Friday News And Views

 Welcome to an "electrifying" version of the FN&V!

Congress debating New E-Bike Battery Regs:

A news story this week concerning the dangers of lithium-ion battery fires and laws for regulation of those batteries was noted in several social media posts this week. A link to an excellent story on this comes from thecity.nyc which you can read HERE.

Apparently there has been an over 1000% increase in battery related fires in New York City since 2019. That and the rate of deaths due to these fires has prompted New York City and the State of New York to take some rather dramatic actions in the form of laws limiting e-bikes and battery refurbishing, a main source of concern in New York City.

But this is gaining nationwide notice as fires related to e-bike batteries becomes more prevalent across the nation. The fact that Congress is getting involved shows that this has become a serious issue for people outside of NYC as well.

Comments: With a flood of cheap e-bikes and electrified scooters available at cheap prices from China, many of which have known quality and safety issues, it seems that it is about time for some regulation. Combined with lawsuits regarding the safety of e-bikes and their construction and design which are ongoing, I would expect that the reins will be tightened on these more budget, entry-level items in the future. 

What the ultimately looks like is anyone's guess now. But if the Feds get the low-end electrified market regulated that will probably drive up prices and make these bicycles even more expensive, maybe even in line with mainstream brand offerings. And that will pretty much make electrified bikes the province of fewer and fewer people due to the high prices.   

Image courtesy of Cannondale

Cannondale Debuts New Moterra SL Electric MTB:

Boasting the most power, longer battery life, and all wrapped up in the lightest weight package than any other current electrified MTB, Cannondale showed off its latest effort on Tuesday of this week. 

Dubbed "Moterra SL", the bike comes in three versions with a range-topping LAB71 series Moterra SL checking in at $14,00.00. The Moterra SL 2, shown here in read, is half the price and the entry into the Moterra range. There is also a Moterra SL 1 at $8700.00. 

Comments: So.....what exactly is "lightweight" for a bike like this? Apparently 43lbs is "light". Okay then.... Let's hope that battery lasts for the entire ride because pedaling 43lbs of MTB without assist would be no fun. Again with the super-expensive pricing. I really have a hard time with electric MTB's at this price when one could buy a brand new Honda 125 MX'er for $3500.00. Anyway....

Image courtesy of Wolf Tooth

Wolf Tooth Offers Aero GRX Rings: 

Tuesday also saw the announcement from Wolf Tooth that they now have "aero" GRX chain rings. These rings come in 46T-52T sizes in oval or round styles to fit 4-bolt GRX crank sets in the 1X configuration only. 

Prices range from $81.95 for the oval rings to $84.95 for the round rings. You can see these and learn more at Wolf Tooth's page for the rings HERE. 

Comments: Aero chain rings for gravel? Going all-out roadie on us here! Anyway, I would think that these would be - at best - only very slightly "aero", if at all. I do think they look kinda cool. But other than that? Well, you can get big rings, for gravel time trialing, I suppose, but yeah.... Not my bag, but maybe it would work for you? There ya go..... 

From Jason Boucher's social media.

Tumbleweed Announces Hire Of Jason Boucher:

Tumbleweed Bicycle Company announced on Tuesday that they have hired Jason Boucher, former brand manage of Salsa Cycles, as an employee who will be tasked with internal affairs, product development, and coordinating Tumbleweed's dealer network. 

Comments: I have to divulge here that Jason is a good friend of mine, although we don't see each other often, and so I am a bit biased when it comes to this news.

I feel that Jason is custom-made for this role and my feeling is that he will thrive in this role. Tumbleweed and Jason are both about the "adventure by bike" ethos that Jason forged into his previous role at Salsa. I'm excited for Jason and where this might take him going forward. 

I also want to say that I had no idea whatsoever that this was in the cards while I was doing my Big Dipper handle bar review, so there was no influence on what I had to say in that review from this decision, since I was out of that loop.

Image courtesy of GT Bicycles

GT Bicycles Announces Changes In Brand Direction:

GT Bicycles, the brand once part of the Dorel Group, is now owned by The Pon Group and recently has announced that they have made a change in brand direction.

Now headed up by Jason Schiers, who was one of the  founders of Enve Composites, (Then know as Edge), GT Bicycles has been removed from Disck's Sporting Goods stores and will focus exclusively on the independent bicycle dealer network going forward. 

First up on their agenda for products is to get into the full suspension MTB market with a range of bicycles at the upper end of the market. Schiers mentioned in a recent "Bicycle Retailer and Industry News" article on this story that he feels all FS MTB's will be electric in the near future. 

Comments: I think repositioning GT as a brand with a more upscale appeal is probably a good thing, but I don't look for this to be a huge mover in the bicycle landscape at this point. I'm sure GT's team has a good plan, but I would imagine it is modest and has smaller goals in mind in the short term. Dealers are reticent to buy any inventory at this point so getting GT bikes in front of consumers may be a difficult task until this glut of inventory clears itself out of the pipeline. 

That's a wrap for this week! Thanks for reading Guitar Ted Productions.

Friday News And Views

The Cotic eMTB prototype. (Image courtesy of Cotic social media)

One Example Of The "New Normal":

As time with this pandemic eases on it has become increasingly apparent that we are in an era, (however short or long it ends up being), of delays, shortages, and long lead times as a result. 

Case in point: Cotic, the UK based MTB brand, has announced that they are working on a motorized MTB rig. You can read all about the finer details here. That post on the Cotic site is a pretty good representation of what it takes for smaller brands to get things done during this 'new era' we find ourselves in.

Comments: So, if you place orders now you 'might' see product by the end of 2023? Did I get that right? Wow! Obviously larger brands will command better terms, but this is not a good sign for the consumer. That would indicate that this coming year will be a lot like the last two years- stuff will be hard to get. As I've said in the past, it wouldn't be a bad idea for consumers to stock up on spares: Chains, cassettes, brake pads, etc, whenever you see what you need in stock. Then you'll have it when you actually need it, instead of scrambling at the last minute to source parts.  

Just A Friendly Reminder:

This is the month of retrospect here on "Guitar Ted Productions". No doubt you've already noted some posts with that theme. Expect much of the same throughout the month of December.

I'll have limited space for 'regular posting' due to the volume of stuff I am working through, so if you are here jonesing for 'current events' then this month will have slim pickings. I'll return to a more familiar schedule here in January, which isn't all that far away! Stay tuned!

In the meantime, I'll point out that many days this month will have double postings. Two posts in one day- so to ensure you don't miss anything, scroll down the page, or consult the right column (on desk top versions of this blog) where my current posts for the month are listed individually. I'll double post if anything exciting or newsworthy (or both) comes up, so don't worry about missing anything in that regard due to my schedule of posts being so intense this month. 

By the way, I have four "Virtual Turkey Burn" reports to share starting with N.Y. Roll's submission tomorrow, which will be followed by the other three in a shot-gun style. So look for all four tomorrow. 

And the 'regularly scheduled posts', like the "FN&V" you are reading now, will still appear. Okay, that's enough about that! Thanks again for your patronage here and for your patience with me this month.

Mason Cycles Debuts New "RAW" MTB frame:

You just don't see many steel hardtail MTB debuts anymore, unless you count UK MTB purveyors. For whatever reason, the UK has never really abandoned steel MTB bikes. 

Mason Cycles just announced a new offering which seems pretty interesting as it is aimed at bikepacking/MTB all-around use, not just for DH/Enduro or go-fast XC-ing, which many times is the case with a hard tail offering from a US based designer. 

The RAW can take up to a 2.6" 29"er tire with a max 34T big ring. That's pretty good there, I think. Then you have the 66° head angle and short-ish chain stays. I've had my say on that here before and I seem to be outnumbered when it comes to that opinion, but I still think we're seeing the outer fringes of slack head angle design and at some point we're going to find a 'pulling back' on those numbers. Closer to 70° but not quite that, in the future. 

We'll see... 

So this is a pretty cool bike. The "Signal Yellow" paint is somewhat reminiscent of the "Fun Guy Green" Fargo coloration, but more yellow. I kind of like that as well. The frame comes with a Rock Shox SID Ultimate fork, so yeah......it's expensive. But what isn't these days compared to just a few years ago? Not that it matters to me, but if I were to get a MTB, this one would be high on the list.   

Recycling Rubber:

Getting rid of old, unwanted tires has been a plague on me since this whole reviewing process started up. What to do? The entire life cycle of tires has always really bothered me from an environmental aspect. There just was no really good options for recycling them at all. 

Well, now things may be changing in regard to this as I see an article on "Pink Bike" here that indicates Schwalbe, the German based tire manufacturer, is working to bring tire recycling for bicycle tires to reality. 

Now how far this gets is anyone's guess, but it is a start. It would be nice to see a program where anywhere that sells tires (for anything) has to recycle them if they are dropped off to them, or something similar. I know we used to have a service come pick up used car tires once a month when I worked on automobiles. Yes- it would be a hassle for retailers, but it would be much better than filling our land fills with tires, or even worse, burning them, which is still done as well. 

That's a wrap for this week. Have a great weekend and get outside!

Friday News And Views

The Cotic eMTB prototype. (Image courtesy of Cotic social media)

One Example Of The "New Normal":

As time with this pandemic eases on it has become increasingly apparent that we are in an era, (however short or long it ends up being), of delays, shortages, and long lead times as a result. 

Case in point: Cotic, the UK based MTB brand, has announced that they are working on a motorized MTB rig. You can read all about the finer details here. That post on the Cotic site is a pretty good representation of what it takes for smaller brands to get things done during this 'new era' we find ourselves in.

Comments: So, if you place orders now you 'might' see product by the end of 2023? Did I get that right? Wow! Obviously larger brands will command better terms, but this is not a good sign for the consumer. That would indicate that this coming year will be a lot like the last two years- stuff will be hard to get. As I've said in the past, it wouldn't be a bad idea for consumers to stock up on spares: Chains, cassettes, brake pads, etc, whenever you see what you need in stock. Then you'll have it when you actually need it, instead of scrambling at the last minute to source parts.  

Just A Friendly Reminder:

This is the month of retrospect here on "Guitar Ted Productions". No doubt you've already noted some posts with that theme. Expect much of the same throughout the month of December.

I'll have limited space for 'regular posting' due to the volume of stuff I am working through, so if you are here jonesing for 'current events' then this month will have slim pickings. I'll return to a more familiar schedule here in January, which isn't all that far away! Stay tuned!

In the meantime, I'll point out that many days this month will have double postings. Two posts in one day- so to ensure you don't miss anything, scroll down the page, or consult the right column (on desk top versions of this blog) where my current posts for the month are listed individually. I'll double post if anything exciting or newsworthy (or both) comes up, so don't worry about missing anything in that regard due to my schedule of posts being so intense this month. 

By the way, I have four "Virtual Turkey Burn" reports to share starting with N.Y. Roll's submission tomorrow, which will be followed by the other three in a shot-gun style. So look for all four tomorrow. 

And the 'regularly scheduled posts', like the "FN&V" you are reading now, will still appear. Okay, that's enough about that! Thanks again for your patronage here and for your patience with me this month.

Mason Cycles Debuts New "RAW" MTB frame:

You just don't see many steel hardtail MTB debuts anymore, unless you count UK MTB purveyors. For whatever reason, the UK has never really abandoned steel MTB bikes. 

Mason Cycles just announced a new offering which seems pretty interesting as it is aimed at bikepacking/MTB all-around use, not just for DH/Enduro or go-fast XC-ing, which many times is the case with a hard tail offering from a US based designer. 

The RAW can take up to a 2.6" 29"er tire with a max 34T big ring. That's pretty good there, I think. Then you have the 66° head angle and short-ish chain stays. I've had my say on that here before and I seem to be outnumbered when it comes to that opinion, but I still think we're seeing the outer fringes of slack head angle design and at some point we're going to find a 'pulling back' on those numbers. Closer to 70° but not quite that, in the future. 

We'll see... 

So this is a pretty cool bike. The "Signal Yellow" paint is somewhat reminiscent of the "Fun Guy Green" Fargo coloration, but more yellow. I kind of like that as well. The frame comes with a Rock Shox SID Ultimate fork, so yeah......it's expensive. But what isn't these days compared to just a few years ago? Not that it matters to me, but if I were to get a MTB, this one would be high on the list.   

Recycling Rubber:

Getting rid of old, unwanted tires has been a plague on me since this whole reviewing process started up. What to do? The entire life cycle of tires has always really bothered me from an environmental aspect. There just was no really good options for recycling them at all. 

Well, now things may be changing in regard to this as I see an article on "Pink Bike" here that indicates Schwalbe, the German based tire manufacturer, is working to bring tire recycling for bicycle tires to reality. 

Now how far this gets is anyone's guess, but it is a start. It would be nice to see a program where anywhere that sells tires (for anything) has to recycle them if they are dropped off to them, or something similar. I know we used to have a service come pick up used car tires once a month when I worked on automobiles. Yes- it would be a hassle for retailers, but it would be much better than filling our land fills with tires, or even worse, burning them, which is still done as well. 

That's a wrap for this week. Have a great weekend and get outside!