I was browsing some old mtb articles on MOMBAt and noticed a trend of companies claiming to have complete drivetrains ready for release and what not and then I see nothing about them being released. What happened that prevented these from coming to market?
Anyone with some insight? Really curious what happened. Grafton and Magic motorcycle are two that come to mind
Paul, White Industries and Campagnolo couldn't crack the market. Suntour - the most OG MTB invested drivetrain company - gone. I think people got wise that it wasn't the hill they wanted to die on.
Man, I loved second generation Dual Control when mated with a Rapid Rise RD.
Stuff worked amazingly well, especially when compared to first gen which was proof of concept and not much else.
Shimano, being Shimano is what killed it too, kinda like what they've done for themselves now, with their blind eye policy to having or enforcing any MAP pricing on line....
Basically it was a LOT harder to create a drivetrain that worked comparably to Shimano than people thought it was going to be. A bunch of companies thought they could do it and cash in on the CNC component craze and the anti-Shimano sentiment in the early 90's, and their marketing people went off and made pie in the sky claims that they'd have a Shimano-killer groupset for sale in 6 months tops, or whatever, as marketing people always do while the engineers grit their teeth and die inside.
And then engineering/manufacturing/economic realities set in. It wasn't easy to match Shimano's 30+ years of engineering and manufacturing know-how, let alone industry connections. And even to sell to the boutique high end of the market where price was (almost) no object, nobody in the end wanted a US made derailleur or shifters in 1994 that worked worse than Shimano products from 1984...
SRAM did it eventually, but they had waaay deeper pockets than most of these small brands, and it took them buying up a lot of the pieces (Sachs/Sedis, Avid, etc). And even then some of their earlier groupsets didn't work all that great (if anyone can get my wife's 2011 SRAM Rival front shifting to not suck, let me know!).
Check Scot Nicol looking over a (beautifull) white steel ibis mojo built w/ m900, future shock, syncros etc.. at 3:20. At one point he says "wow... we have come a long way".
I still have all the fun on my steel mojo but would like a Ripmo... thing is: Ibis keeps getting MORE expensive and their bikes geometry keep becoming outdated on a faster pace. 4K for a bike frame that will be improved in 3 yrs.. add a new fork, maybe wheels, cranks.. It´s a different game now.
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