Mountain Cog
Hosted by an enthusiast and a mountain bike industry expert featuring laughter and passionate guests.
Mountain Cog
088 – Are electronic mountain bike components worth the cost? (The Guru’s 25th Episode co-hosting the MCP)
To celebrate Dane’s 25th episode co-hosting the MCP, the boys sit down to debate the benefits, issues, and costs of electronic mountain bike components. In addition to electronic components (shifting, droppers, suspension, brakes?, etc.) the boys also cover other bike-tech topics like the right way to torque bolts, when grease is really needed, and more. And. Of course. There are a few “minor” disagreements about Shimano vs. SRAM.
Some links to accompany this episode...
Shimano MTB Components (Acoustic)
https://mtb.shimano.com/us/products/mtb/
SRAM MTB Components (Electronic & Acoustic)
https://www.sram.com/en/sram/mountain
PinkBike Video: Broken On Live TV: The Untold Story of Pivot’s New Phoenix DH Bike
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNinULVRHcU
Torque’ng got your down? Here’s an article about bikes + torque + tools.
https://bike.bikegremlin.com/18208/tightening-torque-and-torque-wrenches-explained-101/
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I should know by now that the little red light means that we're on the one that says REC for recording so what is this? My 25th right? Yeah, this is your 25th episode. 25th episode.
Josh (Magellan):I totally forgot it was your 25th episode.
Dane (The Guru):I don't even know how to run the board and I just look at the lights. They're very Christmassy.
Josh (Magellan):It's a very complicated board. Not at all.
Dane (The Guru):So I got a joke. Go for it. I did research.
Josh (Magellan):I saw you doing your research. I wrote it down too.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, you wrote it with pencil, like you didn't even put it on your notes on your phone. Yeah, my handwriting's so bad I can't even read my own handwriting.
Josh (Magellan):We've got to paint a picture for the listeners here.
Dane (The Guru):So we're kind of sitting in the bike shop on two sides of your front desk. Here Register counter. Yeah, yeah, register counter. And there's like a wall kind of, and Dane's got the joke hidden on one side of the wall so I can't see it Right? Yeah, I got my soda covering it, so you can't like.
Josh (Magellan):Yes, you've got like every angle.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, here we go, yeah he doesn't want me to screw it up. Go ahead. Okay, so I wanted to do a chicken joke because I don't know, I like chicken jokes.
Josh (Magellan):You know how you say chicken in Arabic?
Dane (The Guru):No, Dajaj, dajaj. Yeah, there you go. That sounds like the sound I'd make when I have like a hurt muscle in my jaw. To judge, can I tell an off color?
Josh (Magellan):joke, I guess. So. Do you know how you say rooster market in Arabic? Oh God, sook deek, sook deek. It's not off, that's just a different language.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, it is for sure. Okay, so chicken joke what?
Josh (Magellan):what kind of movies do hens like to go see? What kind of movies do hens like to go see? What kind of movies.
Dane (The Guru):Do hens like to go see? Yes, oh man, I don't know. Chick flicks? Oh my god, I told you it was a groaner. Oh, where's your labels? Oh, your labels are in there.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, yep there we go. There's a laugh track for you, buddy chick flicks did I ever tell my other chicken joke? No, go uh, so I just cross the road one yeah, so you've heard that one yeah okay, and then what about the?
Dane (The Guru):um? Why did the chicken fall out of the tree? Because I think that's uh, my first episode.
Josh (Magellan):I think you actually did tell both these jokes this one.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, that's the only two that I know.
Josh (Magellan):It's the only two that I've ever memorized, so all right we'll give a free shout out to anyone that writes us and can tell us the two jokes that yeah, on facebook or instagram. Just finish the two jokes like yeah or just go down in this podcast episode and there's a little thing that says text the mountain cog guys. You just hit that button, texas, and we'll get the fan.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah if anybody does that, I'm I'm getting them a t-shirt, so I got. I got a t-shirt for him.
Josh (Magellan):All right, so it's Friday night. We both got kitchen passes.
Dane (The Guru):Yes, yeah, like the wives have written us off tonight, lacey was super pissed.
Josh (Magellan):She cooked a good dinner tonight and she's like are you going to stay for dinner. I'm like I got to go, I got to be there early so I can pay for your bike.
Dane (The Guru):I told Carrie we were going to go to Slaughterhouse, which is in Tucson, during Halloween. They actually have. We have an actual abandoned Slaughterhouse.
Josh (Magellan):Oh, it actually is a Slaughterhouse, it's an actual.
Dane (The Guru):Slaughterhouse that's abandoned and these guys have kind of turned it into girls I don't know who it is People, People have turned it into a Halloween walkthrough like haunted house and they got all kinds of stuff and I hear it's like one of the best in the country, believe it or not?
Josh (Magellan):We took my son to it my oldest son scanner. He seemed to think it was pretty awesome.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, yeah, I, I hear it's really good. So, uh, my daughter wants to go and so we were going to go tonight, and then I realized we're recording, so we're going to do it tomorrow.
Josh (Magellan):It's our last night. 1. Yeah, last night was trick or treat.
Dane (The Guru):It was trick or treat yeah, my kids would not share candy with me. No, that's probably not a bad thing. No, it's not, I don't need any candy, but I like Reese's, that's for sure.
Dane (The Guru):Reese's is your thing, yeah, those and any form of Reese's, whether it's the pieces or the cups, anything like that. Peanut butter M&Ms, yeah, yeah, not peanut butter, I do like those, yeah, but the peanut M&Ms you know, in the yellow. And then Kit Kat, and I don't like Snickers, like that caramel gets stuck in my teeth. What the fuck are we talking about? I don't know.
Josh (Magellan):You started it? Yeah, I did start it All right, so it's.
Josh (Magellan):Friday night we're here in Guru Bikes in Tucson, arizona, and it's Dane's 25th episode of being a host Actually, your 26th episode, if you count the one where you were a guest yeah, and we thought it would be good just to do a podcast with him and I. We got some cool things coming out with other folks soon, yep, and when we were talking through, like what we should talk about, um, you know, one of the things that dawned on me was that, like I don't, we've got what 16 bikes in the stable, um, and I don't have a single electronic component on any of those bikes and, and almost every single bike that I have has an electronic component right almost man, my downhill bike doesn't.
Dane (The Guru):That's about it.
Josh (Magellan):Everything else does, so really how come your downhill bike doesn't?
Dane (The Guru):uh, just haven't put it on there. Yeah, yeah, that's a good question. They just came out with some. You know like lately in the world cup they've been starting to put uh electronics on the suspension of downhill bikes. Uh, you'll see some pictures where they're. They look like, you know, they stuck a playstation controller on their bike you know, and uh, so they're starting to work with it a little bit.
Dane (The Guru):But in the past, as far as suspension goes on downhill bikes, it's been kind of not electric because that's been kind of like automatic lockouts, which downhillers don't want their suspension locking out right and so uh, so that's just recent in the last couple years, okay. And then, uh, the new fox neo has been spied forever and it's just come out and so that's a cool system. That's new from their fox live and it's gravity orientated, it's not.
Dane (The Guru):It's not xc race orientated. And then, uh, let's see what else in the world cup. That's about it. I think there's. I haven't seen a downhill electric group. So, for instance, I have a SRAM downhill XO kit which is seven speed and it's purposely a tight cluster, um smaller, shorter derailleur, so it hangs down less, and that they haven't come out with anything that's electric yet for that?
Josh (Magellan):Did you guys get the new St Group in yet?
Dane (The Guru):No, it's not out yet. It's not out yet, no yeah so coming soon. I just saw the new pivot, uh, the new um six bar pivot okay, the new pivot.
Josh (Magellan):Okay, I thought you were talking about pivot bikes, but yeah no, it is a pivot okay, it's a pit the new pivot downhill bike, the phoenix.
Dane (The Guru):Okay, the new phoenix is a six bar, yeah, so I got my new phoenix, which you know I get the hand-me-downs, so I've got last year's phoenix and then the new one dropped about the same day that I finished building mine, yeah. So I was like kind of bummed. But um, the new one. I got to check it out up at pivot a couple days ago and it's pretty amazing. I really want to get one in the shop and see how the linkage moves, because they've got a new six bar.
Dane (The Guru):So a dw links are considered a four bar, yep, and so they have two rotating links. They're kind of opposing rotation and, uh, similar to a vpp but different, and similar to a maestro, but different, but uh, the idea is that it helps the rear end move in kind of an upward straight motion rather than an arc and um, and so the new one I guess they made I may get this wrong, but they made a four bar downhill prototype. They made a six bar and I think they may have made an eight bar, oh, wow, uh, downhill prototype for the pivot team to test. And you know, if you guys remember there, if you don't remember, there was a very famous uh live broadcast with Bernard Kerr.
Dane (The Guru):Bernard Kerr crashing and his head to coming off. So and I did, I did just watch the pink bike, pink bike video about that and it was really cool. It was really inspiring. It definitely made me want one of those bikes.
Josh (Magellan):So yeah, if you haven't seen it, pink bike put out like a 10 to 15 minute, I think, kind of interview with the design. I think the top designer, bernard, is in it and Chris Cocalis, you know the, the, the, the leader of of pivot, and they're talking specifically about that incident. What happened, what the. You know why it happened, why they do the prototyping the way that they do it. Um, so it's a pretty cool. It's a pretty cool video that explains what happened and if you're a pivot fan or if you're a pivot hater, you should go watch it.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah Well, a pivot fan, or, if you're a pivot hater, you should go watch it and it'll change your perspective. It'll definitely change your perspective. You go in thinking it's going to be about this broken bike and how could they do that? And then you come out going I want that bike. There's some good marketing genius, there.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, it is very good.
Dane (The Guru):So some people that we've met up there when we were up there, and some cool guys, so it's really cool.
Josh (Magellan):So anyways, we thought we would talk about, you know, electronic components and um Dane has challenged me today. He was like nervous to challenge me, but he challenged me today and wanted me to defend my arguments better. Specifically, I think we were talking specifically around Shimano, uh, and so I went back and thought about that and so like maybe we didn't go into this in the SRAM versus Shimano episode. But, like you know, a couple of like the key things that I care about. Number one is affordability. Right, his price. You call me a cheap ass but you are.
Dane (The Guru):I mean you admit it, yeah, no, no, it's good. There's nothing wrong with that Cause I'm cheap too.
Josh (Magellan):I work in a bike shop so I can be cheap with the really nice stuff. Yeah, and I can't. Yeah, I know.
Dane (The Guru):And honestly, I make next to nothing. But that's why bike guys do it, because we want nice. That is your bonus and that's how we. Part of your compensation is is getting bike parts. So true, so true.
Josh (Magellan):So so affordability is a big one, reliability is a big one, longevity, you know, along with that, um, maintainability, uh, I think part of it is is a familiar like I'm really easy for me to do, um, and then, uh, convenience, you know, also an important thing to me, and so all those reasons, uh, also, I told you earlier that I liked I fish.
Dane (The Guru):I like to, you know, surf fish and I use brand allegiance.
Josh (Magellan):So I got brand allegiance. You know they make really good products. Um, I've got, you know, shimano reels and Shimano poles and I like what I do with the fishing stuff and I've had just great experience with Shimano my whole life, um, and so that is kind of like the basis of why I'm so, you know, loyal to that that stuff. Um, and I've had some problems with SRAM, uh, when I've kind of branched out. I think it was early, you know, in all fairness, I think it was early or like like 10, 15 years ago.
Josh (Magellan):And I think they were still trying to figure some things out. Yeah, I think they probably have most of that stuff worked out.
Dane (The Guru):Well, you know me, I got to be in the middle because I, you know, I sell both, you know, and I do have like a definite SRAM kind of dominates my garage quite a bit. You know, most of my bikes are. It doesn't mean Shimano is bad, it just means that, like we were talking about this today and you know, when you, when you ride multiple about this today, and uh, you know, when you, when you ride multiple bikes and you do, um, but not everybody does, and uh, when you ride multiple bikes, if you have two different groups and the shifters are different every time you get on a different bike, you have to kind of remember, muscle memory yeah.
Dane (The Guru):And so and I was actually complaining about that today because, uh, because the electronic systems that have come out with these systems, they have created new shifters. Yeah, so now your muscle memory is even more screwed.
Josh (Magellan):Now you've got to learn those.
Dane (The Guru):And I'm like why you know they're buttons, they're tiny.
Josh (Magellan):You can make them, exactly the same.
Dane (The Guru):You can make them in the exact same place, and I don't understand why both Shimano and SRAM have decided nope, we're just going to make something totally different, brand new Screw you guys, we're figuring it out and they're not ergonomic. So let me rephrase that they may be ergonomic from a total design perceptive. Maybe they're looking at them going. This is better, but they're not ergonomic. If you're switching bikes, if you're used to something, they're uncomfortable. You have to get used to them.
Josh (Magellan):I actually have a theory as to why they're set up the way they are, is it? I think they're preparing the industry for a time when we only have one lever on the bike and all the buttons are on there, and I think they're trying to get people accustomed to the way that feels, and then, eventually, I I think you'll control everything on the bike.
Dane (The Guru):I think you're not right.
Josh (Magellan):I think it's natural to think that you want to bet, you to bet I just don't think there's any coordination.
Dane (The Guru):I don't think SRAM and Shimano are both calling up each other and going okay, 10 years from now we're going to do this.
Josh (Magellan):No, but it's logical that they would both drive to the same outcome.
Dane (The Guru):So when Di2 Mountain came out and so I worked with one of the first groups that did the first Di2 mountain group, yes, this was for Farewell Bike.
Josh (Magellan):I saw you guys at Interbike that year.
Dane (The Guru):And we got to design the shifters and for this new mountain bike group that we were building, that Shimano had nothing to do with other than making a road version.
Josh (Magellan):Yes, you basically took the road version and converted it to mountain, to mountain, to mountain, but yeah, a different cage, different all kinds of stuff.
Dane (The Guru):Uh, jason, and there was a number of us, but one of the things that I got to work on was the shifting system Right and uh, originally we made buttons that basically went on the grip, right next to the grip, and when I went out and rode the bike my hand couldn't reach him and I was like this is dumb.
Dane (The Guru):And so it wasn't functional, and so what I did was I went back and I actually took a product at the time I can't remember. It was meant to move your dropper lever to your left side. It was a little stud that came down your stud, yep. It was a little stud that came down, yeah, your stud, yep. And it would take the dropper levers which, at the time, would mount on the bar and you'd have to lift your thumb up over the top of the bar and then push down on these dropper levers. And it took that lever and it mounted it sideways, right where your shifter would have been Yep, and it was becoming popular during the one-by revolution, right, and I forgot who made them. But this little thing, this little thing that would come down, and I made a shifter system that went on to that.
Josh (Magellan):Sounds like a Paul thing or a wolf tooth thing or something like that it was before wolf tooth.
Dane (The Guru):Okay, like this is a long time ago, it's like before you were born.
Josh (Magellan):No, I was I saw the bike and inner bike. I was born.
Dane (The Guru):I was an adult, but, um, but this, this little thing that had like a barely a blip of life, because, uh, the lever companies figured out real quick they can make a one by lever and that's what we know now is the dropper lever. And now what's ironic is now we have people that are putting a um, the old levers on their bikes when they have a lockout for their forks on the left side. And so it's funny how that old dropper lever has come back around.
Dane (The Guru):But anyway, the Di2 system that we built. I moved the shifters down so that I could reach them properly, but I only had two buttons to deal with so I couldn't build them like the original stuff. And I didn't need to because we were just showing the stuff off.
Dane (The Guru):But the Di2 that came out wasn't much better and it still had this weird feel lever to move my my lever on my di2 xtr kit over so that it was more reachable and in a better place, so that I could remember which button shifted you know which way, because that's important when you're going up a hill. If you hit the wrong way, you know your shifter into a harder gear when you're climbing and then you're stopping and walking, so you're not at all convincing me that I need to go get electronic components.
Dane (The Guru):So just today I was complaining about this problem because I feel like the the electronics are small enough. They could easily make a shifter, dummy shifter that looks and feels as far as where the paddles are.
Josh (Magellan):The exact same, exact same spot, so you don't have to relearn.
Dane (The Guru):You can your muscle memory to relearn. Your muscle memory is still there, your muscle memory is there. You go from bike to bike and you don't have to relearn which way. And they could make it light and out of the way and they didn't do that. And I don't understand. And both Shimano and Tram, so it's not a brand thing, I don't know what it is. Their constraints are, I think. Uh, at some point they have to just make them cost effective and maybe it's a design thing. They just don't want to tackle it. Um, but when that di2 system came out, I talked to the engineers about that and they had mentioned that their, their idea was that this is new and they want to have a new tactile feel. It's a different system. Uh, it's electronic. They want it to be a new experience. Feel it's a different system, it's electronic. They want it to be a new experience. They don't want it to be just comparable to the old system. And that was what they had told me and I feel like it was mostly BS.
Josh (Magellan):Well, I mean, even if that was a perspective, I don't think that's good rationale. I think they should have maintained the muscle memory.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, I think that's a marketing explanation for something that they didn't know. The reason why?
Josh (Magellan):but I still don't know.
Dane (The Guru):And I I you know I don't get to talk to them, the engineers at Shimano, like we did then, yeah, but back then we were pretty tight with them. Jason had a good uh uh, a good relationship and we got to know a lot more of the inner workings of Shimano.
Josh (Magellan):So okay. So that's one reason is like, you know you got to go to a different, you know, user interface effectively right, and that's something new that you have to learn.
Dane (The Guru):That's only one electronic on the bike we're going to talk about.
Josh (Magellan):We're going to talk yeah, we'll talk about all of them, but so when I was reading through all the things that make me love shimano, I realized it's all those same variables, right, the affordability, reliability, maintainability, the convenience. And now I can add you know, muscle memory and like not having to keep in mind that example was a shimano product so it's not a brand thing, but we're not talking shimano versus shram here we're talking.
Dane (The Guru):We're talking, you know, electric versus acoustic yeah, um, I, I would say uh, you know, if we get on that that little, if we touch on that subject, your logic and reason is pretty solid, because wait, wait, wait, hang on, hang on.
Josh (Magellan):We need to like, can you?
Dane (The Guru):keep that. Can you record that can? You dig it sorry um I I feel like at the lower price points and which is where I like to live, which is what you, you find the biggest value in. Yep, right, yep. I mean I joke around that you're cheap, but honestly, we know that you could buy whatever you want. Yes, but what you do is you appreciate the, the cost per the value the cost per mile per smile.
Dane (The Guru):Mile per smile, yeah. And so I, at that price point, I feel like shimano is killing it right now, and I would say that at you know, like when we sell a 12-speed system and you can choose between a SRAM SX and a.
Josh (Magellan):Shimano Dior. Dior is the one.
Dane (The Guru):The Dior just kills it. And even if the SX is cheaper, the Dior still is better.
Josh (Magellan):It just is.
Dane (The Guru):There's other things that bug me, but truthfully that is. That is great.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, and I don't I mean to that point. I have XT is probably as high as I go. I don't have XTR in anything. Nothing Like I would never buy it. Like the price is just, it doesn't like the weight. Again, I'm a heavy guy, so like you know, dropping a couple of grams off my bike is I got to drop a couple of grams off my body before I drop?
Dane (The Guru):it on my bike. We always try and visualize, have have customers visualize, you know, uh, like if you had three steps, you know, and the the step between, like, slx and xt is like two inches from that one to the next step. Right, it's tiny, like, it's a small jump from that slx to xt and the performance is huge. So, money-wise, tiny step Performance is a big improvement. Xtr is because of the money. It's definitely a better… uh, system but the step up is much bigger you're paying.
Josh (Magellan):You're paying a lot more, yes, yeah, for a little bit, from a ratio, perspective and weight, and you're paying for weight and that's racer stuff so yeah, so shram's similar um, we were talking about this today.
Dane (The Guru):I I've noticed with shimano systems versus shram, shimano's shift smoothness and and quiet and accuracy pretty much goes pretty fluid down the line all the way to dior and 12 speed stuff. So when you get a dior system you're not really clunking, you're not getting a horrible shifting experience, you're getting a pretty good one. Yes, the cassette's much heavier, the derailleur is much heavier, the shifter's heavier, like there's a lot of refinement that's not there, but it's really kind of weight and cost. With SRAM. The shift quality of SX is much lower than NX, which is much lower than GX, and as you go up it gets better and better and better.
Josh (Magellan):That's more election. Oh, Just people just calling me trying to tell me to vote for somebody. That's awesome. Everybody should get out and vote, and I really don't care who you're voting for the election will be over and hopefully there's not chaos, no matter who wins. Hopefully there's not chaos and anarchy in the country.
Dane (The Guru):I just want them to stop texting me, but anyway. So back to bikes. So with the suspension or with the Deore drivetrain, you you get the smoothness of and it's very close to the higher end systems, but you just get a big weight penalty. But you save money with shram it's a little. For me. The experience has been that the shift quality goes down, yeah, at the lower points like.
Josh (Magellan):I would not consider anything below gx and shram yeah I.
Dane (The Guru):I don't mind n a as a gateway drug. Sx. We won't actually carry in the shop and I know SRAM will not like that. I say that cause they want to sell that stuff but in we've just had enough problems with it that we you know if we and and SRAM will back their product up. So it's nothing that.
Josh (Magellan):SRAM's doing. If it breaks, they'll back it up you just don't get great results from that.
Dane (The Guru):Derailleur really is the main thing.
Josh (Magellan):The shifters are fine.
Dane (The Guru):The dub cranks are great. And then when it comes to the cassette, the NX cassette is the same as SX, so it's fine. We use that a lot, but the derailleur is probably the biggest weak point. Anyway, with SRAM, when you get up to like GX to XO to XX1, the weight does not really change much. They're very similar, but the shift quality gets so much better.
Josh (Magellan):Oh really, yeah, I didn't know that. Yeah, and I haven't ridden those systems, so they're like different philosophies.
Dane (The Guru):One is kind of trying to have like a shift quality as being there Consistent across the entire yes exactly, whereas the other one is definitely giving you performance gains as you go up, okay and so so an xx1 way better than an xxo.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, yeah, better than a gs.
Dane (The Guru):It's noticeable and when you move up from uh, you know, as you move up in shimano, you're really just getting weight savings. But you can buy an xo derailleur and an xx1 derailleur and they're like 12 grams difference, like there's almost no weight difference, and so what you do is…. It's really just the performance. It's performance and longevity.
Josh (Magellan):And longevity. Okay, so the more expensive ones last longer.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, they have more things in pivots and bushings. They'll use bearings instead of bushings. So as they move up up they'll get better and better the linkage and the derailleurs have more thought and machining and more um process to make them smoother over time and so one of the reasons I think we struggle in the desert with sx is there's a lot of poly in that derailleur and I think the heat affects it, wears it down yep, and then when you have that thing moving, I think the pivots are just less.
Dane (The Guru):I mean, they're really more susceptible to uh, temperature swings. You know, as that poly heats up, those holes get tighter and then the derailleur doesn't want to shift as smooth yeah, and we get that fine dust that we get out here and that gets in there and then when you get to the high end levels, that tolerance is so much better and so much more precise that you don't have those same issues okay, so let's, so we, we, so we, we.
Josh (Magellan):We went down a rabbit hole on Shram versus Shimano, which you and I always do.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, yeah it's just it's fun because I think people get a lot out of that, because you know, I don't want anyone who buys Shimano to think that they're cheap. They aren't. They're getting really good stuff I love. But I don't want people to think that they're getting SRAM, that they're getting snowed, because it's really performance-orientated.
Josh (Magellan):So they both have their features and the goal is to figure out what's important to the person. So I gravitate to the low-end Shimano stuff because it's got good quality, good performance.
Dane (The Guru):You value, value, yeah. And then some people like I'll have somebody who comes in and they're looking between the top line, so like XT, XTR, and their value is I'm going to go race and I don't want my equipment to be my limiter. And so they are like you know what? I know it's a small gain, but I would rather my equipment not be why I lost the race.
Josh (Magellan):Let's be honest the day that my equipment is my limiter, it's a long time in the future.
Dane (The Guru):it's true, but those people are out there they are, but they're not. Josh anderson, there's been times when I've tried to talk people into less expensive and I know that their ride ability is not there yeah, but they also.
Josh (Magellan):You don't really need x.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, they pulled up in a in a porsche and they're not racing cars, you know what I mean. They just have a. They have an attitude that if I just if I can afford it, I'm just going to get the best, and then I don't have to worry that I didn't get enough.
Josh (Magellan):Well, you know, if I was driving Porsches, I would maybe do the same thing Right yeah. But we're both Toyota people. We're both Toyota people, all right. So sorry to my Detroit friends. Yeah, for the record, my Tundra was made in the United States. Oh, so GMC may not have been.
Dane (The Guru):Hey, whoever you are, hey, uh. So I just another rabbit hole real quick, driving to pivot to pick up pivots, and like three or four car carriers went by cause I'm going slow in the guru van and getting passed by the semis, and they were all Fords. And guess where they were? Coming from Mexico, yeah, oh, right on, and I forget how much autos are made in Mexico.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah.
Dane (The Guru):American brand Ford. I really like Ford. Yeah, I'm going to buy a Transit. Yeah, I think they're a great car company. But it was kind of weird, a little sobering, because you're like American, and then you're seeing these trucks full of cars coming up from Mexico.
Josh (Magellan):So Lacey and I are going to buy a, you know, a sprinter type van and we've been going back and forth between Mercedes and the train and the transit for transit. And I was over at Rincon Valley bike service today, our friend Chris Croto he lives right around the corner from me, he's a great guy, great mechanic and he convinced me that the transit's the way to go, you gotta.
Dane (The Guru):You gotta talk to nick our riding buddy.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, I have talked to nick and he tells me not to buy either of them yes, I know he wants me to buy some 1982 gmc oh, yeah or something, yeah it's probably mechanically perfect, but not not what I'm looking for.
Josh (Magellan):So like opinions are like all right, so let me come back to okay so I hope my whole point with this shimano thing was all those things that make me love shimano right the convenience, the reliability, the maintainability, the affordability. All that stuff is the same reason why I haven't put any. They're the same variables that have that have kept me from putting any electronic components yes, on any of bikes. So I thought maybe we could use this as a framework and kind of go through these points and talk about each of the groups, the different components, and talk about these different variables.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, so there's electronics when it comes to bikes, you have shifting systems, and we're not talking about Garmin or a Wahoo. We're not talking about computers on your bike.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, that's not what we're talking about, although they do integrate into those and.
Dane (The Guru):I learned that on the way over. That is true.
Josh (Magellan):But we're talking about the actual, like your, your your shifter and your Mac.
Dane (The Guru):Yep.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, Are your your derailleur.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, or derailleurs. That's now entered, that Suspensions are things Suspension? Dropper posts. Dropper posts.
Josh (Magellan):And then I want to talk about whether you think brakes will ever go electronic or not.
Dane (The Guru):There is anti-lock brakes on the market right now, so anti-lock or Anti-lock, but with no cables Run off of a computer system and Bosch does it on their commuter level.
Josh (Magellan):E-bikes, e-bikes, e-bikes, and so there's no hydraulic system driving the brakes there's hydraulics.
Dane (The Guru):I, you know I need to deep dive because because that's a category we don't really do a ton of uh commuter, other than when I go to training to be a certified bosch mechanic. Um, yeah, I hear about them, but I don't quite know how they work, so okay, so since we're on the topic, let's dive. Let's dive into this a little bit. So when? Yeah, I hear about them, but I don't quite know how they work, so okay.
Josh (Magellan):So since we're on the topic, let's dive into this a little bit. So when I was talking to Croto earlier today, as I was researching and interviewing people for this episode, I asked him if he thought that we would ever go to brake systems that either were not cable actuated or hydraulic system actuated yeah, hydraulic system actuated and his hypothesis is that no, and he had a really interesting reason why he said the liability on a brake system failing, uh, and I, and, and and.
Josh (Magellan):I think the assumption there is that electronic system has more failure modes than a hydraulic system or a cable actuated system. Uh is so high that the bike companies would never go. They won't even invest in an electronic. No cables, no hydraulic system, maybe even with cables, right, maybe even just electric, but they would never go to an electric system. What do you think about that?
Dane (The Guru):I totally agree. I think the bike industry is constantly trying to manage costs versus weight. That's a big factor. And then safety and uh, you look at uh systems like shimano and shimano is super safe, orientated like yeah, their brake systems often have some sort of device to keep the bolts from backing off. Um, so, like if you guys have had some relatively new xt brakes, you see little serrations on the bolts. Those are supposed to have these little plastic things stuck to them.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, the little plastic with the little. I don't even know how to explain it.
Dane (The Guru):Anti-rotation device and the old, the first generation. I take those off. Nobody runs them, which is hilarious. And, truthfully, as a bike mechanic somebody who's been doing this a long time I don't think I've ever seen a caliper come off on a customer's bike. That wasn't really poorly installed.
Josh (Magellan):I don't think I've ever even had a loose one. No, I mean, I grease them. Is that your standard operating procedure here?
Dane (The Guru):No, they're loctited. So if you look at the Shimano ones, they're actually pre-impregnated with a blue loctite or a white like. But when?
Josh (Magellan):I, so I'll take them out and I'll put them back in. Yeah, so if they've got loctite, I don't leave them alone, but typically when I'm swapping brakes, whatever, I'll just put a little grease on there is that okay, uh, it's fine, you don't need it.
Dane (The Guru):Uh, so grease is usually to keep it from corroding, and so far it's not been an issue. So, or grease grease has a lot of a lot of uh applications to the bikes and it's not always the same. So, for instance, anti-corrosion is one uh, keeping things from making noise, uh, things keeping things moving, or cool like a bearing. Um, you'll have uh grease used for a lot of things, but, uh, in bolts cases, grease will allow two things. It'll allow you to torque it more. So, for instance, a torque wrench will read differently with grease versus without, and so when you're torquing your bolts, if you're so a good example is if your seat post is slipping, yeah, and you're like but I'm torquing it and it says five newton meters, and I've done five newton meters and it still turns, pull, pull the bolt out and grease it, and it will now go farther, uh, because of the grease to that, so that that torque point, yeah, yeah, that five newton meters will now actually be tighter than it was before, and so.
Dane (The Guru):So when we teach mechanics, one of the things that is hard because people don't think about is you know what? What are these things? Uh, you know how does this stuff actually work? Like what is it doing? Because I've seen mechanics just want to put grease. We had a mechanic once when I was at a shop who put friction paste in the headset uh, in an open ball headset because he didn't understand what it was like friction paste that you use when you're connecting, like an aluminum component, to a carbon frame.
Dane (The Guru):Well, just in general, it creates friction like that's the the component and it's most common in the handlebars, because early uh handlebars carbon fiber especially usually had a clear coat on the epoxy and when the stem would clamp on them they wouldn't have enough grip, they would slide, and so friction paste is basically a fluid, uh, similar to a grease, but not exactly yeah, with little tiny plastic balls, okay.
Dane (The Guru):So that's why it feels like sand, more like a gel than it is a fluid yes yeah, it's not a grease and what it does is those little plastic balls create a friction point of a contact point, gotcha, and and they create more pressure in that area to hold better, and that's what they are. Some bars now actually come with a friction material like painted on to the clamp area, which is the same thing. They feel like rough, like sandpaper.
Josh (Magellan):Since I'm going to school right now, I got to go back a little bit. You're talking about torquing, yes, and I recently saw something that suggested that you should never torque from a stopped position, so like, if you've got a bolt that's tight, you should not torque it from a stopped position. So like, if you've got a bolt that's tight, you should not torque it from that tight position that you actually need to loosen the bolt a little bit. And then torque has to be while the bolts in movement. And they showed and this is the video I was watching they showed like multiple different readings and the torque values were actually different. Um, when you torque from a, from a Titan position, like how far they rotated it versus if you backed it off a little bit and then torque from a moving position so you should always be torquing loose bolts, not tight bolts.
Josh (Magellan):Do you guys do that? Nope, no uh no so I may have just taught you something.
Dane (The Guru):Well, you, you did. But I gotta ask you, did they share on that how much the difference was and how many newton meters it made a difference?
Josh (Magellan):uh, I don't think they had the tools to measure that, but it definitely was maybe quarter to half a turn difference because you could see the amount of turn right, because that's the only thing they way, they can measure it right yeah so when they torqued it from straight, you know you do maybe a quarter turn, and then when they torqued it from from a looser bolt, yeah it was like a quarter turn farther or to half a turn farther.
Dane (The Guru):So that that's interesting. So that gets a little bit to the grease point same kind of same same concept. Yeah and uh. So what we teach in mechanics is there's two types of torquing. How did we get on this subject? If I know, dude, this is what we do, yeah um, all right, I'll finish this thought, because somebody out there's like wait, no, don't tell, don't tell me.
Josh (Magellan):You were about to say it. Tell me, aren't you going to talk about electronic components? Now you're in a rabbit hole.
Dane (The Guru):I'll finish this one real quick. But what we teach the mechanics is there's two types of torquing, and that's important to understand that. There is one torque that the manufacturer puts out to keep you from going too tight, and then there's a torque that is to make sure you go tight enough. I got you and you, and, and again. What we try to teach the mechanics is not, uh, you know like you turn your wrist at this degree, you know to get the, you know nothing like that. It's really the concept of what that torque value is meant to do, right, uh, for instance, um, you know, face plate, you know, on a stem is to make sure it's to a certain tightness that the stem doesn't. You know that bar doesn't slip. Cranks is the opposite. Well, I'm sorry, seat post clamp is so that you don't crush the seat post.
Josh (Magellan):Right, or crush the seat post or bind the frame or bind the dropper post, dropper post, yeah.
Dane (The Guru):And so those are two different things One is so you don't go too tight, and one is so you go tight enough. Cranks are you want them tight enough, you don't want them falling off? And so also, we're dealing with carbon fiber and we're dealing with aluminum, and so I see auto mechanics are the ones that just crack me up the most because they're used to breaker bars and like impact wrenches, so they strip stuff out like crazy.
Josh (Magellan):Is Nick always stripping shit out? Yeah Well, I don't know if he is, he's very, he's a good mechanic?
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, he is, um, but truthfully, what I what I see is like somebody will come in and they're just just pulled all the threads out of something aluminum, because they're used to dealing with something much bigger and they need to know torques much more. But then there's the guy who's really focused on the torque and maybe four and a half isn't quite five and he doesn't quite understand what's really meant for him out of that. And so I like that info, I like the fact that there's somebody paying attention to that, and I think if you were dealing like medical equipment or electronics or things where those precision really matters super precision like you know you're trying, or tactical missiles?
Dane (The Guru):oh yes, yes, exactly I think that is like way more, especially when your torque values get to such a degree where those little differences can matter okay, so come back to the brakes.
Josh (Magellan):Okay, so, like I think we're agreeing, so in most cases think electronic brakes are coming I don't think so.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, I, I don't know. We saw that guy on youtube who made some out of rc car stuff, and so it's doable. It's totally doable. The technology's there. The problem is have you ever had a rc car that just stopped working, wouldn't do what you wanted, and then if you're going downhill and that happened what happens?
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, so this is part of what you just explained. It's part of the reason why I don't have any electronic components on my bike. That's the reliability.
Dane (The Guru):I know, but if you look at our lives, we have electronics in everything we do. Liability, so I know. But if you look at our lives, we have electronics in everything we do. And uh, I, you know, there was a point when I, you know, when I was younger, I was like I'm not getting electric windows because I don't want them to break and I'll get the wind up ones, you know, with the crank. You know you can't even get that in a car I don't think so.
Josh (Magellan):Outside of the battery not being charged issue, let's put that aside. How often are you guys seeing, you know, failure modes, electronic systems, shifting droppers, whatever?
Dane (The Guru):Almost never Okay. So like, for instance, reverbs have been out for quite a while as a wireless system.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, that's a dropper post from SRAM.
Dane (The Guru):I mean we rebuild them. It's almost never that we have a failure. I have more problems with the hydraulic system than I do with the electronics on those With the hydraulic reverbs. Yeah, Well even inside the hydraulic system than I do with the electronics, with the hydraulic reverbs. Yeah well, even even inside.
Josh (Magellan):So dropper posts are a hydraulic system, that's inside yeah, it's a valve, even if they're, even if they're cable actuated.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, even if they're cable activated, all the reverbs wireless don't have a hydraulic lever like the non-wireless um. But I see more problems with that system failing, which blows my mind. You know we were talking about that today how often a dropper post fails compared to a fork, and a fork is cycling like a thousand times when you ride.
Josh (Magellan):it Is that, just based on the maturity of the system that they have, they're not that mature as a technology.
Dane (The Guru):I think I think they're still figuring out tolerances, like people think that engineers are magical. But they are. They are not. They have to figure stuff out. They have to learn by trial and error in most cases and they use good judgment and good education to make things last and they know a lot about a system to be able to develop it and work on it and make a new system. But when you're making something totally new, you don't have a lot of the education.
Josh (Magellan):And you don't have stick time right, you don't have, like, the product's got to get out into the field, they got to get used and abused, and then they collect that information and it comes back.
Dane (The Guru):The bike industry is notorious for being one cutting edge Like. A lot of people don't realize that, how cutting edge it is because they had a bike in the 70s or 80s or whatever. They had a bike in the 70s or 80s or whatever. They had a bike when they were a kid. They couldn't get a 80 bike at walmart. But they don't understand how much aerospace is in bikes right, you know and how much, uh, exotic materials we have. You know. Some of the weirdest things go on when you have two materials that just spontaneously weld themselves together, which is really frustrating and you had no idea and all you did was put them next to each other you know and you don't realize, there's ions moving and there's just a chemical reaction going on.
Josh (Magellan):So, um, let's, let's start with affordability, what you know. So, like the price point, like what would you say? The price point is so one of the reasons, the difference between the prices, like what are they?
Dane (The Guru):I want to point out one of the reasons I think you don't have electronics on your bikes is because the electronics is new and so therefore it's rolled out on the highest end stuff.
Josh (Magellan):Oh yeah, that's fair, it's price. To me it's price. That's part of it. But what is the price difference? Is it 2X between electronic and mechanical? Just in general.
Dane (The Guru):That's a great example, or a great man. So I remember when Fox Live came out. That's an electronic system that is built into Fox's top-of-the-line suspension, and it was a $2,000 upgrade After you've bought the… yeah.
Dane (The Guru):So, for instance, we were selling pivots upgrade so after you've bought, yeah, like. So, for instance, we were selling pivots and you could get one without fox, live, with the factory suspension on it, yeah, for x price, and then for yep, and then if you wanted the live version, it was two thousand dollar. Upgrade, yeah, and so I mean that kind of gives you a small window into how much, how expensive that system was if I buy a sram transmission kit right now, it's like what?
Josh (Magellan):$1,100, $1,200?
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, I think GX is like $1,100. $1,100.
Josh (Magellan):What would the same mechanical groupset cost? So if you got a GX mechanical With all the same components that you get because you get a cassette, you get.
Dane (The Guru):I haven't done the math, but it's usually around $400.
Josh (Magellan):Okay, so it's more than 2X. Yeah, yeah, so that's a huge price difference.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah. So let's give an example of droppers right A reverb is around $400. Right, like an acoustic, reverb Acoustic yeah, acoustic Amish reverb is like around $400, whereas a a wireless one is around 800. So that's two X, that's two.
Josh (Magellan):X. But I think a reverb is a bad example though, because the reverb itself even the acoustic version is is a hydraulic system and they're more expensive than other droppers. Just by just acoustic they are.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, they're there. I mean cause.
Josh (Magellan):You can get a decent dropper for 150, 200 bucks right now.
Dane (The Guru):Yep, yeah, yeah, I mean we sell the pw1, the new one up, v2 is like 250 or something, I think v3 v3 is like 250 msrp. Yeah, yeah, yeah, so um, yeah, just just those reverbs are more expensive, yeah, anyways and so uh, but to give you an idea of two products that exist that are exactly the same except for one's electronic. So roughly you're paying twice the price. Yeah, like a man, I don't have these numbers off the top of my head. But a GX derailleur, let's say, is $170. $170. Roughly.
Josh (Magellan):And then I want to say an electronic gx is going to be access, or yeah, like 400 bucks. So so it's yeah, some, yeah, 200 or 150, they're definitely more expensive now.
Dane (The Guru):Uh, I remember when xx1 came out and with shram and I want to say it was like 1500 bucks for an xx1 group and that was super expensive, like if you were getting a drivetrain and that was not brakes, that was a crank chain, derailleur, shifter and cassette it was like 1500 bucks for that stuff and now you can get an xx group is like 21, so electronic transmission yeah and so it's. It's kind of tough because it's like it just depends, but yeah, it definitely costs, so you're paying way more.
Josh (Magellan):So, like, what am I getting? What am I like why? Why do it? What am I getting for that price?
Dane (The Guru):so there's different versions of stuff, so I'll give you an example of not a system that did well and unfortunately, josh, it was shimano oh, here we go well, this isn't meant to dig on shimano this is the di2 system. Their di2 system came out in mountain and it and they brought it out with wires well they always have and, and and they were dumb dumb. Yeah, but they were before. Yeah, I think they were before shram, weren't they?
Josh (Magellan):no, I think shram wireless mountain bike components came out before shimano Di2 Mountain. I could be wrong about that. We need to research that. I did do some research and I'm pretty sure.
Dane (The Guru):I heard that no I think it was before.
Josh (Magellan):It was pretty close in time.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, I had Di2 XTR on one of my pivots and I was one of the first guys, and I actually wasn't one of the first guys and I actually I wasn't one of the first guys, I was late and I actually hacked it a little bit because I was trying to make it super light, and so I was, you were. I found a way that you could run it without their little window system and so I was able to make it lighter and cleaner, so you couldn't tell as much. Okay, um, I just remember that and I would have had access to SRAM, but I don't think they had it out. I think SRAM was doing XX one and they were maybe adjust on 12 speed and SRAM and Shimano was still on 11 with their DI two and it worked good.
Dane (The Guru):There was, there was nothing remarkable about it. It was basically here's electronic, but you know what it was was a reflection of the road group, and I think the advantages that the road group had when it came out is it shifted more accurately, it shifted more consistent and, uh, especially the front derailleur on the road group worked much better yeah, they had that, like they had that concentric thing, right or so.
Josh (Magellan):So you had, you had a you. So you had, you had a. You know, you know you had a front derailleur and a rear derailleur, but you only had one lever.
Dane (The Guru):No, that, um, that happened much later. Okay, the original di2 still had two levers.
Josh (Magellan):Still had two. This is the road.
Dane (The Guru):Okay, so this is the road, because that's the where it's came from. And then, uh, they had great success. The di2 road group uh did really well and it dominated. It blew shram away. Um, shimano has always done front derailleurs way better than shram. Uh, shram literally got rid of them because they couldn't do them as well as shimano.
Dane (The Guru):I'm not kidding, I don't think that's the reason why, but it's definitely I don't even think the guys at shram would argue with me on that, like I don't think. So all right, if you, for SRAM, get a hold of us and let us know if that's the reason why.
Dane (The Guru):We would have SRAM groups on our bikes with a Shimano front-trailer, like I mean, that's no joke, you know. But I think what happened with the Di2 road group is you got electronics that it just shifted better. It really did a better shift because it was a more delicate system you were. You know, road groups it's tighter grouping of the gearing, so when you're moving from one to two, from your first to second cog, it's only a matter of a few teeth difference, and so you aren't jumping these big jumps, and so there's a certain elegance.
Josh (Magellan):So today, if I'm choosing between GX and AXx and axis, right, like the electronic version of gx, acoustic versus electronic, like what am I getting? So for that electronic I'm trying to build, up to that.
Dane (The Guru):Okay, I'm sorry, okay. So electronic, the, the space race for electronics yeah, was started by shimano. They're the first ones to do it and they did it really well in the roadside. When they came out with Mountain, it didn't really do anything for mountain bikers and, of course, shimano still had the front derailleur and they're really focused on the front derailleur.
Josh (Magellan):Because that's the time that they were doing the one shifter thing.
Dane (The Guru):No, not yet. Not yet okay yeah no synchro shifting, or you know yeah.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, there's a C word, there's a word. Yeah, it doesn't matter, we don't have sequential, sequential shifting, we don't have front derailleurs anymore, so fuck it, yeah.
Dane (The Guru):So Shimano hung on to that and the Di2 system hung on to it and focused more on a smaller gear double in the front, and it kind of just didn't take off and it died and their sales reflected that. And so when your sales reflect not good, your company doesn't want to keep dumping money into it. So they kind of abandoned it. It's still there, it still exists. They just had a series come out with e-bikes where it plugs into their e-bike system, their Shimano e-bike system.
Josh (Magellan):So you don't have to run separate batteries.
Dane (The Guru):You don't have to run separate batteries. You don't have to run separate batteries and there are also auto shifts, which is cool. You can stop pedaling and you can shift and the bike will turn the front crank.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, I've seen the videos.
Dane (The Guru):That's when the crank is still moving while you're coasting right yeah and so that is a feature that people could use and it made sense and so it's kind of revived a little bit of DI2. Okay, but really, when SRAM came out with their system in the mountain bike, what they focused on was they went one by, yep, they went super wide range and wireless and wireless. That was the biggest thing. And all of a sudden this wireless stuff came out. We could put it on any bike, that was.
Dane (The Guru):The other problem was DI2, you had all this internal stuff. You had to figure out where to put the battery. Not every bike could take it, because if a bike had external cabling, it was really you had to like. You had to like put a sticker over the di2 wires on the outside of the frame, right like to to stick it to the bike. And so this wireless system came out. So they had features right off the bat. That made sense and it was at the high-end system and at the high-end level. It really wasn't a huge price jump, okay, you know. So I mean it was, but it wasn't so bad that people were like I can't buy it, and what they got really was way better shifting much better shifting.
Dane (The Guru):So one of the advantages to um, to electronic systems, is when you shift, the derailleur moves at a certain speed and it can pick up whether or not you're shoving it into the gear before you're pedaling, so it can back off. So it has little little sensors.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, I mean that are lining it up yeah, there's no curb feelers on the derailleur, but the motor will detect resistance and it can give feedback to the brain, which can then make an action, which is what it does. So you have a system that's a little bit more friendly to ham shifting. If a pro is like jamming through the gears too fast, he doesn't derail as much, he doesn't drop chains as much or she? Um, they don't, uh, they don't have the same kind of mischiefs that used to happen.
Josh (Magellan):So better shifting. One of the things I've I I read about or heard about people complaining and I'm and I don't know if the new systems, this, this, uh, this, this article that I read was a couple years old, but they were. You know, on an acoustic shift, if you're, if you're coming down a hill, like into a wash or into a gully right, and then you're immediately going to be climbing, you're dumping gears really quickly. If you didn't prepare, and on an acoustic bike with acoustic components, you can dump a whole bunch of gears at one time and what it sounded like on the electric, you have to, like, hit the button a bunch of times and it doesn't shift as fast as the acoustic system if you're jumping wide ranges. Is that still the case?
Dane (The Guru):Kind of. In fact, transmission is the newest tram system. When it came out there was a lot of people complaining because they were saying it was slower. And I do a little demo in the shop with people and I'll put the system in the stand. I'll put a bike in the stand with the system on it and I will be pedaling steadily with my hand and then I will hit that shifter as fast as I can 12 times and you will watch the and then I'll take my hand off and while my hands off, the derailleur is still moving up the cog and shifting on its own time.
Dane (The Guru):Right, so it's buffering the shift. It knows that it made it, but it's not going to do it until it's ready. And there's a really uh, really important reason for that. The early um access systems had a certain speed to them and in fact the di2s had the same issues and they would do firmware updates to where you could kind of adjust the speed, uh, and change things. But one of the advantages is also that disadvantage, which is the system is going to shift when it makes the most sense, when it's when it's for it mechanically.
Josh (Magellan):Mechanically, that might not be the right thing for you on the trail at that moment, if you're in an extreme scenario.
Dane (The Guru):It's tough, but yes, so could you get away with jamming through the gears to get up a hill and hearing that crunching noise? Absolutely. Can you pop a link open and break a chain? Absolutely, which one happens more than others? That's a good point. Others, I think it's a good point. I think what happens is, you know, we can kind of push our systems to the limit and you, you, you can learn how fast you can shift stuff and you get comfortable with that. And so if you get on a new system that doesn't let you do that, it can either be a good or a bad thing. If you're breaking chains all the time, it's great. If you're racing, you may see it as a bad thing.
Josh (Magellan):So this is one of the benefits of that new Shimano system. You talked about that. When you're coasting down a hill and you're not pedaling, because you can prepare for that uphill that you know is coming and your bike will actually shift and be ready for that.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, and I've been. In that case where I'm going down a section of trail, I know there's going to be an uphill, but I don't really. Maybe it's a technical descent and I don't have time to move my cranks. Yeah, because e-bikes have a clutch in the crank, they can advance the chain without moving my crank, and so they can be shifting at whatever speed they feel like to get in the gear I want, which is cool. So it is a cool system. I like that idea because it does help with that.
Josh (Magellan):So for 2X. I'm getting better. Shifting For 2X does help with that, so I'm for for 2x.
Dane (The Guru):I'm getting better shifting for 2x 2x the price, like yeah, get back to the gx versus you know act gxx, gx acoustic versus gx axis one of the reasons I think they don't put there's cost right.
Dane (The Guru):the these, these derailleurs, the batteries, the motors, uh, they're very expensive to produce and as much as these companies try to keep the price down, the cost of that derailleur just is up there. They're using really advanced stuff in there. And then the programming, all of the software updates, all of the firmware, all of the back back room you know the back um, back of the house stuff that they have to do to make that system work has a certain cost, and so I don't think they ever dip the price down, because it's really hard to get that cost down. But what they do is they focus on the systems that tend to be more competitive. So when you're tooling around the loop in Tucson and you're just casually, you know, riding your bike with your family, you're less likely to be concerned about you know shifting under load Perfect surface.
Josh (Magellan):Yep, exactly Perfect surface.
Dane (The Guru):Yep, exactly Perfect shift.
Josh (Magellan):So you can shift under load with an electric system.
Dane (The Guru):So that's the evolution. So far that's been happening. So again, if we talk Shimano system, they kind of stalled out at a certain performance and even SRAM basically had their system, their, their chain and their cassette and their cranks were all non-electric systems that had an electric derailleur and so you had the convenience of, you know, a derailleur that's going to help you shift more accurately. Yeah, um it. So one thing that we skipped over, that we didn't talk about, is one of the reasons the biggest benefit to electronic shifting is the number one detriment to mechanical shifting, besides you just hurting it.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah.
Dane (The Guru):Is cable degradation and so on a mechanical system. You have a cable that's running in a sheathing they call housing, yep, and in that housing is usually they call housing yep, and in that housing is usually they're built up of multiple layers. The inner layer that the cable moves in is a poly tube and that breaks down over time. Yeah, so it literally like will get debris in there and a grain of sand takes up enough space to cause friction and so, especially here in the desert with our, our dust is so it can fill those up.
Dane (The Guru):We used to pull, we would be doing neutral support at the 24-hour events. We would pull the rear cable housing off of the derailleur area just right at the derailleur, and it would just dump out dirt. And for race bikes we would pull that one piece off, put on a new piece and the bike would shift so much better because that's at the back of the bike getting the most dust oh, okay, the one, the one part of a cable that comes out of the frame that connects to the derailleur there yeah that that was taking in a bunch of dust yep, another trick is at one point and it's still this way their um, shimano and shram don't have the same size diameter cable.
Dane (The Guru):A lot of people don't know that, so so there are different sizes. They both fit within each other.
Josh (Magellan):I was going to say I've used the same I've used like the Jaguar.
Dane (The Guru):So for the most part, they all will roughly fit together, but their SRAMs are a tiny bit smaller, and so we would take SRAMs, uh cables, and run them into shimano systems and they would shift better because there's more of that gap and less friction. Interesting, and so there's all these little tricks that we did in race scenarios, because we're trying to make this bike work so all the bullshit that comes with cables?
Josh (Magellan):yes, you're not. That's a benefit, right? You're not getting so from a reliability? That's the biggest thing.
Dane (The Guru):So you have cable stretch. So when we sell a new bike the cables settle, the ferrules sit down onto the housing and the housing can actually shrink back and expose wires.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, which I've seen in almost every bike. I've had that stuff can rust.
Dane (The Guru):It can hold dirt. It can hold water. If you're in the Pacific Northwest, you're not worried as much about the dust as you are the rust. Yeah, worried as much about the dust as you are the rust, yeah, and so the shops there will grease the cables and get the grease in there, or they'll maybe run a gore-tech system to try and seal it up or something like that. Interesting, yeah, so the the cable has been a a bane, and so yeah, or if you crash like like lacy crashed at the enduro.
Dane (The Guru):She got a kink in the and we had to replace that cable yeah, yeah, because if it's in the house any of that shit.
Josh (Magellan):So, from a reliability perspective, you're removing failure points from the acoustic system with the electric, but then you you introduce new failure modes where you have batteries that can die and then a loss of signal yeah, yeah you say that doesn't have, I mean the battery. I think that's on the user. So I'm not like yeah, charge your fucking batteries, fucking batteries. Yeah, like, come on.
Dane (The Guru):Well, like, let's say that so that we just have finished the Arizona trail race, which is a race that's 750 miles. I know I got that wrong, but you finished it.
Josh (Magellan):No God, no, Maybe, we maybe in an airplane.
Dane (The Guru):But no, I mean we as a state. We just had this race where people race from Mexico up to Northern Arizona on the Arizona Trail. They're out there for many, many, many days.
Josh (Magellan):Is it like two weeks or something?
Dane (The Guru):You know I should know this stuff, but I don't pay attention to racing enough to understand how long that takes them.
Josh (Magellan):But it's a long time.
Dane (The Guru):More than a 24-hour race, more than any other race that's out there. It's really an event where you're on your bike and you're riding and you're required or you're relying on your equipment for way longer than anything.
Josh (Magellan):It's like a normal runner.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, exactly. And so these are the people that you know they're going to shy away from a battery that needs to be charged Right In that case. They really don't want that.
Dane (The Guru):They want something reliable that goes you know, and so that's a case where a battery may fail, you know, and may cause you to have an issue, and so that's a legitimate, you know worry in a 24 hour you're all the modern batteries that I know of would easily last that long, yeah, and you probably got extras, and in a 24 hour you're going in a circle, so you're coming back by the tent.
Josh (Magellan):You know, every in a while and you can swap it out if you need to.
Dane (The Guru):You've got to worry more about your light battery than you do your derailleur. Yeah for sure. So the accuracy on the electronic systems is better. Even on the Shimano systems it's better. You don't have any of the cable degradation.
Dane (The Guru):The shifting accuracy, shifting accuracy, yep, yep, accuracy, shifting accuracy. So, um, so, over the lifespan of the bike, you're not bringing it into the bike shop. This was actually an issue that shimano would come to us and say hey, we're now realizing that people are not going to bring their bikes to you as much and so we're going to hurt you as dealers. Honestly, they, uh they, they were like, hey, but we have all these firmware updates and you need this special computer program to do that.
Dane (The Guru):And so you need to let people know that they still need to come in for those, which I'm not a big fan of, you know, I'm not like your Tesla to just hook up to your Wi-Fi and yeah, and now you can get your own app on your phone and does it for you so you don't have to come to the bike show.
Dane (The Guru):I don't think that's. I thought that was kind of lame that they did that, but I think they they were just trying to throw us a bone, you know. Um, but it's true, you know these electronic systems aren't coming in for the derailleur adjustments, for the tune-ups, so, all of a sudden, are a different thing, and so what we did, instead of calling people and saying, hey, come in and get your firmware, we just would sell them a tune-up and they would get the firmware with the tune-up, right, and that was included. So we just took the time that we would to adjust the derailleurs and we now just firmware, updated their stuff and made sure it was current, and so they still had a reason to come in. So they still need their wheels trued, they still need their bearings greased, they still need the adjustments, you know, and make sure their nuts and bolts are tight and everything.
Josh (Magellan):So you pay a lot more, you get better shifting, much better shifting. You get, but you eat less service, less service. You reduce a couple of the failure modes associated with the cables, but you also introduce a couple of potential failure modes with battery failure and connection failure.
Dane (The Guru):But you're saying the connection failure. You don't say that, but that we don't see it at all.
Josh (Magellan):I've done a bunch of research and it does happen. It's not a lot, but it does happen.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, so in, I will tell you Di2, it's usually a crushed wire that we see an issue with so a lot of times when it's transported. So, for instance, when the SRAM systems came out for triathletes and they were wireless, it was a godsend, because the wireless systems weren't, these people were taking their bikes across you know long distance and then reassembling them and crushing wires and then they couldn't race, and so that was a big problem, that was a legitimate, big failure point. And so, um, we, we saw that drop dramatically when they went wireless, cause you don't have that problem anymore, yeah and so, uh, so that was one advantage. That uh also was a disadvantage, right, right. So, um, and then when you do other failure points that I've seen, um, you're still going to smack the derailleur no matter what.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, if you, I mean yeah and so those things level out right, but you now have a two times to three times expensive derailleur, yep. So that is an issue. And so the um. Again, shimano hasn't brought now. Now we haven't talked about this, but I'll tell you that the new wireless Shimano is coming and they are very tight lipped. Are you allowed to say that, yeah, because I'm not really citing anything. I don't have any pictures, I just know it's coming. I don't know. I think we're going to be talking about it in probably sea otter.
Josh (Magellan):Springtime.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, if I see it, Because the new Saint system and I'm pretty sure the new XTR is coming. So all those people that are looking at XTR bikes, you should still buy them because they're awesome and they're a great deal right now. But uh, the new stuff is coming and I hate to say that Shimano Chris is going to be mad because there's going to be some bike shop. That's like damn it, dane told them. I I'm just predicting the future, people.
Josh (Magellan):I don't have any pictures. We just heard this on pink bike, yeah, yeah, well, yeah, I mean, there's spy photos and stuff you can you can get that, but I I know the industry and I know it's time.
Dane (The Guru):It's just when it's coming. Is it going to be this spring, or is it going to be fall? I'm not sure. 26 sometime sometime in 25, it's coming soon. So and that, and soon to shimano could be 10 years. So because they take forever.
Josh (Magellan):Here we go. This, this guy, it's true Dude, I got to tell you. Man working with the Japanese, it's all great products, but it takes fucking forever.
Dane (The Guru):It does, it does. And, like I was talking about their safety systems, they're very meticulous and very accurate. One of the reasons they're low end stuff does so well is because I feel like it would shame their families if it didn't. Oh dude.
Josh (Magellan):I got, I got to go down a quick rabbit hole. So so we're in this, in this meeting with Mitsubishi heavy industries, right, uh, defense contractor, right, I mean it's the same company as Mitsubishi the car company, but they just different divisions.
Josh (Magellan):To make big, things make big things yeah and uh, and so we're meeting with them and they, you know, they got their CEO and and, uh, you know a whole bunch of people from the company and my boss is there and I was younger in my career and before that meeting I didn't really know much about the Japanese culture. And so there's this book called Kiss, Bow and Shake Hands, which is a really great book if you want to learn about different cultures and kind of translate between what's okay here in America. You don't show the bottom of your foot to someone in the Middle East.
Josh (Magellan):I don't know if you kiss or not, but one thing I learned was that when they say okay, it doesn't actually mean okay. It means that they heard you. No, it means no, oh, really, yes, no way. So we get to this meeting and my boss is talking to him and they're like okay, okay, okay. And we get to the end of the meeting and he you know we were doing like the debrief when they left and he's like what do you?
Josh (Magellan):think. I think it's great, I think they're all good. They said okay to everything. I'm like. Okay means no and he's like shit it's true, so different okay. So I think we've we've exhausted the uh so shifting stuff.
Dane (The Guru):The last part of the failure part is uh, we have seen a couple corrosion issues with some of the pins for the batteries oh, interesting, like actually on the connection point, like the electric connection yeah, and they're spring loaded, yeah.
Dane (The Guru):And is that water getting in there? You think we don't know, because it's the desert. So you know, remember, we're seeing stuff in a desert environment. We don't have a lot of water. You don't see the water very much. Um, they are sealed, so if they're in the rain there's no water that's supposed to get in. There's O-rings there's a little clasp. There's supposed to be a water system. There's a certain rating, but I don't remember what it is, but I think it's just the contact point's wearing.
Josh (Magellan):Okay.
Dane (The Guru):So maybe it's a continually…. Yeah, friction, I'm not really sure, and it's been to a point where SR um tram did not have a answer for it because that is embedded so deep into the derailleur that it's not something that's serviceable and that has been an issue. And tram has been wonderful and amazing about taking care of people just replacing the component.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, it's discounted price yeah, it depends on the length, because there is a warranty period and you know they also can't control corrosion if somebody's abusing it. They're not really sure and and from what I know of companies not just fram but most companies the first few things that happen they have a very skeptical uh view on it.
Josh (Magellan):They might be mistreated?
Dane (The Guru):yeah it's. They don't know once they see it can't be our product. Yeah, it's gotta be the user. Yeah, as soon as they see a uh, a consistency, they start to get super generous and happy to take care of you. You know, because they know there's it's not the user, you know, but the just riding along. Uh happens where somebody presents something and says I don't know, I didn't do anything, and you know, the frame's broken too and it's got like rocks embedded in it and they're like like I was just riding along.
Josh (Magellan):You were just riding along, yeah, so there's a certain level.
Dane (The Guru):And there is times when they do just break. So that is the only thing that I've really seen, other than people smashing stuff.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, which can happen on acoustic bikes as well.
Dane (The Guru):I don't even see a de-pairing happen. I don't even see a de-pairing happen Every once in a while. We won't get a like. If you replace a battery or something, you may have to repair your system, but in general we don't even see that they need to be repaired very often.
Josh (Magellan):How expensive are the batteries? What's a replacement battery cost Around $40. That's for SRAM.
Dane (The Guru):Now, if you get into Shimanoano, because they're much bigger, it's about 100 bucks. Okay, now there are shimano di2 systems, you could probably go for a few months easily of heavy use before you have to charge it. Yeah, so they last longer. Shram systems you're talking four or five rides of heavy riding, uh, depending, like a dropper post and they charge up in what? An hour, two hours?
Dane (The Guru):yeah, super quick yeah and um yeah, and one of the things that we're starting to see. So I just saw Fox's Neo stuff and they have their own battery system. I kind of wish there would be a universal. However, there are fake batteries, not fake Knockoffs. Knockoffs on like Amazon for SRAM?
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, for sure.
Dane (The Guru):And SRAM is worried about some of those actually Because they put out different voltages and can defry their stuff. Not only that, but they may actually have different materials on the contact points. They may actually cause some of the corrosion.
Josh (Magellan):Oh interesting.
Dane (The Guru):So there is something that you need to know as a buyer of this merchandise if you decide to get something off Amazon because people just feel like the OE stuff is just too expensive and they have to buy something off amazon, you're putting yourself at risk.
Dane (The Guru):You do have to worry. Uh, and and there's. You know a logic person would be like it's the same thing. You know it comes out of the same factory, it's all out of the same stuff. You know they're just gouging us or whatever. But be careful, because if it's not and I have dealt with Amazon a lot, where they make something that is supposed to be the same and it's not I got during COVID. We ran out of hydraulic lines and I bought some off Amazon because we couldn't get them and we needed to fix people's bikes and those hydraulic lines were just garbage.
Josh (Magellan):I mean Amazon is just a marketplace, right? So you have no idea? Yeah, there's just garbage. I mean Amazon is just a marketplace, right? So you have no idea.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, there's a legitimacy when you go onto Amazon you feel as though there's not.
Josh (Magellan):Just so you know there's not.
Dane (The Guru):I understand that. So when you come into a shop you do have a certain level of protection where that shop has their reputation. Yeah, they're not going to try and rip you off.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, and I'm looking around. I don't see any knockoff products.
Dane (The Guru):Everything you have here is OEM and if I have a knockoff it's a really good one. But on Amazon you get that sense because you've kind of been conditioned that online is the same as in-store, and I I'll give you an example. I need lithium ion batteries for my little floodlights that are solar powered. Yeah, and I was just freaking out because I go on Amazon and there's a million brands I've never heard of. I don't want to get a lithium ion charging battery which can have a critical failure and put it into my house, you know, and so it's.
Dane (The Guru):It's a little like worrisome to go buy something like that. I'd say don't buy knockoff batteries. The problem is, you know, when you go to Amazon you don't know what the knockoff is. I got that floodlight system. It's got some generic battery in it, you know, and so you know. Now, in my remote control cars, you know, I have Traxxas. Yeah, and I did go to Amazon and I get the knockoff batteries because they are quite a bit cheaper. I have a Traxxas charger, yep, but when I charge them they're in a fireproof box.
Josh (Magellan):You get another Traxxas charger in my truck oh, that's awesome and some Traxxas batteries and a Traxxas truck.
Dane (The Guru):But I have a fireproof container because if that knockoff battery is faulty and catches on fire, I don't want my house catching on fire yeah, and so so that's something to think about.
Dane (The Guru):With the lithium ions, so as we talk about electronics, that's actually a thing. So when we ship these products back and forth, like when we get them, they have special labels. So when I get you that little spare battery for 40 bucks that's tiny and fits in your pocket, yeah, um, it comes in a box. If it's in the same box as the lube and you know, a chain and maybe a tire, that from our distributors, that box needs a special sticker, has a special designation so that, so that the shipper knows there's a lithium ion in there.
Dane (The Guru):So that is something that I don't think you were bringing up, that we should talk about you know is knockoff stuff no, no, uh, lithium ion. Oh, just in general, yeah, I mean, have you, have you heard?
Josh (Magellan):I mean, like I don't know anyone, we talk about pedal assist bikes, which, by the way, we're going to talk about this. This is my new, my new term for. I'm not going to use the term e-bike anymore, just pedal assist. But you talk about pedal assist bikes. I've heard all the stories, seen all the news reports. It seems like it's always some cheap knockoff brand. Yeah, I have not heard of any. I guess I heard of a tesla, but I've not heard of any like major bike companies.
Dane (The Guru):There's a picture of a specialized. Oh, here we go. No, I'm not digging on them, but they're. It's. It's famous because it's a specialized and it's the. The picture takes the the view of the specialized from the bottom. I see it recirculated, it's an older picture and you can actually see the cells. It's all burnt up, the bikes kind of melted a little bit and and there was an issue, um, and so it's not impossible for lithium ions to fail, and when they do, they go through a chemical reaction.
Dane (The Guru):They it's cascading, which means that it gets bigger and bigger yeah, and it has to burn itself out and not much will put them out. Usually you cover them and try and smother them, so like a lot of shops will have a bucket of sand to put stuff into or they'll have some sort of system, but fire extinguishers don't really work on them. The biggest thing is to get it out of a enclosed area because the fumes are fairly toxic.
Dane (The Guru):It's not like a mustard gas, but it's nasty you know and uh, so you want to get them out into the open, let them off gas and hopefully they're not off gassing on anything. So, like we have a policy in the shop, we don't ever charge our our pedal assist bikes when the shop's closed. We don't leave them on overnight so that we know what's going on. We have concrete floors. We charge them in the middle of the floor, not against the walls things like that.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, things like that, okay.
Dane (The Guru):So there's actually a lot of criteria for e-bikes Sorry, pedal assist bikes, but when we're talking about electronics on the bike, you have that Now. You have that in your watch, in your Apple watch in my phone in your phone in your cigarette or whatever.
Josh (Magellan):I don't smoke cigarettes, but yeah the systems are pretty solid.
Dane (The Guru):It's usually damage, or you're right. In New York right now, there's an issue with uh, cheap e-bikes that people are purchasing to commute Uh, most of them I don't want to say it's just commuters. What it is is mostly delivery drivers are using the e-bikes to get around and do their deliveries and they're getting the cheapest form of transportation so that they can make a living, so that they can make a living. And then they live in an apartment complex. The bikes are drug around the up and down the stairs and all over.
Dane (The Guru):Nicked up and banged up yeah, and if that battery system doesn't have what they call a battery management system?
Josh (Magellan):BMS.
Dane (The Guru):BMS. Bms, that battery management system, will maintain and monitor the battery while it's being charged and while it's not to look for temperature, and so on the charger side, it will take the charge off if it sees a hot cell or one cell is getting overheated over the others. There's a lot of technology in that, and so when you go looking for e-bikes and you want an inexpensive one, one of the first places that they skimp on is that system, and then they just put a regular transformer in to charge it, and they don't have that kind of technology in the bike, and that's. Most of the buyers are that, and so there's legislation going forward. We'll probably see requirements for importers.
Josh (Magellan):For BMSs.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah Well, not only BMSs, but a UL rating. There's a couple different ratings that they need to have that they're pushing forward. That basically will require e-bike manufacturers to meet the standard.
Josh (Magellan):Have a certain quality management.
Dane (The Guru):Yeah, and then I think they're working on trying to do some sort of buyback program where if you have one, that's not that way that they'll give you a credit. I know that that's a big concern because they're already out there yeah uh.
Josh (Magellan):So how do you get them?
Dane (The Guru):off the street. You got to stop them and then and then, uh, that's a big concern with these commuting bikes. So in our shop we only carry um name brand. Well, one, their name brand. But two, they're almost all ul rated. They're very high end their name brand, they're you're not really at the same risk level. But man, the amount of people that come in like, yeah, I looked at the e-bike here and it was, you know, 2500 bucks and I can't afford that. I got one from Costco for $500. That happens all day long. Costco is selling them, amazon is selling them. Last year at Christmas Kohl's was selling e-bikes, best Buy had e-bikes and those little boards, the little two-wheel things. They're out there and people are consuming them like crazy because they're cheap. Be careful.
Josh (Magellan):You're taking on risk if you buy that cheap product. Get a quality product.
Dane (The Guru):So electronics on the system that's probably the biggest drawback is dealing with the batteries.
Josh (Magellan):Right on, so let's do this. Man. We've been talking for about an hour and 15 already. Holy crap, it always happens, right.
Dane (The Guru):We didn't even get to the topic.
Josh (Magellan):Yeah, so let's well, we did. We talked a lot about it, but let's, let's save the suspension, because I think it would be cool to deep dive, because I know it's.
Dane (The Guru):It's bringing a lot of new tech and I know you're a suspension expert. When I'm on a system I'm testing yeah, you're testing them, so let's save that.
Josh (Magellan):We'll just do a system. We'll just do one podcast episode on specifically like the like, elect suspension electronics.
Dane (The Guru):That are coming out, yeah, and we can, we can deep dive on that.
Josh (Magellan):Um any final thoughts, man?
Dane (The Guru):Uh, you know, I I wouldn't be afraid of electronics. Uh, I think they're amazing. I think pretty soon that's going to be the only thing you get on a quality bike. Um, I think Walmart's always going to have cable activated.
Josh (Magellan):So I'm eventually going to have to go to electronics.
Dane (The Guru):We'll see, because as soon as the new Shimano systems come out, you know I'm going to want one. Well, not only that, but they're very good at consistency, safety they're very good, so they may not be as cutting edge and as right you know out as fast as possible. But when they do make a product, it's quality, and so if their system comes out and it blows everybody away, that may be something that Could change the whole thing. Well because that will drive SRAM to make more.
Dane (The Guru):And then they'll make more, and so that competition is what really drives it Will drive it. If it's like the first Di2 Mountain Groups where nobody bought it, it will just die on the vine. But the fact is people love this stuff. It's pretty amazing. Our number one road group are wireless SRAM systems and SRAM was awful in the road market for cable Before this Before this and the wireless has taken them and just vaulted them amazingly ahead.
Josh (Magellan):That's like the Rival system or whatever SRAM.
Dane (The Guru):Rival, Rival Force, Red, all of them. They're gravel groups. Sram is just really committed to, to electronic systems. They've seen the advantages and they've got the time and engineering down to where they're trickling it down to some really good price points.
Josh (Magellan):Uh final thing, and then we'll. We'll end uh, I saw that some pictures of a mechanical, yes, so that's to your point.
Dane (The Guru):Uh, that's coming. And again, the guys at SRAM may be mad at me, but uh, I didn't sign any NDAs so they can't say anything. So I haven't seen anything official.
Josh (Magellan):But yeah, I just saw it on pick bike.
Dane (The Guru):There is a transmission uh G I don't know if it's GX, I don't know what they're going to call it but it's basically a mechanical transmission system which uses all of the most of the advantages. The biggest one that you lose is that super reliable under load, because again, you can shift faster than the chain is ready to move, and so that is one of the reasons the transmission systems do so well is that they know where the chain is.
Josh (Magellan):They know where the cassette is.
Dane (The Guru):They have set electronic sensors that are doing all that stuff. Well, not only that, but they have mapped out the shift ramps and so the derailleur is moving at the speed it is so that it picks up the shift ramps and under load you don't pop a chain open or break a chain or bend a tooth or anything. The mechanical system will lose that, but you'll still get amazing shifting and you'll get a much better price point. That's awesome, well, dane episode 25.
Josh (Magellan):High five.
Dane (The Guru):High five. That's awesome. All right, it's been great Thanks man, hope you guys enjoyed this.
Josh (Magellan):Have a great day. Okay, bye.
