FLASH-POINT BLOG ARCHIVE: Aug 2005

We have reached the stage where rims are coming off the presses in some volume and the pipeline to the drilling machine is filling up. In the next two weeks we will be getting additional hubs, spokes and decals so wheelbuilding will start in earnest.
Our training is progressing well and the quality of the rims is clearly improving day by day as the press operators pick up the quirks, acquire new skills and learn to make great rims. In the weeks ahead, as we approach US launch day, we will be tightening our QC parameters, setting higher standards all along the process chain and concentrating on delivering only the very best wheels.
Results are coming in from the early riders, some indicating we may have tweeking to do to improve wheel balance and tighten brake track variations. We have plans underway to address these issues all along the process, from improved preforming design to new equipment with far higher control on brake track machining.
Stay with us for the ride of a lifetime.

Industry Trade Shows are vital to this industry and probably many others. For the keen cyclist and all the organizations involved in the sport, September 1st is when it all begins. This is the first Trade Show of the season and will be the grand unveiling of Flash-Point wheels to the entire industry. FP and Zipp will spend days in each place to show all of our newest products and latest innovations to Bicycle Shop Owners so that we can eventually get them into the hands of the cycling entusiasts worldwide.
The show schedule is quite brutal for a fairly short time period, starting in Germany in Sept, then Canada and Italy 10 days later, Interbike in Las Vegas and the French Show at the end of September, Australia and England in mid October and Japan in November. While folks from FP and Zipp will not be at every one of these shows, we do have to ensure that we have product there.
It is crazy busy but we love this time of year, stay tuned and we will try and get some Euro scoop for you while we are there!

Talked to Todd Narkis aka 'rim doc' just before he left and asked him to share some thoughts on his role as lead Flash-Point researcher.
What did you enjoy most about this project?
Provided a fresh approach, I was able to start with a clean slate and none of the existing rules needed to apply.
Can you share with us the steepest challenges?
Building the rim with minimum sub-parts, optimization of the laminate structure and getting the best out of the base  materials. The result of using multiple plys was a pleasant suprise.
Were there any heart stoppers along the way?
Our first prototypes failed in wheel building when we had the wrong fiber orientation. It was necessary to return to the drawing board and revisit all our assumptions.
What lessons do you have to share?
Our final laminate structure works with the 'natural' stretch of the weave and fibre. This made a huge difference to stability, shape conformation and final appearance - don't fight the material,  work with it!. It is really hard to throw existing proven approaches totally overboard and start afresh. You tend to keep slipping back into old ways.
Thanks for sharing these insights with us Todd and good luck with your next moves
 

Today, we finally got them back from the printer and now we are ready for our first of many trade shows.

In knee warmers, arm warmers, vest and in the dark....  That is how the ride last night finished.  I love this time of year in Indiana, but seriously, it needs to be light just a little bit longer for my taste.  I did manage to squeeze in another good ride post work yesterday and put some good efforts in on the Flash Point 40's.  The wheels are still every bit as responsive as the day that I picked them up and are quickly becoming one of my favorite "every day" wheels to ride. 
I had to stop last night and buy a new set of knee warmers about a 1/3 of the way into my ride because I thought that it was going to get too cold for my fragile frame (for most of you that don't know me, I'm every bit of 190 lbs and only about 5 foot 9 so fragile is not the most often used phrase used to describe me.  If you are just getting into my blog here today, I'm the grinning idiot in the catalog).  Anyways, I stopped at one of our local retailers to pick up a pair and had the chance to show off the new Flash Points a little early.  As I had hoped, the guys at the shop were fairly excited to see what was coming and also quite impressed with the look and aesthetics of the wheel set.  It was nice to have some one elses opinion, even if they were looking just at the wheel from a cosmetic point of view. 
 
So the ride went well, no problems what so ever with the wheels.  I think that the engine still needs a little work, so I'll keep riding and logging miles as long as I can stand the cold weather and diminishing sunlight. 
Ciao for now...
 

Hello again!  So almost 4 days completly off the bike.  Only a small roller work out in this weekend, so it felt good to get out on the road last night and get some decent work in.  The legs are even feeling a little tight this morning, so that is always a good sign. 
 
I headed back up north again last night after work with the same FP 40's that I have been tooling around on for the last couple of weeks.  The wheels are still holding up great.  Last night was basically a good loop for me with some hard efforts in the middle and right at the end.  The wheels still feel good under hard acceleration and while my tires might have been a little soft yesterday, I didn't have any problems catching up on some good interval work.  Another solo ride, but it went pretty well and even though there was, what felt like a massive head wind going up, it was much appreciated on the way home. 
 
I should have the chance to get some good miles in this evening as I may try to catch our Tuesday / Thursday world championships (aka local group ride that turns into a slug fest every night).  I'll let you know how it goes tomorrow.
Ciao for now...   

Todd Narkis, the lead researcher on Flash-Points, has left the team to move to Wisconsin to be closer to his extended family. We wish Todd the best in his new role and surroundings.While guiding our development efforts, Todd shared many insights, experimented and turned the Flash-Point concept from an idea into a real tangible, viable product. His quiet diplomacy helped us get over major hurdles, assisted us to maneuver around roadblocks and find the downhill sweet spots that you will certainly feel when riding our wheels.Todd always had an idea to share, a scheme to trial, or a brainwave that he wanted to try. It was great to have him on the team, testing new things, suggesting neat approaches or coaching the laminators to overcome obstacles. I will miss his quiet thoughtfulness, his sparks of intuition, his persistence when the road gradient suddenly became tough.
Always hard to judge the contribution of an individual in what is a close & cohesive team effort, but we will all miss Todd, as we evaluate the first road tests, turn up the production and launch Flash-Points into the marketplace. Every F-P wheel will carry some imprint of Todd as it rolls down the road.

It is finally starting to move out of summer here in the Midwest.  I had to finish up the ride last night in the dark and with armwarmers on.  Now the armwarmers thing doesn't mean a whole lot yet as it is still relatively warm all things considered, but it's just not 90 deg. at 8 pm any more, so it feels quite a bit colder.  It's really the whole "finishing the ride in the dark" thing that I am no so fond of....  
 
So last night's ride took me north of the city again and out of downtown on the Monon trail (The Monon is a "rails to trails" walking / running / riding path that starts in downtown Indianapolis and runs out to the northern suburbs).  It's not much for a training route, but is a good way to safely get from the city to places where you can ride fairly safely.  After getting off at the northern most part, I took a little loop that another one of the guys in warranty and customer service and I do when we have the chance.  I ended up feeling so good that I rode it again after finishing up the first time.  Central Indiana is notoriously flat and this ride isn't really any different, so there isn't a lot of excitement save sprint against myself for road signs....  Which I have come to enjoy, if for no other reason than I always win! 
 
The FP 40's are holding up just fine.  No real issues to speak of thus far, granted, I don't have a whole lot of miles on them, but I've not been easy on them by any means.  Today will be a day off and a chance to rest the legs after some good efforts last night.  Talk to you all soon. 
Ciao for now.....   

Our last new mold for the Flash-Point 40 rims arrived last week and it has now been put through its paces. This week we are in hold mode waiting for the early road test results, ironing out the last remaining wrinkles, doing laminator cross-training and setting our internal production quality standards.
If the road test results prove favorable (all early data is very positive), we will shift into high gear producing 40's and 60's to meet anticipated market demand in the fall and early spring next year. We will be training our wheel builders, watching for consistency and checking quality. One can feel the excitement and hear the buzz as experiences are shared, reports from test riders are exchanged and personal knowledge of the product and its potential mount.
In the days ahead, we will be releasing the wheels to a wider audience for even tougher testing to explore the ultimate limits of our technology. The Flash-Points will be going up (and down) the high country in Colorado, working the salt laden flats of central Florida, covering many miles daily under the sure power of outstanding tri-athletes and traveling in the cycle groups across the USA and beyond.
There is something definite but difficult to define (excitement?, exhilaration?, energy?, élan? , entrancement?....) being and playing a part in launching these babies.

So, I got some decent miles in yesterday morning in the rain, but it turned out to be such a nice day that Erik and I headed out after work yesterday afternoon for some more time in the saddle.  He's riding a pair of the 60 mm FP's so logging as many miles as we can has been sort of a fun take home work assignment.  Just keep in mind that Erik is about 6 foot 4 and I'm a subtle 5 foot 9 ish, so catching a draft on him is like, well, we'll just say it's a bit of a biscuit as I almost sit under his saddle height! 
 
I figured that with the deeper wheels and relatively flat terrain that we were headed to that he would be pulling away from me like a bad habit, but I did manage to hang on to his wheel for the most part.  We had a couple of little rollers yesterday evening, but the wheels spun up to speed quite quickly and I didn't have any trouble climbing either in the saddle or out of it for that matter trying to keep up with "Big E". The rear wheel is a little out of true now, but going from pot hole to pot hole will do that to anything.  I'll get it on the stand this afternoon and get it trued up for the rest of the week's riding and this weekend (which barring any really bad weather will be a good chance to log some decent miles).  I am glad that we went with the standard exposed nipples on this wheel.  Internal nipples just make for added nuisance, maintenence wise.  As most of us out there aren't too keen on spending precious riding time at the bike shop or in our own workshop fixing problems, this will be a nice feature of this wheel set.  Even if you don't true your own wheels, your mechanic will thank you eventually. 
As we got some good miles in yesterday, I neglected to go on the 0530 hammer fest / Time trial that leave the north side of Indy.  I'm just not sure that  bunch of guys showing up on TT bikes with full aero kits is quite my style or the best way that I can think of to start my day.  Maybe next week I'll go for the suffer fest, but not today. 
I'm off....  take care and happy riding.

Yeah, that's me.. I'm the really small kid in front with the big goofy grin on his face....  

Good Tuesday morning to all of you!  So this morning's ride was wet.  That is about all that I can say for it really.  We started in a light mist and it just continued for the duration of the 24-ish miles that we rode for.  Pretty docile morning for the guys that I was riding with.  The wheels are still holding true and round very well and for the bumps and brusing that they are taking, I'm suprised that I haven't had to true them yet. 
We'll have to see how the hubs hold up to some rainy weather as I think that we are due for it for the next couple of days.  Granted a little preventative maintenence goes a long way and wiping them off and keeping them relatively as dry as possible post ride will no doubt help in any situation that may fester.  Depending on how much I ride this week and how bad the conditions are, I'll pull the hubs a part, or more than likely beg one of our warranty engineers to do it for me, and just take a look inside to see how things are shaping up. 
The wheels were a little dodgy in the corners this morning, but I honestly attribute most of the handling flaws to myself and relatively poor conditions.  I did manage to take a couple of hard accelerations this morning and the wheels responded quite well.  They hold speed fairly well, not so much as the 58 mm deep rims that I have ridden in the past, but I wasn't suffering while sitting on the front this am by any means. 
Alright, I'm off to work!  Happy riding......

We have started to pack the Flash-Points into their boxes for the EuroBike show at the end of this month in Germany. This will be their formal European debut. Our shipping crew is hard at work gathering all the goodies and boxing up the newly finished display stands for the journey.
Reports from selected riders testing both the 40 and 60 wheel sets are very positive. The wheels are holding up well to some hard punishment on the road. We are using a neat log sheet to record a variety of opinions and perceptions around performance, comfort, safety and durability for each ride. This will make Flash-Points debut on the market with an impressive pedigree, portfolio and a 'track' record to be proud of.

Alright, so it's a good Monday morning and we are back in the office after a nice hot weekend.  Friday was pretty much shot by the time that we broke out of the office, but it did make for a good Saturday morning ride.  A handful of guys headed to southern Indiana, but after a long week and still a little unsure of how the stomach bug would handle being out on the road hammering, I decided to turn some long slow miles solo that morning. 
I left downtown Indy and headed north early on.  By the time that I finished, I had about 75 miles in and was cooked.  The area that I was riding in this weekend is completly different than the last couple of weekends.  The northern half of the state is flat like a pancake, while the souther half is full of rollers and what we, "mid-westerners" would call large hills....  Needless to say, the wind was up a little more and you are more exposed as there isn't much for terrain cover from the wind (and sun for that matter).  So basically, a long, flat ride was what I had.  Actually ran into some decent cross winds along the way, so I did get to see how the 38 mm cross sections handled the wind.  Truth be told, they handled great.  Keep in mind that I'm now a svelte 190 lbs, so it takes a good push from the wind to make me uncomfortable, but even with that beind said, they handled it quite well.  All things considered, my last "long term wheelset" was the CSC Team Issue, and it doesn't have any aero profile at all, I at least expected some push and unsettling behavior from the new wheels in the cross wind, but was left to ride along comfortably. 
I took yesterday off and hope to be able to log some decent miles this week in between the rain storms.    
Ciao for now....
 

Hello,
I got my FP 40's last week and proceeded to go on vacation in Estes Park Colorado.   So my main ride of the week was up Trail Ridge road to the Alpine visitor's center (12,295 feet)and then back down the mountain.  What a ride.  First off there is no air in the air up there.  When I got to the top I was gasping and weasing and sounding like anything but a bike rider.  I met my wife and we wnet for a hike.  Then I changed clothes ans headed back down.  The descent was incredible.  The top part you are above treeline and that day I was also above the clouds.  it was about 40 degrees at the top which made the first part of the descent a little cold, but as I got to treeline it started to warm up.  29 mnutes after leaving the alpine visitors center I was at the bottom and happy to be in the slightly thicker air at the 7500 feet.  of Estes park All in all a great day and a truly memorable ride!!!!!
See ya on the road
Nate

Alright, we are now two good rides deep and still going strong.  Last night got a good 40-ish in after work and this a.m. spent an easy 22 or so on the bike.
Wednesday:  Rode from the office up to our usual group ride that leaves from Butler campus and had the wheels on some rough roads going up to start the ride.  The wheels are definitely plenty stiff and corner quite well.  In comparison to the Team Issue CSC wheels that I was riding, they are notably a different feel.  I'm not sure whether I attribute this 'stiffness' the deeper rim, but that is what I would assume.  Laterally the wheels are still rock solid and clean and smooth through the corners.  Heard a couple of "pings" from the spokes on the first good up hill, out of the saddle effort, but no major problems with wheels coming out of true.  
Thursday:  Had to drive up north to a ride to get some miles this morning, but was well worth it.  It's only about a 22 or so mile loop, but was another chance to log some miles with the wheels in a little different scenario.  The wheels sustain speed very well as we had some pulls at the front of the group upwards of 26 to 28 mph.  They aren't sluggish by any means under acceleration, but very different from the feel of a lighter tubular wheel set.  I did have a chance to look over the wheels before my ride this morning and everything still seems to be in good form for the most part.  Wheels were a little out of true, but again, to be expected after the first couple of rides and getting spokes settling in and all.    

We have dimensioned and weighed the final production-ready
prototypes of the FP-40 and FP-60. Their measurements are as follows:
Wheel           
Max
Width           
Depth         Weight

FP 60 f          
23.5mm              
59mm         804g

FP 60 r          
23.5mm              
59mm         984g

FP 40 f          
20.5mm              
40mm         744g

FP 40 r          
20.5mm              
40mm         924g

I got a set of the FP60 wheels and had a chance to ride them this past weekend. They ride quite nicely. They are a bit on the heavy side, but on the flip side of that, they hold speed quite well. Yesterday, we headed out to the park to shoot some photographs of the wheels in action. Total mileage between the two rides is 75.

Good morning again! So, first ride accomplished, photo shoot done, no real efforts handed out, but needless to say, it was a good first ride and a good first impression of the wheels.

The Flashpoint 40 set that I am riding is a little heavier than the wheel set that I was currently tooling around on (Zipp CSC Team Issue), but they were still very responsive and climbing wasn't bad at all. Regarding lateral stiffness, the wheels seem to be pretty stout so far. They are laced 2x 2x for both sides on the front and rear, so I didn't have any flex to speak of during this ride. As I said before, we didn't get any really hard efforts in, so we'll see how the rest of the rides go this week and I'll keep you all posted. So far so good...

The decals didn't look as bad as I had once thought that they might against my red and white frame, but I'll try to post some pictures today to show.

Ciao for now....
jbd

Well, hello out there. I've just gotten my first pair of the new Flashpoint wheels that we'll be debuting this year (40mm version). The wheels look pretty sharp even without the finished decal on them. They are round and true as I expected them to be and should be a good ride. We are going out to shoot some pictures on the road for the upcoming catalog and then heading out for the first test ride during our Tuesday / Thursday 'World Championships'.

Just to give you some back ground on me and to give some reference to my posts, I'm not the traditional cyclist. At 190 lbs and only 5'9" I'm probably better sorted playing lacrosse, but I really do enjoy the riding and it's probably less dangerous in the long run... At least I hope. I'm not the most fluid rider, but do have my moments of brilliance. I can certainly pedal squares with the best of them though.

I'll keep you posted to how these wheels hold up on their maiden voyage this evening and go from there...

Happy riding!

Our next check comes after drilling the rim. Particular attention is given to size, location and angle of the spoke holes.

4) Post drilling the rim is given a final look over and the hole count is scribed on the tire bed for easier matching with hubs and spokes. We also do a final OOR (out-of-roundness) check to ensure the rim is still within specs - dropping a rim on the floor or a hard band on the braking tracks will be sufficient to give a flat spot or local brake track defection that would not be detected until the rim has been laced and somewhat tensioned on a truing stand.
5) While lacing the wheel, inserting the spokes and connecting the nipples, the lacing crew is on the watch for hub quality (missing seals, crunching, grainy feel, ratchets that do not engage of stick) that may indicate issues with bearings, springs or incorrect torque.
6)After reaching final tension all built wheels are put through the 'crusher", an air operated press that stresses and reseats the spokes and external nipples. Here our experienced wheel builders listen for 'cracks', 'pops' and other sounds that may indicate potential defects. The built wheel is then checked again for even tension, inspected for spoke hole bulges, cracks and closely examined for any other signs of rim failure. The last check in wheel building is to give the built wheel a spin checking for balance, hub noise, vibrations and rattles (caused by trapped flash of aluminium shavings within the rim cavity.
7)The final QC gate happens in shipping where we add the decals and box the wheel set. All aspects of rim and wheel quality are inspected to see only great wheels leave the factory.This may seem excessive, but we take great pride in delivering only the best product we can to our customers

Image of our latest decal prototype. Final decal will have color, but we can see that the fit of the decal is good.

We now have trees full of Flash-Points. These will be used for internal and external testing. Testing should begin tomorrow.

A row of Flash-Point 60 Rear Wheels.

The spokes and nipples we have been waiting for are finally here. The wheel-builders have been lacing up sets of wheels all day.

You know, one would think that after years of developing a rim and wheel, the decal would be the easiest thing in the world. Turns out we just could not get comfortable with any of them but finally settled on a design we feel will be well liked and help position the product as one of substance and quality. Must have gone through 4-5 different ideas and designs and numerous color ways but I think we are there now. Delivery of first color samples in next few days and production 10 days later.

A Flashpoint wheel consists of a number of key parts that must come together at the right time in the correct proportions to ensure a quality product.
Pre-impregnated (resin films added) carbon fiber comes in rolls from a supplier and must be transported & stored below zero degrees Fahrenheit to prevent the highly reactive resins from bonding. Each type of carbon material is color coded and stored in a large freezer within the factory. We keep track of the specific quality parameters (supplied with each roll) and practice FIFO (first in first out) to rotate all deliveries.
To ensure clean parts and reduce degrade from included moisture, we thaw each roll prior to cutting on a computer controlled table. The cutting table allows us to control the sub-part dimensions to within 0.05" giving highly accurate and repeatable pieces for assembly.
Another key part of the Flashpoint rim is the co-bonded aluminum brake track. This is made from a select alloy, rolled and flash-butt welded, treated with aerospace materials to ensure a very strong bond with the carbon. Because of extremely tight tolerances in the molding process, we make 5 QC measurements of every Al hoop to check the dimensions, rolled parameters and weld quality before the hoop is added during the perform process.