What does the future hold for mountain bikes?

RED_

Hi, here's a quick one

just wondered what you all think or hope mountain bikes will be like in 10//20 year's time?

How much can they be improved from what they are now?

projectsome

evolution says lighter and more gears for certain bikes but other types I don't know. we could see huge front cogs.

Raymondavalon

Internal GBOX type drivetrains and perhaps belt drives opposed to chains
Carbon spokes, carbon discs, ceramic bearings, things like computers and/or GPS systems will be single ASIC design and could be integrated within the stem.

GHill

Raymondavalon wrote:

Internal GBOX type drivetrains and perhaps belt drives opposed to chains

That.

Grimy

GHill wrote:

Raymondavalon wrote:

Internal GBOX type drivetrains and perhaps belt drives opposed to chains

That.

+1

There is definatly room for improvement over the drivechain. The chain and sproket setup has little room left for improvment over the fundemental design. Its got so many flaws because of the unforgiving environment that it is exposed to in off road riding. A less maintenance intesive system, with less exposure and more reliability would be a fantastic step forward. Instead of a chain maybe a driveshaft to provide drive to the rear wheel, probably carbon for weight and using a sealed continuusly variable ratio epicyclic gear box in a slightly oversized front BB for "gearing" that would provide the ideal cadence for all speeds.

Foot_of_travel

Grimy wrote:

GHill wrote:

Raymondavalon wrote:

Internal GBOX type drivetrains and perhaps belt drives opposed to chains

That.

sealed continuously variable ratio epicyclic gear box in a slightly oversized front BB for "gearing" that would provide the ideal cadence for all speeds.

That has a sprung torsion plate that could be adjusted to suit the riders strength, by the rider, at the handlebar, at the press of a button. Electronically.

Northwind

More carbon, probably. Frames designed to suit the material rather than carbon frames designed to be like metal frames...

The Northern Monkey

Radio/blu-tooth controled shifting,braking, seatpost adjustment (height), suspension travel?

motherhucker

Haha the bikes will be riding themselves by that time i bet :P

It'd be wicked to have a lightweight perfectly shifting/operating drivetrain to use on any mtb, not just the burly ass DH bikes that have gearboxes at the moment. I.e. the Diamondback Sabbath still sitting my LBS that would drop like a sack of...

...Anyway, other than that and a few minor adjustments to gear that companies will have made by then, i wouldn't want them to change a lot, so you can sort the men from the boys. And of course the women from girls

smartbiker

I'm sure they will get fair bit lighter, I'm surprized how heavy bikes still are after all these years.

The Spiderman

I`d like them to look at ease of servicing and reliability.Lets see improved drivetrains,brakes that are easy to bleed,tubeless tyres that are easy to set up,etc.
I also hope that manufacturers co-operate and we don`t see each going their own way with iown ntegrated aprroaches to suspension design,and components making compatability and servicing a nightmare.
We already have sqaure taper,Octlink,Isis,external and now BB30 bottom brackets,1.125 and 1.5 steerers,9mm,15mm and 20mm bolt through front axles.
Settle on the best solution and stick to it!

weeksy59

MAybe not as much as you think guys.

MTB's get a lot of their innovation from motorbikes in many ways.

However despite lightweight materials, improved options for suspension etc, the motorbikes that sell are stll very simillar aesthetically to 20 years back.

Still using chain drive etc.

Calipers still bleed in exactly the same way, same pad and piston style etc.

I think the gearing system and some of internal semi automatic box maybe ?

xtreem

DH bikes will weight around 15kg, but they will still be pushed uphill.

Most XC bikes will weight under 9kg, and people will still buy parts to lower the weight.

oldabe10

I dont think they will use carbon discs for MTB as they are only powerful enough when they are hot, they are alright for road bikes as the brakes will be good enough but id say MTB a bit of a nono, maybe carbon centre and steel/aluminium braking surface??

harry_jones1984

Co2 capsule gear shifters for dh bikes integrated stems on everything, 1.5" steerer on everything, people will still insist on running fully rigid steel single speeds because they don't want to get their totr bike dirty or wear any of it out

benneally

make the frames out of aerogel...wow..

cullen_bay

there will be new techniques of manufacturing carbon and aluminium, it will lower weight and "add stiffness". Maybe we should have a FMBP: Future mountain bike pundit?

seriously, the next 5 years will probably see drivetrains going internal for fr and dh, then gradually getting lighter until they can be used by weight weenies on xc bikes, after that, i can only see a way forward if a new composite is discovered that makes carbon fibre seem like aluminium!

cat_with_no_tail

+1 for internal gearing. Some kind of improvement over the shimano alfine, sturmey archer type hubs and the G-box type designs, but more tailored towards XC use.
Of course, production meterials and methods will change as certain natural resources become depleated and more heavily regulated.
Introduction of new lighter, stronger materials that none of us have ever heard of (yet).
Possible increase in aerospace industry standard designs and materials.
Increase in the amount of electronic technology used, implementation of a fighter pilot style HUD in helmets?, integrated tyre/shock pressure sensors/regulators.

Of course, this discussion could well be redundant beasuse as cycling increases in popularity the government will decide that they have missed out on an opportunity to make some money and introduce mandatory taxing of all cycles used on the road. They will then decide that Mountainbiking, in fact cycling of any kind is far too dangerous, and poses an unacceptable Health and Safety risk, we are not capable of making that decision for ourselves because we are mere plebs. As such, it will be outlawed pushing the sport underground. Small bands of "cycle Junkies" will begin to come together. Meeting in old disused barns in the dead of night where they will swap carbon parts and sniff GT85.
Then, after all the oil is gone, after the riots die down and the governments have collapsed, a new world order will emerge, with cyclists as its leaders.

Then again......

Sarnian

You have just maneged to conjure up the image In my head of mad max riding a mountain bike

cat_with_no_tail

Does that mean we would all have to ride Cannondale Road Warrior 500s ? If so, I think I may revert to walking :P

zero303

smartbiker wrote:

I'm sure they will get fair bit lighter, I'm surprized how heavy bikes still are after all these years.

Are you really? A lot of my hardtails from the late nineties when they all started getting forks were heavier than my Five and a LOT less capable.

cat_with_no_tail

or even better, one of These

zero303

In fact, even on top end race kit - they have to reach a point where light simply becomes broken and useless (and often this is already the case)

Torres

I think eventualy either centrelock or 6 bolt rotors will become an industry standard, not sure which though.
Titanium will become more mainstream, used in components like bars, stems and posts more, and hopefully, cheaper.
Suspension will probably get lighter, and more adjustable.
But there will still be the weekend warriors who rip round trail centres on their fully rigid, steel, singlespeeds

whydoesitalwaysrainonme

some weird extremely light and extremely strong material that weight next to nothing
and 100000000000000000000000000mm travel that doesnt get affected by pedalling.

whydoesitalwaysrainonme

oh and in 30 years time you will be able to get a carbon fibre bike for £180 like you can get an aluminium bike £180 now.

Chaz.Harding

Maybe on day they'll design some kind of self-propulsion device...? Who knows...

JOKE!!

Raymondavalon

weeksy59 wrote:

MAybe not as much as you think guys.

MTB's get a lot of their innovation from motorbikes in many ways.

Still using chain drive etc.

If you look at Harley Davidson, the Sturgis came out with belt drive almost two decades back and they still use belts on Harleys and Buells

Regarding the belt making its was to MTB'ing I've seen a commuter MTB from Tank Cycles with a belt drive system: Clicky! Although it does use a Shimano internal 8-speed system.
However, we could see bikes looking like this but with full suspension

Daz555

I hope to see the death of the derailleur - on MTBs at least.

I'd love to see this sort of tech evolve to the point where it was light, efficient, and capable enough for proper off-road use: http://www.zerocycles.co.uk/bikes.php?P ... dac39bf979

Then again, I'll be too old to care.

stevieboy

I hope nothing changes because I dont want to have to say "back in my day" to any young wipper-snapper

All i'd like to see now is electronic gearing on an MTB with hidden gubbins, apart from the mech's obviously or a GBOX type system, even if it means sticking with the tried and tested chain.

Weight will not come down too much more now, I certainly wouldn't want a 20lb 6-inch kona, I like the weight on the downs (and ups). Any lighter on the Scott would also be crazy, at 19ish lbs it's already a bit too skittish.

To sum up I think gearing has the greatest way to go, although really, is there anything wrong with the current system? A decent system set up properly works flawlessly in 99.9% of the conditions. It is only through poor technique, poor set up or extreme conditions that the problems occur IME.

geordiefreerider

For some reason my post has been removed - the jist of it was about a hydraullicly operated derraileur - an idea I came up with a few years back thinking it could be more accurate and reliable, but research online showed it had already been thought of, dont understand why it was removed this forum baffles me sometimes ???? :roll: