It's totally normal to be skeptical when a magazine also has a sister company that sells bicycle components... However, the reason Compass exists is because we at Bicycle Quarterly wanted to put our research into practice and make the parts that we want to ride on our own bikes. We cannot tell others what they should manufacture (and believe me, we have tried!), so we had to do it ourselves. It's that simple.
The conflict of interest is best dealt with by being honest. So when the handlebar bag of a test bike that was held on with a Grand Bois decaleur we sell flew off during a fast gravel descent, of course, we reported it. When we found that the Grand Bois Ourson tires didn't perform appreciably better than the Panaracer Col de la Vie that used the same mold, we said so. Sure, we lost some sales at Compass, but the credibility of Bicycle Quarterly is far more important. And the Ourson tires were discontinued based on our research, and we replaced them with our own Compass Loup Loup Pass tires, which perform much better. And Compass Bicycles sells the MKS platform pedals and half-clips that I found to offer less optimal performance on short hills... If I was trying to boost sales, I would have said that the half-clips offer the same performance as clipless or full toeclips, and have quoted the Youtube study... To suspect that we talk about fork judder on carbon cyclocross forks only to boost sales of Rene Herse bikes is a bit far-fetched. For full disclosure, we do get a small licensing fee from Boulder Bicycles for every Rene Herse bike sold, but so few of these bikes are being made that it's totally insignificant, on par of what we make from selling Maxi-Car replacement axles. These are projects we do because we want to do them, not because they make money. We also do sell the wonderful Kaisei "Toei Special" fork blades, but again, I doubt many are sold to riders who'd otherwise buy a production carbon fork... The carbon fork issue (brake judder with cantilever brakes and a high-mounted cable hanger) has been reported in many magazines, but I believe we are the first who figured out what really is happening. It is simply a mismatch between very stout fork legs and a flexible steerer. Instead of getting the "brake dive" in the fork legs as the weight transfers forward during braking, you get flex in the steerer, which affects the tension of the brake cable, setting up a rhythmic oscillation. It can happen with any fork material, but it's predominant with carbon forks. I am sorry if that wasn't explained clearly enough in the article. Jan Heine Editor Bicycle Quarterly www.bikequarterly.com -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
