Graphene frames coming!

[pobrien]

There is an article on the Cycling Weekly site from July 14 regarding the imminent roll out of graphene frames that could lead to lighter and stronger frames. It was an interesting read.

It hardly seems necessary to me to have lighter frames (heresy) but cyclists are a demanding lot.

The first frames seem to be priced around 4000 Pounds.

[EDS]

In ten years we can all wax poetically about the sensations of riding a carbon frame!

[verticaldoug]

was this the july 14, 2016 article or did they rerun it?

A graphene bike will still primarily be a carbon fibre bike, but with a some graphene sheets thrown in. I doubt the bike gets that light since the resin and traditional carbon fibre will still be the primary materials.

I already have a graphene helmet which is my Catlike Mixino with a 'graphene' layer which supposedly saves 10grams

The only graphene bike I've seen is this one in the UK. It weighs about the sames as the Cervelo R5 California.
https://dassi.com/product-range/interceptor-graphene

I really am not into riding paper mache

[cribbit]

I don't think pure graphene will ever be feasible as a material, they certainly mean as another layer in a carbon frame. Unclear just what benefits you'll get. It's already light enough and hard to shed weight from, but I could see it adding strength for the same weight.

I also bet it ends up being 100% marketing gimmick, graphene is notoriously impossible to get results with outside of the lab.

[oogens]

the benefit is you get to pay twice as much

[pobrien]

VerticalDoug is right, they recycled the article and I did not notice the date.


The frame would have some layers of graphene under a carbon fibre layer.

As we know, graphene is a single layer of carbon atoms bound in a hexagonal honeycomb lattice network.

I expect there would always be the need for a protective/structural component to protect the graphene.

The helmet is a good example of where this product may show up.

[Mark McM]

From the old non-stick cookware TV commercial:

"Diamond is the world's hardest substance - but you can't cook on it"



https://newscenter.lbl.gov/2016/02/08/graphene-is-strong-but-is-it-tough/

“This material certainly has very high strength, but it has particularly low toughness—lower than diamond and a little higher than pure graphite,” said Berkeley Lab scientist Robert Ritchie. “Its extremely high strength is very impressive, but we can’t necessarily utilize that strength unless it has resistance to fracture.”

Toughness, a material’s resistance to fracture, and strength, a material’s resistance to deformation, are often mutually incompatible properties. “A structural material has to have toughness,” Ritchie explained. “We simply don’t use strong materials in critical structures—we try to use tough materials. When you look at such a structure, like a nuclear reactor pressure vessel, it’s made of a relatively low-strength steel, not an ultrahigh-strength steel. The hardest steels are used to make tools like a hammer head, but you’d never use them to manufacture a critical structure because of the fear of catastrophic fracture.”

Although pure monocrystalline graphene may have fewer defects, the authors studied polycrystalline graphene as it is more inexpensively and commonly synthesized with chemical vapor deposition. Ritchie is aware of only one experimental measurement of the material’s toughness.

“Our numbers were consistent with that one experimental number,” he said. “In practical terms these results mean that a soccer ball can be placed on a single sheet of monocrystalline graphene without breaking it. What object can be supported by a corresponding sheet of polycrystalline graphene? It turns out that a soccer ball is much too heavy, and polycrystalline graphene can support only a ping pong ball. Still remarkable for a one-atom thick material, but not quite as breathtaking anymore.”

[grilledcheese]

Is this even a good idea? Light and stiff is only half of it, but what about repeated vibrations and stresses?
I knew a few people with those Vittoria graphene rims who thought they were bad and the brake surface deteriorated within a month. Different use case, but still..

[pobrien]

Is this even a good idea?

That is a most excellent question!

I personally would not look at a first gen graphene frame.

I am sure the frames will sell once on the market.
Verticaldoug already has the Catlike Mixino helmet with graphene.

[bitpuddle]

Frames are really light enough. I’m more interested in what Allied is doing; mixing in Innegra to make the frame more durable and with a more manageable failure mode.