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Re: Interesting Aliexpress finds! - good deals, interesting stuff, new products etc!
I like that the shifter is Shimano style (two levers for shifts) the Sensah shifters are single type if I'm not wrong. I currently have the Sensah Team Pro shifters which are Shimano compatible, but I'm not entirely happy with the shifting. Even though it's supposedly index, it still relies on a certain amount of friction/force to get into gear. My Shimano shifters shift perfectly on every click. I want to see how the LTwoo shifters handle. Only downside is that reviews mention high gear shifting needs to be done in the hoods. I was originally planning to order some 105 shifters for my gravel build, but I was able to get a cassette, chain and LTwoo shifters/Rd for a really good price. Plus the GR9 shifters are 1x only and come in at 400g with alloy levers. 105 R7000 shifters are 500g and the left FD shifting would just go to waste on my 1x build. November 11, 2022, 03:52:19 PM |
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Re: How do yall feel about the value of open mold road bikes vs mainstream brands?
Here is my analysis... Point #1 - Of all the frames I've ridden and tested, only 4 have performed flawlessly and free of any quirks. From the build process to long term on the road: Yoeleo R12, Winspace T1500, and two Specialized Allez Sprints. While I don't believe having a UCI sticker is the absolute marker for quality, it's also not a coincidence these 4 frames have them. Build quality, details and functionality matters at this price point. Point #2 - Neither a UCI sticker nor offering a unique frame design is an indicator of a frame's performance. Yishun R086D and VeloBuild VB-177 are great frames despite more or less being open mold designs. What I've learned with cheap frames is if the specs/design of a frameset looks too good to be true...it probably is. TanTan x38 (Scott Foil clone) and VB-168 (SL7 clone) were sluggish for me personally. Point #3 - Buying experience. Having the only two flagship Specialized shop outside of California 20 minutes from my home, you can tangibly see why they are so popular. The shopping experience is like going to a premium car dealership. Might as well be for a $5500 SL8 frame. Trek's flagship shops are horrible. Never buying from them again. With Specialized you're not just buying a bike. You buying into the local community, you have a home base for local rides/coffee, and you're dealing with managers/sales reps/mechanics who are also cyclists themselves. I cannot overstate how important this is for the 95% of cyclists in the real world who don't spend time on YouTube/forums geeking out over Chinese brands like myself. Point #4 - My online presence is such that I'd rather not be a walking billboard for expensive brands. I'm trying to be aspirational to the fitness but budget minded shopper. Although I really want to buy a Giant Propel or S-Works SL8 next season to see if the hype is real. I cant keep testing cheap frame forever. Obviously I'm probably not the average cyclist. Swapping new bikes/frames constantly is painful. However, I've grown tired of regularly dealing with the quirks and customer service annoyances of the cheaper/open mold frames. No matter how many "Chinese" bikes I've tested, I always go back to my Winspace T1500. Which brings me to Point #5 - The only thing holding me back from buying the Propel/SL8 today is that we starting to see more Chinese competitors to Winspace/Yoeleo in the $1500-$2000 range coming to the marketplace for the Western world. To me this is where the best value to performance ratio can be found. UCI-Approved, limited licensed frame design, fantastic paint details, competitive frame weight, and quality supplied hardware. I'm currently in talks to acquire a frame from one of these new brands 
September 11, 2023, 02:05:07 PM |
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Re: How do yall feel about the value of open mold road bikes vs mainstream brands?
I honestly think the best option is to go with a mainstream second hand frameset and then build it up with your own "chinese" components. Anyone that is going for whole bike builds is a super fred at this point since I would have to immediately replace the bars/stems (44cm lmao) and cranks (175mm lmao). I also have a lot of wheels already so the wheels/tyres that come with it would go sitting in the corner. If it comes with a powermeter i'd have to sell it since i already have powermeter. The saddle is also useless since it won't be my preferred saddle. At that point i bought a whole bike and only using the frame and the groupset. September 11, 2023, 10:24:01 PM |
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Re: Winspace T1550 Build
Here is my T1500 w/ D67 Hyper Wheels. Over 2 years of use and still probably my favorite bike. Mechanical shifting Ultegra R8020 has been absolutely flawless. Elilee OSPW system...now out of production 
February 17, 2024, 02:07:23 PM |
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Re: Chinese cycling clothes
sometime ago there was some talk about long leg/thigh bibs, I've just got 2 bibs which maybe can fit whoever is looking for this.. After almost 2yrs using my YKYW bibs - which were the 'go to' for long rides - the foam started to not support as much (still good for ~3h tho), and especially that I've crashed while mtbiking with my favorite one and it scratched a little the side panel (just wore out the fabric, no opening tho) So I've decided to try some new ones... risked on a Spexcel, although I had bad experience with them 2yrs ago, and also wanted to try a Lameda one, especially after it got complimented by Jon/ChinaCycling as something like 'best chinese bib' So, this Spexcel one impressed me, quality is superb, straps are comfortable and hold well in place, the fabric is comfy too. The pad reminds the EI Paris one, is thick and for a 4-5hr ride it held really well. the leg is long, about 2-3cm longer than the ones I got from YKYW and Darevie, although the same size (EU Small, or Asia M). And even on this long ride it held well to my skin, didn't went up much, to the point that it was just about to pinch the back of my knee when pedaling. overall, liked it a lot! The green is beautiful. The Lameda Starlight I've had issues... The sizing table is a bit wrong, I saw multiple pages on Aliexpress and even the PandaPodium one, through measures and weight I'd be a EU M size, which I've ordered, but unfortunately was a bit big. What is strange is that the leg is pretty long, getting down to my knee, but the upper part and straps are comparable to the YKYW I have, bit smaller even. So I ended up passing on to a friend who's slightly bigger and to him it was perfect. In the end, if I had gone with the size I'm used to with chinese brands (EU Small, Asian M) it'd be ok. What I can say, having ridden it for 10-15 minutes, is that the fabric is really good and comfortable, the 2 panel/seamless construction is nicely done, the quality honestly impressed me. The padding seemed thick and comfortable, but was a short use so cannot vouch for it Main point is, the leg is long, similar to Spexcel, so I believe for the smaller size would be perfect. I'll order it next and see if it works Any product link that could help, with EI pad?The YKYW ones I can say are legit, I have 2 from them February 19, 2024, 08:12:31 AM |
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Re: LTWOO ER9 & ERX - Electronic groepsets
I've installed 5 ER9 groups in the last 2 weeks. 1 gave me issues for some reason, but it was my fault. Make sure the limit screws are set properly, as well as the 3rd screw that sets the tension on the cage. The RD protects itself very quickly, so if any of the 3 screws are off, the cage wont shift. It's given me a new appreciation for my own incompetence and the fact that stuff usually works as long as it's installed and setup properly. During the builds i'm often thinking "this is such POS" but then an hour later, or a week later, i realize it's just me being incompetent / thick / tired. Did you unplug and reset? battery's charged? If you remove the wheel, does the RD shift? Are both FD & RD running the latest firmwares? EDIT: setting the 3 screws and calibrating the gears (as well as the FD) is somewhat of an iterative process. If you change a limit screw, your calibration of the RD is likely to need updating. I wont pretend that I understand how everything affects everything, but the point is the moment you change the tension on 1 screw, there's a decent chance the rest of the system is affected. And if ONE thing is off, everything can be off, and the RD tends to protect itself and refuse shifting until it's happy with alignments and what not. February 19, 2024, 09:39:54 AM |
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Re: Best and worst overall quality/value components/tools/gear from AliExpress?
On lightweight cassettes: I bought an SROAD/Spedao monobloc 11-32 12sp cassette made of steel. Around 6000km and still going strong. Shifts perfectly fine and weighs around 230g. On my new disc brake bike I took a gamble and bought an 11-34 12sp cassette from Goldix made of an aluminium monobloc and several single cogs made of steel. After around 2000km there's visible wear marks on at least one of the alu cogs. So much so in fact that I can provoke the chain to skip on it. Also, I never managed to set the gearing up on this cassette as smooth as I would have liked. The shifting is just rough and noticeably less smooth than on any other cassette I tried. I now went out and bought another monobloc steel cassette. This time from ZTTO because I think the design is even better than with Spedao/Sroad. Bottom line: Don't waste your money on these alu/steel cassettes. I think no matter which manufacturer you're getting them from, they're just not that great. March 29, 2024, 02:15:10 AM |
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Re: Seka Spear
some punters don't care about anything but looks and that it's works. Others also value performance and won't be interested in a time or look. Are you implying if someone is seeking performance and not just looks, then they will ignore Time or Look frames? As in because they don't perform well, just look pretty?  That has to be one of the most ridiculous if not the most ridiculous thing this forum has produced. Sure we are on a forum named Chinertown but this is getting crazy at this point.
April 30, 2024, 05:11:52 PM |
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Deerobust/Goldix wheel build 50/55mm 1319g
I wanted to share with you all the results of my first wheelbuild. The headline specs/stats are:
I've been meaning to make this thread for a while. I've been busy finishing my PhD and finally had the time to cobble it together. Theres some more build info I want to add in a later post but I'll put this up for now. I had recently bought myself a truing stand and tensionmeter to rebuild a wheel with a rim that I broke racing CX. Now having the tools to build wheels, I got curious about the phenomenally low prices on wheelbuilding components, as well as the freedom to pursue interesting build configurations. I'll be transparent here: this is a vanity build driven by questionable weight and aero-weenie-ing. Experienced wheelbuilders will probably cringe at my choices, and that's fine with me. The irony of scraping for grams on this build while I could stand to lose 20lbs of body fat is not lost on me. At the end of the day I had a lot of fun building these up, I think they look super cool, it's exciting to me that I've built up such a lightweight wheelset, and I've had a pretty good experience riding them so far. Given this premise of vanity over practicality, I hope you can appreciate my wheelbuild for what it is. Rims: I did a bit of searching for the manufacturer of the lightest rims and landed on Deerobust. It helps that they are the first result when you search "lightest carbon rim" into aliex. This is no exaggeration, the 21mm-internal-width, 50 and 55mm-deep rims I chose ("featherweight"-spec + paintless finish) were quoted at 390g and 420g respectively; the only manufacturer that seems to come close is Lightcarbon. I chose 50/55 simply because it's a depth that seemed to strike a good balance between weight and aero. I also won't lie and say that the decision was influenced by the fact that the Enve SES 4.5 rims used by Pogi and UAE are 50/55mm deep, even though if we're being realistic those are completely different wheels. I chose 21mm internal width because it seems that this is still the ideal rim width for aero given a 28mm tire. I understand the rule of 105% says otherwise. On the other hand, Peak-torque's testing results (particularly the comparison of the Polaris Ascent 42 against the ICAN Aero 35 across 28mm and 32mm tires) suggests that a 28mm tire is faster on a 21mm internal width rim compared a wider one. Another feature I chose for my rims is internally-drilled spoke holes. For one, there is the (dubious) aero benefit of having hidden nipples. But more importantly--as ENVE's marketing material points out--smaller spoke holes means stronger spoke holes, and therefore a stronger, safer rim. I paid $507 (inc. shipping) to order my rims from Deerobust, with bespoke paintless finish, hole-drilling, and logo. The rims weighed 410 and 415g respectively. I was a tad disappointed that my front rim came 5g over the spec weight +/- 15g margin of error. On the other hand, my rear rim came 5g under spec weight, the average weight between the two was under the +/- 15g per rim margin of error, so I called it good and decided to not complain. Hubs As for hubs, I chose GOLDIX 21-spoke hubs with 2:1 lacing. These have no official model number but appear to be a DT-swiss style ratchet hub with straight-pull lacing. I chose these because a) Goldix seems to have a fairly decent reputation on here, and b) these hubs are very lightweight. The standout unique design feature of these hubs is that there are 21 spokes, 14 spokes laced in a 3x pattern on the stressed side (drive side on rear, brake side on front), and 7 radially-laced spokes on the non-drive side. I went for this unusual design because fewer spokes theoretically means lighter and more aero, while the 2:1 3x lacing, especially when paired to such deep rims, potentially could make up for the loss in stiffness. Remember, this is a vanity build. When my hubs arrived, they seemed to be of decent quality. The bearings were a tad notchy--something that has gone away since I started riding them. The bearings are "NBK" brand, and have metal ball cages, which are a feature of decent-quality bearings. These aren't showstoppers, but they aren't complete garbage either. One criticism I have about these hubs is that that to achieve radial lacing on the non-stressed side, the hub axle has a hole drilled out to allow a spoke to be passed through into the back of the spoke hole. This means that the wheel bearing on the radially laced side is offset inboards an entire centimeter. This is bad for hub stiffness and longevity. The further inboards the bearing sits, the longer the unsupported section of the axle is (making less stiff), and the bearing has to bear more axial/side loading (which harms longevity). In the future I might swap these hubs out for a different design. Spokes and nipples For this build I chose Pillar Wing 20 with Pillar hex-10 internal nipples. I have a whole extra story to tell about these nipples that I will get to another time. I chose these spokes over the alternative (Sapim CX Ray/DT aerolite) because they are supposedly stiffer, lighter, just as aero, and definitely are cheaper. The idea that a wider spoke section is just as aero as a narrower one baffles me, but I'll trust in Campagnolo and Boyd, who have supposedly tested this difference and chose the Pillar wings. I also spoke-prepped my threads using Rock n Roll Nipple cream. Finishing touches As is common, I have wrapped my wheels in 28mm Continental GP5000 clincher tires, with RideNow 19gr tubes inside, likely the lightest and lowest-rolling-resistance combo in the Continental range, barring the GP5000TT. I'm also running ONIRII's super-light 160mm floating disc rotors, and an S-ROAD one-piece 11-32 cassette Overall impressions So far I've logged about 100 miles on these new wheels on my road bike. They certainly sound cool and feel fast. And they do not feel like they're particularly lacking in stiffness. One major complaint I am experiencing is that my freehub ratchet has been slipping occasionally. I serviced it and found that I had reinstalled the o-ring incorrectly and that some dirt/grime had made its way into the ratchet. After a bit of cleaning and regreaseing it was nearly perfect once again, perhaps I need to clean it more and regrease with the special DT swiss ratchet grease. Are these truly "fast" wheels? Who knows. They haven't stopped me from setting a bunch of Strava PRs here and there. But as far as bling factor, these are 10/10, super cool and super fun wheels to have. Thanks for reading my wheelbuild story. Would love to hear your thoughts and questions. Hopefully soon, I can make a quick post about how I dealt with some challenges I experienced using the Hex-10 nipples. May 15, 2024, 03:30:12 PM |
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Re: VeloBuild VB-R-268 frame
Very nice, well done. I would have ordered it without the text, and added the text with car vinyl cut locally. That way you can get exactly the text & spacing you want and, importantly, you can easily change your mind, rinse and repeat. Looking forward to the pictures of the fully built bike! June 07, 2024, 07:22:25 AM |
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