine. They're just a result of the machining (no matter if CNC or not) and how far you take it with the finishing passes (or/and additional operations).

If you want to know, if the post has been machined - yea, if it looks anything like the picture, no way around it. Was it on a CNC, though? Probably, I wouldn't expect them to turn semi mass-produced pieces on manual lathes (not that it was impossible) ... but again, nothing to do with the ridges.