Update on new wheel (more comfort, speed, & grip) testing and Austin Group Ride feedback!

If they developed a good wheel then tried to sell it, all would be good.

I worked for a Fortune 500 company. I work in a startup now. I’ve worked for other startups and for venture-backed things. I’ve worked with companies making wheels as a tester. Those are real companies that care about skateboarding.

This place makes it obvious they don’t, and pretending to care is a side-effect of needing to sell things.

When I smell bs, I tell others before they step in it. :smiley:

What I’m telling you is that, if I only cared about money above everything else, I would do exactly what they are doing…

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@b264 Man, I love you. You keep my on my toes and I feel like it’s a intellectual sparing match with you. Entrepreneur longboarder vs. entrepreneur longboarder. I always look forward to your posts.

I even invited @b264 to comment just so he would see it. I’d feel neglected if he was busy cheating on me by going on a keyboard tirade on someone else than me :frowning: image

To answer your question: Yes and No. I’m looking for someone that has a large follower network so we can spread the word more. I want them to test them. I’m confident we’ll make something pretty cool and I’d want them to write a detailed review. I’m sending a set to @mmaner and also @anorak234, and a couple other people that have a lot of clout.

Climate, terrain, use-case - I can’t control that and they’ll test how they want to test. It’s up to them and that wouldn’t be a fair test if I controlled how they use it, when they use it, or how they ride.

Doug

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@b264 Let me be clear: Skateboard wheels is a tiny, tiny market. No VC would ever back skateboard wheels. But that’s ok.

This is a fun side project for Andrew and myself. My other company is backed by Silicon Valley Venture Capitalists, like Y Combinator, and is way bigger than this.

This is what we do on our spare time to keep our minds fresh, outta tunnel vision, and learn. Yet, this is something I’m not willing to spend $20k on molds + unit cost + logistics up front.

We’re making a lot of prototypes. We’re making molds ourselves and pouring wheels. It’s pretty interesting to be riding wheels that were 100% made by yourself. We’re having a lot of fun measuring the sensitivities and happen to make a wheel that we want to ride. It’s all positive.

@b264 You’re an entrepreneur yourself. You’re building a business yourself.

This is building product that people want 101 (you might know that if you’re truly in a growing startup): Validate there is initial interest in your concept (signups), Validate problem people have + get feedback, build something, test it yourself and with other people, get more feedback, improve it, get more email sign ups, etc. When you’ve reached critical mass, then you open it for sale (we haven’t asked for money in exchange for wheels to date). You start investing in the tooling when you assess there is enough demand.

If they suck, we’ll improve it. It’s as simple as that.

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Or some wheels to test! @b264 - you wanna test them when we get closer to a final config?

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Why are you not comparing against flywheels? Is it just because of the wheel adapter? I only say this because a lot… And I mean A LOT of us here use flywheels or their clone counterparts.

Also I’m still waiting on someone to do a super wide and soft wheel like centrax/bigzig. They are absolutely superb when it comes to comfort and grip. Just more rolling resistance.

PS: I’m Australian and it is “we made heaps” :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:.

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HAHAH.

We just got a set of flywheels and will be comparing it soon in future updates. We recorded a lot of this content weeks ago. We’ve also made some improvements on the new wheels we’re making (more in future blog post). We’ll have to redo some of this testing and will be sure to include the ABEC. We got the 107mm ABEC.

Also because this isn’t my day job and I run another company, it does take a little longer for me to get to test and spend the huge amount of hours to write these posts.

We also discovered a way to include the Kegel and the ABEC pattern too in the same wheel design.

I’ll take a look at Centrax and Bigzig. Never heard of them. Thanks!

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That’s kind of.aeesome. Are you saying with your core you can use flywheel or kegel pulleys?

Regarding Centrax wheels. It’s an ABEC formula that’s been around for a while. I rode them in downhill push boards years ago, nownim riding them in my hummie build. I loved them then and I love them now.

They are super grippy and comfortable. They are 83x77mm, so the touch lots of real estate. Might be worth looking into the form factor if nothing else.

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Actually, I am testing another design at the moment. You should definitely send some to areas that have snow and salt in the winter though. I mean, you know, regardless of the magnitude of social media followers and everything LoLz

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We’d be giving the current design out to people to test for long periods of time, but the initial prototypes are 3D printed and after a while the plastic ends up fatiguing and then they break. We also designed them with too sharp of a fillet and it breaks at the spoke.

It’s kinda a hazard at the moment, but we’re working on developing our own pour cast models for the core so they don’t break.

Note: Edited because I sounded like a jerk.

Yeah.

The pattern fits and we’re trying to figure out if we can make kegel on one side and abec on the other. Haven’t actually tested it yet, so there is a chance it won’t happen. The biggest obstacle is the offset.

Good pointer on the Centrax! TY!

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LoL I’m not a hater, you’re the hater. I just say it when I smell poop instead of silently walking around it. If you set off to develop a great wheel and succeeded and then started trying to sell it, all would be great.

A great analogy would be if you were trying to find a cure for cancer. “trying” is the key word here. But, you started selling your cure before you were done finding it. Therefore, you had to go and create science that proves your cure works because you’ve already started marketing it. Your entire way of doing things is backwards. That’s not how science works – that’s how religion works. It’s just like Theranos – except for wheels.

And you get a 5/10 for trying. Trying to discredit me instead of doing the science first. It’s all marketing, plain and simple. I have truth on my side, so if you keep jabbing me, I will keep breaking it out. Go do the science first. And don’t lie when you need “testers” they don’t need “social media followers”, they need to be “wheel abusers” in various climates and road conditions and use-cases. When you need “marketers” that’s when social media followers matter. Science cares not about audience. Facts are facts. Sure you can test in southern California only on sunny days and only care about top-speed and hipness and marketing. Or, you could care about wheel science.

I know exactly how you could make lots of money this way, but it’d be unethical for me to suggest it. Of course it’s probably already your plan anyway.

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We’ll keep posting progress video and showing our validation. Always looking for feedback on what people want to see on validation. Soon, you’ll be seeing people on this forum with wheels. I think mid december is when we’ll be distributing wheels, but it’s highly dependent on how our current molds go. Having some trouble with the pour.

In the next posts, I’ll be having a poll on the colors and the spoke designs. I’m also working on a grip testing video where we did a big skid pad.

If you have any other suggestions on how we should test, that would be great. How about you stop just bashing and try to add some value?

Thanks, Doug

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Test them in different climates with different riders in snow and dry and across railroad tracks and over streetplates. Don’t be disingenuous. Put science before sales. Put development before hype. Don’t fall into the trap of only testing in southern California.

Devise some sort of way to measure rear-leg-numbness-per-ten-kilometers-ridden.

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Boy those wheels look really tall! :smile:

Just to add my useless advice. I’m not sure what the roads are like down in peru, but @Eboosted might be a good choice to test in a different climate + road quality environment.

That would be sweet if you can make it happen.

As for your spat here, I get that you want to defend your brand but getting into a pissing match with someone doesn’t make you look any better in my eyes. Have to agree with @b264’s opinion on your ‘testing’ strategy. Feels more like you’re hoping for social media shill marketing instead of actually trying to find people in environments that will test them properly. (Not talking about mmaner and anorak, commenting on your original post about testers.)

Back to the wheels. Assuming your claims are true, I’d love to grab a pair to abuse with some Oaxacan roads, would love to know when you guys are ready to sell them.

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I wish we had some of that sweet, sweet VC funding for eskate wheels, but it’s not where the smart money’s at as it turns out. We’d have molds done and parts on the way. Sadly, the operation is more like me mixing PU in my kitchen then having Doug try to break the wheels to test them in between our other projects and with our own money. If you read the latest post, we’re doing our best to quantify the wheels in a scientific way. Put science before sales, as you say.

RMS acceleration is the metric you’re looking for when it comes to bumpiness and how that’s felt on the board. We splice out the vertical component of the accelerometer data while going over cobblestone, then take the root mean square of that data, giving you a single value to compare how bumpy each wheel is. We’ve done exactly what you’ve suggested already. And there’s more data to come! If you have a better/specific/objective test methodology to quantify and compare ride comfort, we’re always eager to hear them.

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Thanks for the feedback.

You’re right. I deleted the stuff. I was trying to be funny, but that just isn’t a good move.

Send me a DM and when we’re closer to getting a more production oriented wheel, we’ll consider sending it over. But you’ll need to ship it back (on our dime) so we can ship it other people to test if that sounds good. We are just a couple of guys with a set budget for marketing and need to prioritize people in the states for shipping because no doubt will it be a $60 for one way shipping, so that will drain our money pretty quick at first.

Thanks, Doug

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Well I’ll test em and if I like them I have no problem advertising them

Hello yes yes, snowy and salty road rider here :slight_smile:

I wouldnt mind testing :slight_smile:

woops sorry b2 I didnt mean to respond directly to you :heart:

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Are you in the states?

Are you in the states as well? DM me!