BMX - Flippin Heck

There is just so many bikes, grips, tyres, pedals, shirts and everything else that it just makes your face hurt looking at it all, let alone reading everything. But even at a skim it's interesting looking at just how different the two brands are. Fit's all quality photos and minimal layout while Eastern just piles as much shit as they can in there with photos that look like they've been taken by your mum and graphics laid out by your dad. That's harsh, but my point is that they do things completely differently, yet both sell a shitload of bmx paraphernalia.

This pretty much sums up the difference:




Absolute chaos...



...v.s Absolute clean

And when it comes to the words, I'd say Eastern has crammed about 2000 into the first few pages, including a detailed analysis of how to identify whether you're a "Beginner, Intermediate, Expert, Pro and Team" rider and a very scientific chart to decide upon your TT length. But there is also a dark side to all this information that no kid will ever read:

Since you still didn't read it, you wouldn't have seen that bit that warned of other brands hiding subpar products behind flashy advertising. Is that code for "read on to find flashy products behind subpar advertising?"

BMX - Rays MTB Park Ohio

On another note, here's two more barspins in public places to add to the list.





Hey guys,

Dean, Adam, and I along with Efinger friends Gary, Mike, Billy, Brian, Dave, and Justin took a trip to Rays MTB park in Cleveland Ohio. Let me just say, that place is AWESOME! The park was super different then anything NJ had to offer with stuff such as bridges, rythem rooms, curved wallrides, rocks, skinnies, tetter-totters, elevators, and much more. Expect a video from the trip soon. Thanks to Nina at Rays for letting us ride on Thursday and Tony for letting us borrow a video camera for the trip.

More Mike Kuhn

Mikey just put up some more shots form the session at hippy's house.

Summer Update

 

Hey guys,

Here are some quick pictures I had laying around on my computer of the guys. In other news, Dean has now almost fully recovered from his broken ankle (see the post further down the page). Hopefully everyone is enjoying riding in the sunny weather.

All Extreme-Mike Kuhn

Mike was riding at hippy steve's house the other day and shot a couple of photos of Joey C. check out Mike's site for more photos he has taken. It's some amazing work.

A Warm Winter Day

Breaking News

Yes this is some news. About broken frames... and I'm sorry about that title.

Anyway, it comes via Pijin and basically it is that three frames have broken in comps over the weekend. One at the Masters in Cologne, one (@8:15) at NASS in the UK, then another at NASS. All three have just sheared off at the head tube. Nasty.

I'd heard a few stories of frames collapsing in exactly this way. But stories are one thing, to have three "on record" incidents, makes it all the more real. Not to mention making you wonder how many other frames bit-the-big-one in a less public way over the weekend.

I suppose when frames weights drop and drop like they have, you could say that this looks to be like the official bottoming out... ahem. The difficulty is that all the frames going around use a wide range of different technology and processes that means comparing by weight alone won't give you an accurate measure of strength. Heat treated tube sets v.s front triangle only v.s full post-weld, internally butted tubing v.s gussets v.s internally gusseted tubing, machined this, shaved that - a frame is not a frame is not a frame. Throw into the mix the possibility of poor welding and/or quality control and you're well and truly fucked!



Sunday's Ian Schwartz frame: keeping gussets alive and hearts out of mouths, 4.95 lbs

So you've got to be an engineer just to get your head around which frame to buy, but the information is out there. And you can be safe in assuming that if a manufacturer's description of a frame doesn't mention something, it ain't on there. Think of the description as their sales pitch - they're not going to leave out features that they've spent time and money putting into the frame.

I think the way Federal are doing things goes a step towards making life a little easier and is definitely something worth supporting. Apparently their 2010 frames will be coming out with three tiers of heat treatment options: Standard, Front triangle or Full Post-weld. That's on top of a butted and internally gusseted tubes - You know exactly what's going on and can choose the option that suits your riding... or the dollars in your pocket.





Federal's Notorious HT: Full post-weld heating, a bunch of other features, a respectable 4.6 lbs

In regards to these three breaks over the weekend: I'll leave the detective work on all the details of the frames to you, but it must definitely have some people feeling a little shaky. If you do happen to be aboard one of these frames, or if the whole thing is just getting you down, here's some light entertainment... pun intended.

Blahhhhging!!

Thats how I been feeling for the past week with some sort of something going around..So who ever got me sick-Thank You and whoever I got sick-Your Welcome.. So I've had plenty of time to catch up on everything BMX including all these fine items below.

Have you seen the cover of the New Dig BMX? Ya, just the cover makes you want to have one and we have plenty here now that we are getting them straight from Dig!!

Our favorite lil zine maker is back with Holeshot Issue 7, don't be like that come by and pick one up. Lots of good stuff in this one and definitely worth what you got in your pocket..

This has probably been sitting in my mailbox for a week but thats how often I check it. I hate mail!! 90East DVD's are here along with all the new T's and a sweet Lee poster..Kinder is famous!!!

Restock on all We The People tires in wire bead. These are a good alternative to Fly Ruben tires(we still have a full line of those too). Same compound and smoother tread.Which means you'll roll faster..

Restock on all Eclat seats also including Gonzo pivotals and Complex seats..These are by far the shops best selling seats so don't slip up and come grab one..

We will have some more WTP completes in a couple weeks also. Last batch went in a week..

Back to the grind this week...

Middle of Nowhere!!

Cov Crew Shredders.. Ya guys lets see some more..


Here is another from Andrew.. Kids are getting sick..

Back in the Saddle!!

Hampton Beach or Bust!!

Chunk Killed this wall at Highland.. WO!!! Big thanks to Rob and everyone at Highland MTB Park for opening their doors for us..

Check it out the place is amazing!!

Fit completes are back in but are already going quick. We will have a restock on Kink Completes along with 2011 Verde Completes soon..Summer is here, get your shred boners out!!!

Ride or Die!!!

The weather has been crazy lately. Its like we have a T-storm on a daily basis for the past week. I dig a good T-storm!!

Lots been going on around here, We will have a full shipment of completes rolling through the doors in the next few weeks. More Kink 2011 Completes along with 2011 Subrosa Completes.

Animal is always releasing something new. Here is this weeks offering.New Backpack and Tee.

Here are some new Fly Bikes seats also.. They look comfy. These are railed for all you pivotal haters like myself.. Got some more Alta stems too!!


The boys at FBM were nice enough to re-release the "Blow up you Car" Tee and a few others along with a couple hats. Tear the sleeves off these things and go shred your face off!!!

Jake has been roasting everything in his sights along with this dub on the reverse line..

A Woman Walks Into a Bar...

2010 bikes have well and truly started to appear.

Subrosa are having an honest tilt at the "more is more" crown, with a humble tally of 17 bikes. But it's not won yet - Mongoose are yet to run.

Colony Descendant bike is having a fair crack at taking the "how low can you go" title from Blackeye's Killorado complete . It's a race to the bottom. But wait, this guy is already polishing his trophy, if you know what I mean, with his custom Solid from last year.

On that note, a joke:
A woman walks into a bar and asks the barman for a double entendre.
So he gives her one.

Anyway... I can't tell you much more than that other than the Kinks 2010's are out and they've kept it to a round number. That GT are doing a brakeless street complete that I can't find a picture of, and Verde are doing two completes that both look nice.

Over and out.

WeThePros

It's a cut-throat business the re-posting of bmx product news. It's the quick and the dead. You snooze, you lose. Post something up 12 hours after it drops and you're nothing. Nothing!

The WeThePeople 2010 completes have already been levitating in cyberspace for days, but now there is this nicely re-packaged official release that allows me to keep my dignity:

What can you say other than that WeThePeople are the rulers of completes. Even the most salty of critics would struggle to come up with legitimate complaints about the above flip-book and bikes in it. Maybe it isn't exactly your flavour, but the package as a whole is pro. The bikes, the spec, the artwork, the photos, the info, the presentation. Pro.

They've broken the range up into series, which start with "Novice", and then in true marketer-speak jump straight to "Expert" and then mangage to find 3 more levels above that. So it's: Novice, Expert, Pro, Master and Elite.

They also give a pretty good rundown of what you actually get from the frames at each different level. For example if you buy a Novice Series bike you know that at least your down tube is Chromoly. On an Expert Series you get CrMo downtube and chainstays, on a Masters you can the top tube to the CrMo list, until you work your way up the range to full heat treated CrMo of the Envy. On top of that you can check the spec tables at the back of the book to see at which stage the bars step up from hi-tensile to CrMo, or whether the dropouts on your forks are heat-treated or not.

It seems like a pretty obvious thing to do - to give people all the information so they can make the choice of what they want to buy for their money, but it just doesn't usually get laid out like that - in fact the more suspicious conspiracy theorists amongst you might even believe that manufacturers were trying to hide exactly what their completes are made of. (?)

So there is a lot of information about the bikes. That's good. But there is also some nice details: Some integrated pivotal posts that you can lop off if you're not into them, plenty of integrated seat clamps of course, bikes with front and rear specific rims, seat / post combos, removable brake mounts, 8.2" rise bars and female front hubs. Plus loads of nice eclat spec, especially at the top end.

A couple of interesting details are the "Salt Mid sized BB sealed bearing (polymer bb)" on the Zodiac and the polymer bearing in the "Salt Cassette 9t sealed bearing / polymer bearing" on the Envy. What's going on here? I don't know, I'm going to bed, so I'll just leave you to speculate on that with some firey and informed banter in the comments. Ha..... ha.... ha.