Safety First

In 1885, the transportation panorama modified eternally when John Kemp Starley designed the so-called “security bicycle:”

This design persevered and for the whole lot of the twentieth century, and it even made it into the twenty first, although by 2024 it was formally lifeless, having been utterly changed by the battery-powered stand-up scooter:

Ah nicely, the bike was enjoyable whereas it lasted.

After all, a few of us nonetheless take pleasure in driving the old style security bicycle, although more and more we’re changing into one thing akin to Civil Struggle reenactors or renaissance truthful attendees. I personally experience a security bicycle frequently, though generally I wish to negate the “security” half by equipping it with a pair of ass-ploding Spinergy wheels–you already know, simply to maintain it thrilling:

[I’d remove the rim stickers, but I’m concerned they may be structural.]

The Spinergy Rev-X is arguably essentially the most notorious bicycle wheel ever constructed, having acquired a popularity for spontaneous failure that has supposedly despatched numerous unwitting riders to the ER. As a champion of primitive security bike expertise comparable to metal frames and aluminum rims and wire spokes I’m naturally inclined responsible carbon fiber and cutting-edge bicycle for all of the ills of society, but as a contrarian and skeptic I’m additionally innately wired to low cost or snigger off all types of mass hysteria. This places me in a clumsy place: do I reject the Spinergy as an emblem of bicycle trade hubris and extra, or do I embrace it in an effort to thumb my nostril on the “woosies?”

Effectively, it’s a troublesome name. On one hand, as somebody who was an energetic racing Fred in the course of the heyday of the Rev-X, I by no means personally witnessed and even heard about any spectacular failures aside from these I examine within the newsgroups (bear in mind these?) and if something on the time the Rev-X had a popularity amongst riders for being heavy but sturdy. However however there’s the well-known “Spinergy Accident Reporter” web site, which does make for some chilling studying:

Now, earlier than we go any additional, I ought to state for the report that I’m a staunch advocate for conventional wheels:

You desire a protected wheel? This can be a protected wheel:

So far as I’m involved, that is pretty much as good as a wheel will get, and if I had been placing collectively a motorcycle from scratch, I’d select one thing like this each time, no matter whether or not the bike had been an upright rambler or flat-back street racer. Actually, even whereas I used to be nonetheless racing, I ultimately gave up on “wheelsets” and went again to conventional wheels with 32 spokes. Oh, positive, when a motorcycle arrives at my doorstep sporting a pair of superlight aero wheels I’ll completely experience and revel in them:

However wheels like this usually are not my default, and in that sense I’m like somebody who smokes socially, or who has a drink or two at a celebration however doesn’t maintain any booze in the home–I take pleasure in it occasionally, however it’s not a way of life.

By the best way, the Rolfs have been trouble-free up to now, although they’re harmful in that each time I take away a tire I handle to nick my knuckle on the bladed spokes:

Anyway, it’s within the spirit of social smoking that I’ve been having fun with the Spinergys–and, because the failure web site itself notes, Spinergy had offered 100,000 Rev-X wheels by that point. I don’t know if which means 100,000 particular person wheels, or 100,000 pairs of wheels, however both method it’s quite a bit, and in the event that they had been actually that harmful we’d have misplaced a whole technology of Freds and weenies. As for why they’re harmful, based on the web site it may very well be kind of an ideal storm of “whirl-mode flutter,” bending, and torquing:

Because the wheel rotates it develops numerous frequency modes: a) whirl-mode flutter is brought on by the blade-like spokes interacting with the wind; b) the pure frequency of the spoke in bending (longitudinal to the blade): because the wheel turns the blades are alternately in excessive and low stress; c) Torquing of the blade-like spokes. These frequency modes, whereas maybe individually benign, might trigger a sudden catastrophic failure in the event that they turn into resonant with a number of different modes. Within the case of the bicycle wheel, the supply of the power that builds up is probably going the pumping motion of the wheel going up and down, because the bladed spokes are bent and torqued, because the wheel rotates. This bending and torquing is because of the totally different masses imposed on the bladed spokes as they assume totally different factors of rotation. For instance, at 10:30 and 1:30 the wheel would are likely to sag considerably as in comparison with when the spokes had been at 12:00 and 6:00. A secondary power supply could be the interplay of the wind on the rotating wheel.

However in fact the salacious a part of the positioning is the crash studies, a few of which learn just like the outdated Penthouse boards in that that they’re typically a heady mélange of braggadocio that bodily fluids that leads you to query their validity as a lot as you’d wish to imagine them. To wit:

I used to be on a membership experience in Connecticut August 10, 1999. I’ve been racing a motorcycle for roughly 12 yrs. I’m ranked as one of many nice sprinters in New England. I understand how to deal with a motorcycle.

Presumably he was additionally 6’5″ with a Lou Ferrigno physique and the phallus of an Azerbaijani plowhorse.

However then:

I simply received away from the pack and I used to be about 30 sec. in entrance of them. I simply got here off a hill and was doing about 34 mph. I regarded again to see had been they had been after I went off the street. I went about one foot off the street and as I used to be turning to get again onto the street the spokes exploded (the rim stayed intact). The wheel didn’t hit something. I used to be despatched about 30 toes by the air.

With out realizing his identification we’ve no method of confirming whether or not or not he was certainly broadly generally known as “one of many nice sprinters in New England,” however turning round to look behind himself and going off the street within the course of is at odds with the assertion about bike-handling. *

*[Please note I would typically not make light of a crash, but I maintain the statute of limitations runs out after 25 years.]

Then there are those from the self-styled engineers who provide spurious technical analyses:

The opposite factor that you need to take note of if you happen to experience these wheels is the trueness of the wheel. I did discover that the wheel had turn into nearer to true because the vibration received worse during the last month. To ensure that the true of the wheel to vary one thing needs to be taking place with the spokes. This website online certainly saved me from a really unhealthy crash. I had regarded on the wheel not less than a dozen occasions and located nothing unsuitable. However by wanting with a vibrant gentle and pinching the spokes collectively about 4 inches up from the rim you may see the cracks open while you pinched the spokes. Thank You.

A wheel that will get extra true because it approaches failure?!? DEAR GOD, WHAT HOPE DO WE HAVE?

After which there are those which might be simply abjectly terrifying, and have every little thing from sudden spontaneous collapse of a nearly-new wheel to reconstructive facial surgical procedure:

My Spinergy wheel failure is thought to almost each bike racer in San Diego. Thanks for this website online, I hope it helps to forestall these form of accidents. I purchased my Spinergys at Cycle World in San Diego on 3/13/97. As I purchased them for racing solely, I had solely 3 races (2 time trials) on them when the entrance wheel failed.

This occurred proper in entrance of the feed zone, which made for a lot of witnesses. There have been additionally many group mates behind me (Swami’s Membership), and mates with the SDBC Membership. All of them say that I didn’t hit something, or anybody. The rationale the Spinergy wheel failed will at all times be a thriller, as I’ve no reminiscence of the crash. When my face slammed the bottom, it tore off most of my ear. My face was laid open from round my eye, down the size of my jaw. This required appreciable cosmetic surgery. My knee was floor to the bone, and is left with a horrid scar. I used to be unconscious for about 8 minutes. I used to be later given a bag of spokes, carbon fiber shards, a hub, and a rim.

That’s horrific, although to be truthful a bag of damaged wheel elements is a reasonably good prize at a Cat 4 race.*

*[Sorry. Statute of limitations though.]

And sure, there are even mountain bike tales:

My consumer was driving his mountain bike on Northstar Mountain in Lake Tahoe, CA about July of 1997. He works in a motorcycle store that his dad owns. He races on an newbie degree and instructs the native bicycle police drive. He’s an informed rider. He was taking his first run with a set of Spinergy Rev X Roks wheel which was newly bought. He started to enter a activate a single monitor run, when he heard a moaning sound. The rider behind then describes how the entrance wheel collapsed and the bicycle merely fell to the bottom throwing him over the handlebars placing a rock together with his head. The spokes and easily given method, separating from the hub connection. The design seems to have triggered the spoke failure. He suffered concussion with related signs (bloody nostril/complications for following weeks) neck and again ache.

Studying these makes me query each the wheels and tales, however principally it makes me query myself. It’s like studying about alien abductions. Do I query the tales as a result of I believe there have to be a extra logical rationalization? (Some prior harm within the case of the Spinergy failures, or the consumption of LSD within the case of the alien abductions.) Or do I query them as a result of the reality is just too horrible for me to ponder?