Another Crank Recall, Stages and Kona go Bankrupt and Elitewheels vs QVist Patent Dispute 

A lot of people have been asking what I have been doing. As explained in the video, I have been investing heavily in my own manufacturing and intend to release some new products shortly. I also applied for journalist accreditation, I am not sure I will get that, but we'll see. And I've also been busy with my day job!

BMC is an acronym. Built in Mainland China.

FSA lawyers: "Dear Hambini, it's a 'minor' injury depending on your age. In your case, 5 years old, that would suffice!"

I.had filed for a US Patent for an item. A US patent application publishes about a year after it is filed. Before it will be issued. Around a month later, my IP search showed a Chinese patent for my item. All they did was copy and paste our whole application and file in China. We had filed OUS, including China. They have absolutely no regard for IP there.

ROOKIE mistake clicking on a Hambini video with my volume still on 95%

The FSA recall is a joke. I purchased a Canyon Grizl in 2023. The groupset on the bike is GRX. The cranks were supposed to be GRX but Canyon had a disclaimer stating that the bike may arrive with a substitute crank due to low stock issues. Well, guess which crankset came on my bike? I say the recall is a joke because...Canyon is washing their hands of any responsibility and emailed me a link to FSA's recall page. FSA says you have to take your bike to a bike shop and they will work with the bike shop to get a new crank installed. They won't directly send you a new crankset nor reimburse you for the faulty crankset. Firstly, I don't want my bike sitting at a shop for who knows how long whilst FSA and the shop dick around with each other...I can replace the crankset myself in 10 minutes. Secondly, I don't want an FSA crankset. Thirdly, what about the people who don't have a bike shop within a convenient distance from their home? I told FSA & Canyon to fuck-off and I purchased a GRX crankset which I will be installing myself.

Wow… the Hellllooooo part made my neighbours crank fail 😢

All this talk of Hambini bottom brackets being expensive ignores the life cycle cost. I bought a BB386 EVO to Dub Hambini bottom bracket and after about 9000 miles I replaced the bearings. A local industrial supply house that is a certified NTN distributor supplied a set of bearings for $30. I'm now looking for a BSA to Dub bottom bracket and have researched Chris King, Ceramic Speed, Cane Creek, Wheels Manufacturing, and BB infinite bottom brackets. They all use custom bearings, and some of their replacements are outrageously priced. BB Infinite wants $150 for a set of bearings. I can do the math on how many bearing replacements it takes for a Hambini bottom bracket to become economical. I am now on a Hambini waitlist.

Hambini must be getting bent over by Elite because his argument about Qvist is so hypocritical it’s fucking laughable. Hambini says that his BB is expensive but rightfully so. It’s “a bargain” he says. Then 3 mins later, he says Qvist’s hub is expensive but “forget it” no will buy that.

The Qvist design looks like it has used Chris King for "inspiration" See here ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-U27--j4k_aM.html A few updates: Elite have released a lengthy statement on the patent allegations, if you ask me they've acted a lot more professionally than Qvist, you can read it here www.elite-wheels.com/company-news/investigation-into-patent-issues-regarding-the-drive-helixs-helical-dual-ratchet-system/ The initial outcome of this is elite are not going to sell their wheels with these hubs in Germany. And Stages are being sued by Giant (who made their bikes) for not paying bills and Giant have also poached a few of members of their management, So Imagine a Giant Power Meter is about to come out.

Damn the QC, Full Speed Ahead!

Twisted German: Shimano ist Cranken-House

Can Shimano pls buy Stages and use their powermeters?!

Kona - CEO of large outdoor water sports company buys Kona (at COVID peak) to diversify company. Said CEO gets fired for making bad decisions. New CEO decides to stick to core business and sell (financially non performing) bike business. Source BRAIN aka The Bicycle Retailer and Industry News, compulsory reading if you want to know what is happening inside the bike industry.

Filing the patent in Germany still gives Qvist protection in China. The Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) lets you file first in any member country, then use that priority date for your patent in any other. China and Germany are both PCT members.

The issue with the Qvist patent if it was applied for in Germany in 2021 is that it should have been regarded as prior art in the Chinese patent (according to the publication date of the German patent), with Qvist having priority for a Chinese patent. But that issue aside, a defense of Elite may be that even if the prior art and patent priority exist, the Elite design may not infringe, because of the design is different or what is claimed is not being used by Elite.

We have bikes with FSA gossamer cranksets in our shops. For now, no de-bonding, but half (if not more) have a wobbly chainring on new bikes...

Hambini, my FSA Gossamer Pro crank debondes while riding and I offered to send it in to you for analysis but you said you were too busy. I fully understand, there's so much shit product on the bike market that I'm sure you're kept super busy between your regular job and RU-vid and bike stuff 👍🏻👍🏻

I appreciate the fact that you're using Firefox

Fun fact - Qvist (pronounced [kvist] by the way, and also spelt kvist nowadays in Danish/Swedish/Norwegian) means...a twig.

Not going to lie....I'm a bit bummed out about Kona..

Sad news about Stages. As Far as I know, they were the only company to make a Campy 11 speed compatible carbon-fiber non-drive side crank-arm power-meter which sold at about half the price of the next cheapest Campy crankset power-meter option. Great accuracy, simplicity, elegance, and durability (no disintegrating crank-arms here!). A very nice piece of kit. They will be missed!

I think you can see the madness of the bike industry in the Specialized sale. 50% off a kids e-bike, now £1750. There’s 2 things wrong with that.

Patent attorney and bike nerd here. While I appreciate you covering these patent things, you're a bit off the mark with your analysis of the situation. Next time you cover a patent situation you should let me know, I'd be happy to go through it with you so you can sort out your show notes.

I really want to see Hambini's field reporting for the Reaming News Network.

I have a Pole Vikkela, sorry to see them go bankrupt. Leo Kokkonen (the founder) seems like a good guy to me, I have long thought you'd enjoy how Pole work. CNC'd 7075 frames and tight tolerances. Leo made several videos explaining the details on each bike and they sold me on it. Guess I ride a collectors item now.

Stages made a good product. Sad to see them go.

Pretty soon we'll realise that the very people who told us we need to spend £15k on a bike with heavy (and unnecessary) disc brakes, tubeless tyres (that they never install at the point of sale, I wonder why), and electronic gears, maybe worked for the industry. Now, the gravy train has not only stopped but is going back to steam, the market is imploding. Gravel, Fixie, power meter, £50 socks, you don't need any of this crap to ride a bike. Enjoy, we'll be better with these mega companies and go back to people who love the sport.

Minor injuries, that's a good one.

Fsa cranks seem to be crap, we had a notice at our job about fsa cranks that flex too much and hit the derailleur

Got a Scott for the road and a Stages SB20 for indoors... I sure know how to pick the winners 😢 Stages support used to be fantastic. About a year ago, it went to non-existent, I have 2 open tickets about a misbehaving PM that I never received an answer for. Bummer - the bike itself is basically indestructible.

Hey Hambini any update on the bike lube video?

Sad to see Kona being bankrupt. Bikes like the Kona unit are absolutely awesome travel bikes. You can ride them over the whole world and if they really fail, the next welding machine will be able to fix them.

Locally to me, the Specialized dealer has Tarmac SL6, SL7 and SL8 on their books at the same time. Strangely, there are deals available on the SL6 versions... May explain the Specialzed sale in the UK, but may not!

thats a bummer for kona and stages. ive only had kona mtbikes since 2000, along with santacruz thry where the bikes any downhiller would have in the bc interior back in the day, real og's. as for stages, my power is like 8 years old and still going strong, i use gravel riding thru mud, puddles, whatever, its bomber.

Hambini suggests that people should be moderate and cautious with their comments.

Damn. Didn't expect Stages to go bankrupt. What even are their expenses? The app certainly hasn't had an update in years. Their hardware works well in any case. Have their crank based power meter as my frame didn't have enough clearance for cheaper alternatives. Their bonded on pods are among the flattest on the market.

Always blows my mind how short sighted the bike industry is; how long did bmx, mtb, road, fixies last? Gravel is on the down now and whatever pops next won’t last either. Oh well, I’ll snap up the fire sale stuff

Your comment about Qvist hubs being expensive is complete hypocrisy. I bought a bb30a race bb from you and it was expensive! Currently it's £312 or €364 excluding vat! How on earth can you say Qvist’s hub is expensive at €420.? I'm not defending them, but I also can't see how you defend your own pricing and condemn theirs in the same breath! Edit: I'm not allowed to answer your comment Hambini so I'm adding it here. I agree, you've never said your BB was cheap, but you are justifying its price even now. However, you dismiss Qvist hubs as overpriced, essentially saying their prices are unjustified. Surely, their prices are justified when a hub is more complex to make than a BB? This video stinks of someone shilling for Chinese companies. A nation that hasn't had an original idea in its entire existence!

So Qvist actually made another post about their production where they specify, that they manufacture all the parts except the bearings and springs for the hubs

As a former sponsored fsa rider their products are junk. Their QC is a farce.

Genuinely sorry about Kona as they seemed like a decent company... although IIRC they were sold by their originators in 2022 to some probable vulture scumbags so arguably were already dead.. shame for the staff though. Pretty shocking if the others listed are also likely to hit the fan... although when they've been dining out on ten grand bikes for the past decade or so they fucking deserve it tbh. Specialized especially given their track record for grimey team-America corporate-cockend litigation-happy bully-boy bullshit..

Merlin's are extremely slow getting stock in too lately. Not wanting to start unfounded rumours, but that's the way Wiggle/CRC went. I could be completely wrong, but these days not much surprises me.

In legally required documents that are regulated in the US, such as a patent application, it's the general rule to avoid 'marketing claims'. That is, a phrase like, "does the job quick and easy" is not allowed. The characterization of possible injury as 'minor' is a marketing claim or akin to that, as you note. You can be concussed by falling off a bike, even with a helmet on and even if the bike is stationary. A reasonable scenario for the crank arm breaking is when the rider is at speed and pushing as hard as possible on the cranks, so if it fails it would almost surely lead to loss of control and veering off in a dangerous way. A good example of this principle is the US auto industry, no stranger to legally required recalls. The description of the fault is no-nonsense.

The Stages spin bikes you see in gyms are typically the SC1/SC3 models and as of almost a year ago Stages handed off support for those to Precor, so the question could be directed to Precor about whether they will continue supporting them. Precor was never involved in supporting the SB20 smart bike (not a spin bike) which is used by many indoor cyclists at home. I expect those people are screwed in the event of any problem, unless someone picks up the pieces.

Elite posted an article this morning stating they have been in contact with Qvist and have, for now, suspended sales to Germany. I agree that this may not work out the way Qvist is hoping for.

I've had a left-side Stages powermeter for about six years. A decent enough tool for the price I paid. I'd be sorry to see them crash and burn. But oh well. There are plenty of options now.

Holy crap Hambini, I fell off my chair with your intro! I will be contacting my lawyers regarding my injury from said fall. However, I am willing to settle out of court with you if you can provide me a Hambini bottom bracket for each one of my seven bikes! 😂

Tragic news with Stages. Got burned on their SB20 smart bike. Paper weight.

New Shimano clip on pedal adjustment screw thread stripped with one adjustment to high and low setting. They should have used harder grade or CroMo steel.

I don't see what's patentable in the hub design in the first place. Anyone who's seen a Chris King or DT Swiss hub (Those are the ones that have decades of using a face ratchet style freewheel behind them that I can think of off the top of my head) has already seen that mechanism applied to make a freewheel. Shimano XTR hubs are also using it since they went to 12 speed. I vaguely remember reading somewhere that DT Swiss had a patent on the face ratchet style freewheels that was stopping other manufacturers using it (Not sure how this didn't affect Chris King) but it has expired now anyway. Making the ratchet 2 sided might be a patentable attribute if they're clocking the rings half a click off each other to give twice as many engagements per rotation as either ratchet ring has, but just making the rings with twice as many teeth and eliminating the mirrored parts is a cheaper, simpler, lighter option and will be more than strong enough assuming the rings are well made enough that all teeth carry the load evenly in the first place, which is essential if the hub is to last at all. I'm pretty sure this is the reason nobody has bothered with designs like this before. The other reason face ratchet hubs are not popular, is that the ratchet rings need to be machined very precisely to engage properly and also need a high degree of hardness, making them very expensive compared to pawl style ratchets, where the hard parts can be a lot smaller and are geometrically much simpler, so an equivalent performing and lasting hub with radial pawls will be cheaper. The massive downside of the face ratchet design compared to radial pawl style ratchets, is that if any contamination gets between the ratchet rings and they don't sit parallel, they pretty much don't engage at all and will skip with no chance of the freewheel catching a click or two later, while also probably terminally damaging the parts as part of one tooth at the far side of the ratchet to the contamination will catch and definitely overload if this happens. That is the one area where this design is actually good, as both ratchet washers have to be contaminated at the same time for it to completely loose drive, but having decent seals will more or less eliminate this as a problem worth worrying about for most people. Chris King designed their freewheel to mitigate this by having a helical spline driving the ratchet ring, so that the more torque it's carrying, the harder the rings are pressed together. This still doesn't help if anything big gets between the rings, but it's a much older and much cleverer implementation than the hubs discussed here - and the quality is almost certainly much higher though they do cost a little more. Of all the companies making rear hubs, I'd guess that Chris King have the highest percentage of the hubs they've made since they started still running on people's bikes though - with the bare minimum of servicing, they look to have the potential to last forever. Rohloff's 14 speed hub might be the only comparable product in terms of being able to last the rest of the life of the owner.

My personal opinion is a lot of these companies are charging too much for bikes, which, as you pointed out do not cost that much money to make and are mostly manufactured in the far east for not much money. It’s not sustainable. When you compare the likes of a Canyon to a similarly specced Trek/BMC whatever, the difference is vast. I understand there’s a direct to consumer model with Canyon but still, the savings are mental. Even Canyons are becoming expensive by comparison now too but still offer much better vfm than ALL other mainstream manufacturers (in my humble opinion).

The Bicycle Retailer and Industry News coverage of the Stages bankruptcy mentioned that the executives from Stages joined Giant. So glad they are going to be ok.

It’s a shame about Stages. They were a great company.

High end Stumpy at 50% off here in Sweden. Specialized is not immune.

I use your bottom brackets in all my bikes and they are brilliant! 😉👌👍

Looks like from what you say and others to, we will be lucky to have a cycle industry. Hardly anyone cyclescin the UK now. From a UK perspective, 2012 was peak cycling. Looks like the future is scooters😢

If you’re heaving on the crank when it falls off, a broken arm will be the least of your worries, especially if the missus was thinking she’d like to start a family 😮

@hambini I"m not a fan of FSA. My CAAD 10 came w/ their SLK Light crank, and after 11 years the non-drive side pedal insert was loose in the carbon arm.

Question for mr Hambini. Ever done a video about shorter cranks? Which part is a hype and which part makes sense?

Bring back cotter pins, and hammers in toolkits!

Damn. Just When Stages released a Shimano Power meter that worked. SMH. Bike companies going bye, bye. They got greedy during the Pandemic. What goes around....comes around.

Failure standards associated

For what it's worth, I feel sorry both for Stages and for Kona. They each brought to the market something people actually wanted and needed, and they were reliable and trustworthy. Unfortunately, they are the collateral victims of the global bike market fuckup lead by the brands everybody hates.

Trek is growing in Asia. Not sure how sustainable this is, but we have 2 Trek distributors within 7 kms :(. Both of them are owned by friends so have to think carefully what I buy from which shop.

Kona made some cool bikes, but man the current line up is just boring. My honzo ST is fantastic, I wish they leaned more into what made them unique than trying to copy the larger market. They will be missed

When we getting a hambini hub?

Konas have been made in the far east since the 90s (apart from the small volume custom US built ones they used to do)

I had an fsa omega crankset for years on my old bike and it was a solid crank. Stages were for a place in time but better tech for the price came along and thry didn't innovate.

Over priced bicycles will do that to any company. 12 grand for a bike made for under 200 bucks in China. Same parts made in China and are copies of other brands and sold to the public. There is a lot of car parts are also copies but made with cheaper materials and poor quality. But there is two different areas of China that make parts. One is a counterfeit market. The other is the actual area of business.

I'm really curious about the 'Journalist application' 💁‍♂🤣

if upheld then Elite are going to have an injunction against sales outside of China for that particular hub. The obvious short-term fix, if they can't get around it legally, is a different hub design. I wonder if GCN will have to find another wheel sponsor in the meantime? Probably not, but still not a great look. The patchwork quilt (*not cue-wilt) of patent organizations needs an update for the 21st century, at least.

Kona had a long slide to the bottom. Too many brands. Too little innovation.

Hey About time you make one on the Lotus saga, new design, other brands latch on, among TOOT engineering with an UCI challenge or. Are Ku Cycle overlooked or is Alex Bok not a genius. Graceias :-)

Pole's latest vids and posts have interesting comments from alleged customers who are waiting for their bikes. Idk if that's trolling by haters but some claims need to be investigated. 🤔🍿

Stages out of business because their product is just too good. Mine is on 9 years at 500km per week, still as accurate as my brand new smart trainer.

So a location close to the university city Dresden, where TSMC decided to build a chip factory(production start in 3 years approximately), isn't able to produce some hubs, because, more than 30 years ago, it was the former GDR? And then simultaneously complaining about potential insane electricity costs and high product prices... I am starting to worry you getting a journalist licence ...

I know you don't really do mountain bikes but I would like to see what you think of the Atherton bikes frames and he construction methods, they use titanium printed lugs and carbon tubes bonded together and they recently released an aluminium lug and bonded tube bike.

You need a 5YR old's degree in Reeming, so let the REEMING COMMENCE!!!

I don't care who makes a product, just if it will not brake under my 100kg :) I love my shimano hubs, they will for sure outlast my shimano cranks and fsa cranks :) Will SRAM ever recall the first gen cranks they made with the Soft aluminum threads for the pedal :) I have so many miss matched Spline Sram Cranks :) It was always fun landing a jump with your pedal on your clipless shoe :)

Good show hambini

I guess I better take care of my SB20 because Stages certainly won't. I'm beginning to realize the big mistakke I made in buying it.

Stages Gen 3 on Campag Super Record is great. Gutted they’ve gone.

I have a question! nowadays lower tire pressures are recommended to go faster, does it also mean that if I drop the pressure on my sexdoll she will work faster

Why the hell would you use a power meter when on a good day you develop 300 waits? So why would you be surprised that people wouldn't pay $1,000 for a power meter to learn after 3 months of heavy training that they have gained less power than the accuracy of the meter? People finally wake up as is presently occurring in the carbon fiber frame market. Even the aluminum Allez is so overpriced that no doubt Specialized is in for trouble. Components are being as simplified as possible to reduce manufacturing costs but when did you require 12 speeds unless you're a professional racer? I rode 40 miles yesterday on a steel bike on crappy roads with huge road shocks being transmitted to me ass. I didn't need a $5,000 frameset nor 12 or 13 speeds to get me through it. Admittedly I am 80 and I used to try the best. But nothing made me a better rider than me.

Really enjoying the Hambini Show. Thanks.

What is a journalist? Everyone is a Citizen Journalist.

Who took the back entrance first thou...

makes sense why stages wasn't calling me back about a replacement part. :)

Care to link me those h-works hubs? Cant seem to find them, might be cool to build my own wheelset with them on the cheap. Ive been eyeing 9velo lv45 2.0 on Panda Podium.. building myself saves just a bit more. Probably some Light Bicycle AR46 rims and sapim cx ray spokes

I have zero interest in a ratchet hub but $400 for the rear is in line with other high end hubs.

I remembered, turn the volume right down at the beginning, hearing still ok 😂😂

No loss re. stages, multiple early software glitches, making data unusable, water leaks and finally total death with calibration values going haywire.. shite...

Its thursday btw

Chuck Norris turns the volume up on Hambini videos.

That these bike manufacturers still think they can get away with 9K bike prices, for frames that have been time and time shown to be seriously sub par (at best), they for sure deserve everything they get.

Qvist/Elite freewheel design(s) theoretically would not be as efficient as the freewheel design on the hubs used by 9Velo etc

Absolutely can’t wait for more absolute crap content

Speaking of company reps getting pissy online, ever looked into 5Dev cranks and the kooks who sell those?

Hambini, you're exactly right - Who's buying 9K bikes? I rode with local rider for several miles who had a brand new Cervelo with a 12 speed electric group set. I rode with him riding a Tarmac SL2, guess how much I paid vs him? under $1K for me last spring, his bike was guessing over $6K from a local shop plus he paid state sales taxes on the purchase. I'm returning in a couple weeks to an annual bike swap to see what else is available in that price range. The money I don't spend on cycling goes to my retirement or vacations.