Friday, October 23, 2009

Ginny's new ride... world's LIGHTEST bike?!?!

Ginny has just finished work on his latest ride which is possibly the lightest flatland bike i've ever heard of. Total weight is 6.7kgs.... you heard that right.

Frame: Abadthing Slim Fit
Forks: KHE Tanaka brakeless
Fork bolt Carbon capped, ti bolt, alloy jam plate
Bars: KHE Swiss Miss (drilled griptubes, alloy bolts)
Bar ends: Fly bikes Nylon
Headset: Kink Intergrated
Head spacer: Custom made 34mm Titanium
Grips: Ares 88
Pegs: Ares Uma plastic
Front hub: Proper Microlite (blue six flush fit Titanium bolts.. milled down with allen key head) Double butted stainless spokes, alloy nipples
Front rim: Alienation Deviant
Tyres: KHE mach 1 Premium foldable
Crank: Ares 130mm, 19mm alloy axle, alloy tension bolts, titanium clamp bolts, hollow alloy sprocket bolt.
B.B. : plastic with custom made teflon inner bearings
Sprocket: Modified St Martin 16t English sprocket
Chain: KMC X9SL hollow pin, drilled plates
Pedals: Wellgo WR1 alloy body, titanium axle, sealed bearing.
Seat: Severely cut down Odyssey Senior, Blue six hollow Titanium bolt, custom made plastic bolt anchor point.
Seatpost: Abadthing cut.
Seatclamp: Proper with titanium bolt.
Freecoaster: KHE Geisha lite 36h, 9t. ceramic balled steel caged bearings. Double butted stainless spokes, alloy nipples, titanium stub axles, Dragonfly modified titanium nuts
Rear Rim: Alienation Deviant
Tubes: KHE twiggy, st martin tube liners.
Weight: 6.7kg (14.7 lbs)






Where can I start? Maybe the front?

First off, The Ares plastic pegs will only take the smallest flange nut you have ever seen. (I can't even get a 17mm socket down them) I could have used a standard 15mm steel nut, but no It still won't fit properly, and yeah.... I have the Proper Microlite female setup on the front. So here we go...

I turffed the original 17m steel socket bolts, and hooked myself up some smooth faced titanium Bluesix 6mm hex key (no socket head) bolts. After ramming a lubed chunk of clay on a stick down to the bottom of the peg, I realised these still didn't fit the small landing on the bottom of the peg. I lathed them (and the alloy washer) down to 13mm. The absolute maximum diameter the pegs could take.

I had to make a custom Titanium headset spacer (34mm) to get maximum spacing, as well as optimal clamping area for the drilled griptube KHE SwissMiss bars. I fitted them with purple alloy bolts as well. I opted against the original KHE fork bolt, I used a carbon capped, ti bolted, alloy 'jam plate' to clamp itself on the inside of the forks... It's surprisingly powerful. And even lighter than a Tree alloy bolt.

The crank was a fair drama as well, the plastic bottom bracket 19mm hole fit for the Ares crank was as sloppy as a shithouse. I bought some 30mm solid PTFE (teflon) white tubing and custom lathed the inside hole to be the tightest interference fit I could get onto the alloy spindle.

I drilled (4 holes) 2mm deep blind holes around the perimeter of the bearings and ground some dry lube into the divots... Far superior to the solid nylon inner bearings. The inner runner actually hangs onto the spindle, and runs super smooth on the outer... I can actually clamp the crank tension bolts down alot harder as well... It's how it should be.

The St Martin 16t sprocket was also a bit of a nightmare to mount up as well, I had to grind away a small part of the crank arm so the chain could run around it and also grind away part of the mounting bolt.. That sucked lining that thing up. The tolerances are so close. But it seems to have worked!

Even the Proper seatclamp, I replaced the steel bolt with a titanium one but it wouldn't seat properly... Back to the lathe... I champhered a slight edge onto the bottom edge comparable to the original one. That was an absolute shit to do. I could barely clamp it in the lathe. It took me near an hour solid of light as all hell lathing with out damaging/bending/stripping anything. Just to take the equivalent of .005grams (or 0.02mm) off the bottom edge of the bolt...

I Cut 3" of the Abadthing pivotal post, and replaced the hollow steel bolt with a Bluesix hollow titanium one. Cut and ground off the seat nose, and ground off the uncomfortable edge on the back of it. I even replaced the unnecessarily heavy 'half barrel' alloy seat for the bolt with a custom made plastic one... That last point right there is like 20gm straight off for something so retardedly unneeded.

Pedals not everyone may like, but they are sealed bearing, alloy bodied, titanium axle jobbies... Wellgo WR-1's with purple anodized end caps of course. :) 175gms a pair.

The Geisha freecoaster runs steel caged/ ceramic bearings, as well as titanium stub axles with Dragonfly titanium nuts.. (lathed down to 13mm on the flanges of course ... *sigh*).

8 comments:

  1. OMGGG how much cost this machine?

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  2. Take off the headset dust cover and compression bolt, drill some holes in the headset spacer or make an aluminum one, and get some Odyssey PCs with the Bluesix Ti spindle and you can drop the weight even more.

    Not that there's a real reason to, but it looks like that's what you're going for.

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  3. I thought Ginny was a girl, seeing he can't just man up and save the money for protein drinks instead of spending all his money to retain his womanly figure...

    Word verification : mentily (seriously)

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  4. You DO know aluminum alloy is lighter than titanium don't you? So what's up with the stem spacer? In this case, where does sensibility ends and stupidity begins?

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  5. Yeah, I know that aluminium is lighter,... in equivalent size..
    The ti spacer is super thin, way thinner in wall diameter than my alloy ones. Alloy loses pretty much all its strength at the same thickness. It is lighter than an alloy one of the same size.. Trust me. Plus the pedals are pretty much the lightest around. It was built purely as a fun 'what if' project.

    Lol@ 'womanly figure' oh man, If only.. haha

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  6. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  7. Is the 130mm crank not too short?

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