I bought wheels from them for my Nordavinden. They showed up and were round. I had to have the rear tensioned fairly soon after delivery.
I ordered wheels from them once and got an email the next day that the hubs weren’t actually in stock despite being listed as in stock. They offered a different set of more expensive hubs for the same price but I asked for a refund instead.
I’ve ordered numerous things from there over the years. Very legit.
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Looked into Tailfin? I have their anything cage mounts, and the workmanship is dentist-worthy. They work well with their own bags, which are also dentist-worthy. The bags also roll down to be tiny when not in use, if you go for the set.
The only issue I could see using their stuff is the fork bags you use on their cages have to be relatively structured, like the Salsa Anything bags, or Revelate Polecats, or the like - either reinforced or kinda small with some stiff waterproof fabric. The cages are too small for a typical stuff sack or larger dry bag. So, you lose flexibility.
I’m curious why you’re not going for Relevate Polecats, myself. The shape is good, the structure is good, and they’re a good in-between size. The only weakness I see is the strap loops stick out a bit much and might get caught on a branch.
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Tailfin cargo cages looked good to me as well, in no small part because they are less wide. I’d like to avoid a big rigid structure that can really apply weird-angled loads to my fork if I crash or tip my bike over.
The press photos of the Polecat bags looked sort of bulky, but then I’m considering Ortlieb, so clearly I can’t be that worried about it.
I think it’s key to see pics of the stuff in use with a rider on the bike. I know for me my own visual bulk certainly overshadows any luggage awkwardness.
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I care about that, but also about the likelihood that I’m going to snag the bags on something and, once snagged, how much it’s going to mess up the fork.
My fenders will pull free if they get too strained, not the case with fork bags, which worries me.
If you fill the Revelate tangle with enough stuff, you get leg rub for no extra charge (when running road crank/bb).
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I forgot, are you going singletrack/hikeabike or double track/rail trail/road touring?;for the smoother stuff a tunis Tara and some regular old ortliebs is fine, and I’ve crashed with that setup multiple times and the panniers took the brunt.
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I get the paranoia. That said…
Pack 'em with bulky but light stuff, don’t pack them too tight, and they’ll have some ‘give’ to deflect impacts. Get ones with relatively low profile strap loops, and the odds of snagging something are low.
Also realize fork bags are right in your field of view, so they’re easy to plan ahead for, when it comes to tight spots. As long as you’re not shred-bombing through thick-branched forests, I don’t think there’s much to worry about.
You’ll be delicately picking your way through woods the first few times riding with them, but the extra weight on the fork always reminds you they’re there, so planning ahead for them becomes second nature.
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Oh this is 99% riding on paved roads, I’m just paranoid after ripping a threaded insert out of a fork one time. I’d really rather not pay for a 100 mile uber ride back to my house.
My dream situation is as @akasnowmaaan describes, the bags act as a bumper in a crash.
Basically if I’m using a new kind of bag, I’d like to take what I’ve learned about setting bags up and breaking forks in past so that I can fuck up in new and exciting ways
I think it’s more likely to mess up you than it is gonna mess up the fork. At least that’s been my experience.
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Reading about Hope’s new Evo super short cranks, they (a Bikeradar review) say:
“Hope does say the shorter length will affect your gearing, and you should drop two teeth from the chainring for every 10mm you take off your crank length.”
I’d not heard that specific a formula before, and it got me thinking about my tendency to buy 175mm cranks because they’re the longest cranks readily available (I know Dura Ace does 180 and Lennard Zinn does a lot of things in his own private life).
So this is more woolgathering than actually planning to switch out cranks, but:
does this sound right? in what range of crank lengths does this “5mm crank length = 1 tooth” relationship hold?
Reducing resistance as you reduce leverage kind of makes sense but you probably have different length legs
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yeah, the general wisdom is “taller person longer cranks” which is intuitively right to me based on my pants and my bikes and my desk and whatnot.
I’m just poking at the idea that maybe not? I like the idea of shorter cranks for opening my hip angle
Pretty I sure I could sneak in and change anything on most of our bikes by 5 - 10mm and no one would notice
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5/175 is about 3%, and 3% of something in the 30s is about 1.
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Lol agreed @jame5on . This kinda stuff is so funny to me. Yeah, general wisdom except for years the range of available off-the-shelf cranks was about 5mm. Come onnn.
The hype around those Hope cranks is largely centered on gravity-oriented body positioning which, like, some people do that on singlespeed bikes or even chainless. Ain’t no one but a few dozen people on earth (and maybe a couple hundred deluded amateurs) thinking about watts in this context.
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short cranks are popular in time trial as well, I believe.
What I’m thinking about here is whether the conventional wisdom about crank length has much of a basis in utility, or if it’s like KOPS or CONI manual ergonomic folklore.
Like most things related to fitting on a bike, it’s an intersection of efficiency, perceived effort, varying muscle group recruitment, and available position. It’s hard to assess these things outside of experience - the gestalt often makes more sense than any single variable.
That’s why I was thinking about the range in which a crank length to tooth tradeoff makes sense - if it really does at all.
It’s no different than gearing down on MTBs going from 26 to 29 wheels
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