Goodbye Flip/Flop, Hello Love/Hate

The trials and tribulations of my botched spoke length calculation for the second “budget” wheelset got me thinking about something that I’d noticed about the flip-flop wheel I’d bought from the STW classifieds. If I’d continued my wheel build with the short spokes then the finished article would have had a couple of turns of thread protruding from the nipples, which would be unsightly and may weaken the finished wheel as each soft brass nipple would not be “full” of spoke. Most if not all of the spokes on the flip/flop wheel are showing exactly this, a little bit of thread protruding from each of the nipples. It’s a symptom of the shoddy work of someone who didn’t have the correct size, either because an erring punter ordered the wrong ones (like me) or maybe because a shop didn’t have the correct size in stock. This, combined with the rather slack spoke tension that I’d spotted previously, calls into question the quality of the builder’s workmanship. Both of these “faults” suggest that Condor Cycles may have built the wheel to a deadline rather than to an exacting standard.

Notwithstanding these issues, I had been planning to return the flip/flop wheel to the configuration it had when I bought it, namely a doublespeed. It’s now doubtful that I’ll ever get around to doing this because I’ve got a new project in mind, centred upon replacing my unloved On-One Inbred singlespeed frame. While it has some good points (cheap, fairly strong, easy to re-sell) there are lots of reasons why I don’t like the Inbred that much: crap paint that falls off if you so much as look at it oddly; previous poor experience with On-One which has left me with “brand antipathy” rather than the more usual loyalty; and no rear disc mount. Also I’ve grown to dislike with a vengeance the horizontal “track” dropouts along with chain tugs, disc brake incompatibility and general faffing about when removing a wheel. As a means of tensioning a singlespeed chain track dropouts can’t be beaten for outright simplicity, but they are far from being the most elegant solution. The slightest adjustment to chain tension inevitably involves messing with chain tugs to toe-in the wheel and then having to re-align the brakes, both fiddly jobs that I loathe. What I want is a frame with normal vertical drop outs that can be used with a normal quick-release skewer (without tugs!) and that will simply drop out, as it were, when the skewer is undone.

How then to tension the chain? When using a frame with vertical drop-outs the traditional bodge is to use a chain tensioner, something akin to a simplified rear mech (in some cases it IS a rear mech!), but while convenient this is also inelegant and spoils the lines and purity of the bike. Over the past two or three years the likes of Orange (P7), Kona (Unit & Explosif), Voodoo and others have used sliding drop-outs that incorporate normal vertical drop-outs but that can slide fore and aft on the frame and are secured with bolts. Sliding drop-outs are crude and do the same job as a track drop-out while enabling the use of a quick-release skewer. However although using a disc brake does become easier they do nothing to solve the brake alignment problem unless the brake mount is also part of the sliding dropout, something that I think has only been done on the Whyte 19. So sliding drop-outs are still too fiddly and I’m not a fan. No, what I want is something simpler still yet more elegant and that “something” is an eccentric bottom bracket.

An EBB is where the bottom bracket itself is fitted off-centre into a larger cylindrical sleeve that itself sits in an enlarged bottom bracket shell in the frame. To tension the chain, simply rotate the EBB until the chain becomes sufficiently taught, nip up the bolts and off you go! It’s a difficult thing to perfect, because the bottom bracket is a point on a bike where all the stresses and strains meet. Huge torsional forces are applied simultaneously by the rider via the bars, saddle and especially the cranks, and it’s also the place where both front and rear tyres like to deposit mud. Yet what an EBB is effectively doing is adding another moving part to the mix right at this sensitive point. The only budget frame that I know of with an EBB is Dialled Bikes’ £265 Love/Hate. Other budget manufacturers have dabbled with the EBB and ended up producing nothing but a bunch of creaking, groaning bedsteads. Is the Love/Hate any different and if so, why?

It’s been around for about 9 months now and rider feedback says that, yes, it is different. The Love/Hate uses a Phil Wood EBB, which has an excellent reputation as both a simple to use and silent component. I love the concept and the bike looks absolutely stunning in its bright orange colour scheme dressed up with all black components. It will definitely be my next purchase, the only drawback being that I’ll also have to replace my Pace RC31 “shorty” forks because the Love/Hate ideally needs the longer 440mm variety.

Back to the doublespeed concept, and it has occurred to me that with a bit of imagination I could set up my “utility” rear wheel as a single-sided disc-compatible doublespeed if I so wished. This can be done by using two splined cassette cogs and a suitable arrangement of spacers and would consequently render the Flip/Flop wheel redundant, the reasons being threefold: by their very nature, flip/flop hubs are not disc compatible and one of the reasons for buying a Love/Hate is so that I can use a rear disc brake; to use a regular cassette hub would eradicate the need to remove the wheel and flip it over every time I want to change ratios; I don’t think I’ll ever ride a fixie again, if I can help it! Even a single-sided threaded singlespeed hub can be set up as a doublespeed using a double freewheel, available at stupendous cost from White Industries, purveyors of pimpy top-shelf singlespeed finery from the US of A. So my brief dalliance with the Goldtec wheel will almost certainly end with it being sold on when the Love/Hate arrives. For a profit, of course!