Are entry level carbons any good?

Chip \'oyler

Bar Shaker wrote:

Chip \'oyler wrote:

[
So 150 sheets of high modulus carbon expertly wrapped around a mitred joint and then cured in a state of the art autoclave is nowhere near the rigidity of a cheap far eastern frame made with inferior carbon? Could you explain to me why that is?

Er, you really have missed this, Chip. The article said that they use 150 separate pieces of carbon, to make the whole bike (not layers, over laid to make one section).

The point about carbon is that each sheet has enormous strength, sheets glued together are as strong as cheap fibre glass. The mat material becomes irrelevant when you start sticking little bits together as it is the unbroken strands that have the strength, not the resin.

150 separate bits is really an Isopon GT... and a total lack of understanding of the material being used. It would be like pouring a reinforced concrete slab, but throwing boxes of nails into it, hoping that would work.

I don't want to diss your bike, but you are paying for the craftsmanship, not the structural properties. There is nothing wrong with that, if that is what you want.

Think of it as a hand made watch, that doesn't keep time perfectly, but looks good and took a craftsman a long time to make. For the same money, you could buy an atomic clock. For a lot less money, you could buy something machine made that keeps near perfect time. To some people the time keeping abilities come second, to some they don't.

Yes I did pay money for craftsmanship. I also paid for the fact that the Maxima is a true custom made frame. Not only do they build it to my body measurements, they also build it to ride how I want by custom drawing the different carbon tubes to suit. They can then build stiffness, compliance etc even further by how they wrap the joints. So my frame is the only one of it's kind, and is built for me and me only.

Now correct me if I'm wrong - but that isn't something that can be done with a monocoque not unless each frame was layed up differently in the mould. And even then they couldn't build it to fit me perfectly unless they built a complete new one off mould. Then we would be talking big bucks I imagine!

Just for the record - I'm not slagging off monocoque bikes or the frames people are buying from China. It's just that I'm getting pissed off with inverted snobs on here who rip into people who have payed more than £1k for their frames. If I was to slag anyone off on this forum for having a Halford's Carrera or buying their cycling clothes from Aldi I would get flayed - and rightly so. But why is it OK the other way round?

Chip \'oyler

Rolf F wrote:

neeb wrote:

I've got a couple of 40-year-old King Seikos, which are very high quality mechanical dress watches made for the Japanese market only. They have completely in-house manufactured movements (not ETA generic ones) and once serviced properly will quite happily run to chronometer standards. However, because they are "only" Seikos they are cheaper and better value than vintage Omegas etc. - you just have to factor in the cost of paying a proper watchmaker to fully service them, which will cost almost as much as the watch (but is well worth it).

They look quite nice; not heard of them before - though still not cheap and I suspect the Omegas were better investments (though prices have already risen a long way). The market for old Omegas has been dominated by either Chonographs or gold dress watches. Stainless steel cases from the late 60s on have been bargains.

I'm moving the other way - high quality but generic mechanisms on forgotten brands. I just bought a perfectly nice Tressa with a 17 jewel movement for £20 on ebay. Runs well, looks OK (dial is a slightly clumsy Indian repaint but perfectly neat), case is barely marked and it is a class apart from modern stuff. I plan next to get another similar watch with a fast running mech to teach myself how to clean them.

Funnily enough I'm starting to get into watches myself! I've owned an Oris Big Crown for over 10 years now and just boughta TAG Heur Carrera Calibre 1887. I know TAG's are a bit common but I just love the styling and design of mine.

Anyway - can you recommend any good books about watches, the brands, history etc?

neeb

Rolf F wrote:

They look quite nice; not heard of them before - though still not cheap and I suspect the Omegas were better investments (though prices have already risen a long way).

Maybe, although I'm hoping that the value of King Seikos will rise in the future. They are slightly undervalued at the moment because they were the second-tier premium line after the Grand Seikos, and while Grand Seikos are still made and marketed in Japan, King Seikos are not and so lack some recognition at the moment.

neeb

Anyway - can you recommend any good books about watches, the brands, history etc?

I think the internet is often the best source of information, although like any subject with nerdy/collecting potential you will come across a lot of seriously pathological obsessives...

Unfortunately IME a lot of watch collectors seem to be extremely conservative and (again, IMO) somewhat difficult to relate to.

rolf_f

neeb wrote:

Maybe, although I'm hoping that the value of King Seikos will rise in the future. They are slightly undervalued at the moment because they were the second-tier premium line after the Grand Seikos, and while Grand Seikos are still made and marketed in Japan, King Seikos are not and so lack some recognition at the moment.

I'd have thought you wouldn't want the prices to rise unless you've finished buying!

Chip \'oyler wrote:

Anyway - can you recommend any good books about watches, the brands, history etc?

Chip - never found any books that worked for me. There always seems to be far more stuff on the net. For example this place has more than will ever end up in books
http://omega-constellation-collectors.b ... 52-75.html

That said, even that chap seems to know lots about the pie pan era and not very much about later watches but I still couldn't have got my Constellation without that site. Most stressful ebay purchase I've ever made though as the fakes and frankenwatches are more common than the good watches but still make high prices.

neeb

A great resource if you want to understand how a mechanical watch actually works is this:

http://www.timezone.com/library/wglossa ... 1806327073

Also these articles are really interesting:

http://www.timezone.com/library/horologium

cojones

Decision made, £1100 carbon ordered, couldn't have done it without you guys *wipes tear from eye*

rake

i usually agree with what you say bar shaker. yes the shapes of a moulded frame do have advantages that plain tubes cant utilise. there is one thing though, fibre length only affets the strength when its below a critical length for the tickness/type of fibre being used- from when i did a bit of a read up. the force necessary to pull a fibre through a piece of resin increases with the length of the fibre. Once the fibre reaches a certain length the force which is required to pull it through equals the fibres breaking strain, so any more anchorage into the resin will have no effect since its well in enough to reach the maximum strength of the fibe and snap it. Strangely if the fibres are longer than this critical length and overlapped the material has its full strength regardless of any additional fibre length. surprisingly they only need to be a few centimetres accordingly to 'the book'.