Chinese Open Mold Gravel / CX Bikes

The spirit of Grav-lo-cross. No but seriously, cyclocross and gravel go here!

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matcav
Posts: 107
Joined: Thu May 28, 2020 3:52 pm

by matcav

Same price I've got - In eur at the end came for ~790,00
Still a good price for the package, tho
Last edited by matcav on Fri Jan 21, 2022 5:44 pm, edited 1 time in total.

by Weenie


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Miller
Posts: 2764
Joined: Thu Sep 21, 2006 8:54 pm
Location: Reading, UK

by Miller

DaMaDo wrote:
Fri Jan 21, 2022 5:05 pm
Things have gotten expensive. How much do you haggle?
That's exactly what they charged me. Landed in UK it was £675. I thought that was great value.
One minor saving: I asked to pay by credit card which they can do via alibaba and that took 2% commission instead of the hefty 5% for Paypal. (Is that to pay for Elon Musk's rocket hobby?)

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Miller
Posts: 2764
Joined: Thu Sep 21, 2006 8:54 pm
Location: Reading, UK

by Miller

Although I will say I'm having a nightmare trying to get the rear brake hose through the chainstay. Feels like there's something in there catching on the hose, a mould line perhaps.

kroem
Posts: 435
Joined: Sun Sep 01, 2019 4:37 pm

by kroem

I pulled it the other way I think in the end... IIRC
Current
Waltly Gravel (stolen... and found!)
P-X Spitfire Ti
Fairlight Strael

Old
Canyon Ultimate SLX 6.7kg (crashed)
Tantan GR039 7.2kg (sold)

DaMaDo
Posts: 17
Joined: Thu Jan 31, 2019 1:42 am

by DaMaDo

Thanks they took $20 off and it's on order now. With the chinese new year, it will be delayed a bit more, but that will give me time to get the xplr drivetrain for it.

Do LBSs have any issues working on these frames (principle-wise)? I should be able to do everything except maybe bleed the SRAM brakes. I can do Shimano, but SRAM seems to give me trouble. I'll try again though since it's a different system than the old etap red.

mChavez
Posts: 4
Joined: Wed Mar 30, 2022 12:22 pm

by mChavez

Howdy folks.

Waiting on my chinacarbon gravel frame to arrive - does anyone know where I can order a decal that would read "Chinarello" in the right font in the UK?

Thanks.

mChavez
Posts: 4
Joined: Wed Mar 30, 2022 12:22 pm

by mChavez

There seems to be little to no reviews of buying from CWind on AliExpress, so I thought I'd write a few words about my experience.
Frame (model CW-G-001) arrived yesterday, One month later than expected (first, delayed by Covid lockdown, then by Parcelforce).

I must admit, I did not do too much research of chinacarbon frames, just ordered one spontaneously (Why not!) in the shape & colour that I liked. If she lasts me a couple of years, I'll be happy.

The frameset appears to be a close copy of Carbonda CFR707, but with a slightly different rear triangle & BB. No idea who makes them.
Frameset is identical to velobuild GF-002, however, velobuild list material as CF T800, while CWind claim T1000. Whatever that means. :noidea:

Mostly very positive reviews on Ali, but there are multiple listings, so I guess listings with negative reviews might be quickly deleted :roll:
Box looked like the postie tried his best at attempting to break the bike, but, despite being rather poorly packed, the frame was not damaged apart from a small paint chip on the headtube.
Build quality appears to be good (albeit, I've seen better). Frame feels solid & stiff. Paint job is good, however, they painted over the brake mounting points, so I guess I'll need to give them a clean to mount the calipers straight. Bosses for mounting bottles, guards, etc are a bit of a rough job.

The frame is marketed as suitable for fully internal cabling (with a Cwind integrated handlebar that I was not interested in) or for external cabling. This is not accurate - it looks like you'll need to fanny about with it quite a bit to make it work with your favourite stem&bar combo because the framest is not really designed for external cables.

While I'm quite pleased with the frame after unboxing it (in fact, it seems merginally better designed & made than a Miracle frameset that I bought a few years ago & never got to build up), there's a a few issues that have really annoyed me.
Firstly, the headset is a complete mess. The lower split ring is poorly made and it's diameter is almost 0.5mm bigger than it should be. As a result, instead of sliding the bevelled surface onto the split race, the headset bearing sits on top of the ring with minimal contact. This is very poor and potentially dangerous.
The upper part of the headset is designed on the assumption that the steerer will perfectly fit into the thick alloy semicircle plug that goes into the top bearing. There is no usual split ring to securely clamp the steerer into the bearing. In my case, the steerer was not a perfect fit and there was a little bit of wobble in the headset because of this poor design.

Secondly, the seller did not pack the external cabling frame cap (a wee bit of plastic with two ports for cable externals) or any headset cap . So the frameset comes with an assumption that you'll only ever be running an integrated stem/bar combo.

Contacted the seller (CWind store) & explained the problems.
In regard to the headset, the seller claimed that all's been designed, trested and QC'd (my arse) and refused to aknowledge that there's anything wrong with the quality or the design of it. Pretty poor response. I've tried my luck to ask for a £15 refund towards a working ZTTO headset :lol: , but the seller was only prepared to send me another one of their crap ones. This sets my expectations extremely low for CWind ever actioning a warranty (2 years) claim, but time will tell. Hopefully, I'll never need to use it.

In regard to the external cabling, first the cheeky bugger tried telling me that I have to pay £10 for the external cabling cap & headset cover, but then agreed to ship the frame cap for free as it's included in the product photos. Their headset cover is useless anyway, because their headset is mince.

My headset solution happened to be quite straightforward. I've had a spare ZTTO headset lying around that had a working 1 1/2" fork race and an adapter to fit straight 1 1/8" forks into 1 1/2" lower headsets. This adapter fitted perfectly into the top bearing on the CWind frame (integrated headset with 1 1/2" bearings top & bottom).

Overall, really looking forward to building up this frame, but I don't have much confidence in CWind as a seller. The sensible part of me is kicking myself for not waiting until PX Tempest goes on sale (if that ever happens) and getting it for an extra hundred or two £ compared to the carbon bike. However, I've wanted to try riding a chinacarbon frame for quite a while now.
Last edited by mChavez on Sun Jan 29, 2023 5:44 pm, edited 1 time in total.

CyclistFromQuebec
Posts: 41
Joined: Sat Jun 06, 2020 5:49 pm

by CyclistFromQuebec

I've recently (this winter) built a bike around the CFR696 and I've been loving it so far! Although I didn't do gnarly gravel yet it's been amazing on the trails and it's also been super comfy riding on the pothole filled streets. Plus they didn't really clean the streets yet so there's lot of sand/rocks/trashes on the side of the roads where cyclists usually ride.

My question is, I'm planning a very casual trip with some friends in August (like 3-4 days of light bikepacking) and although I did buy the frame because it had tons of mounts, I don't think I saw much builds with actual racks on them. My plan would be to pack very light (since the fork is carbon) so probably just the sleeping bag/mattress on each side of the fork. As for the rear I have a 10l bikepacking saddle bag, but if I could I also have a rack and some panniers laying around. Anybody have any experience running a rear rack on this frame? I know it's technically built for this and it should be plenty safe, but I'd like to hear about some of your experiences (even experience about some salsa anything cage or similar on the fork would be appreciated as well).
Last edited by CyclistFromQuebec on Fri Jul 22, 2022 8:00 pm, edited 1 time in total.

mChavez
Posts: 4
Joined: Wed Mar 30, 2022 12:22 pm

by mChavez

Sod aligning the valves - you're missing a critical piece of equipment here. No idea how you can ride this bike without purple anodised valve caps!

On a serious note, I too am interested in using racks with this frame, front & back. Albeit I probably won't trust it enough to put a child seat with a kid onto the rear rack.

CyclistFromQuebec
Posts: 41
Joined: Sat Jun 06, 2020 5:49 pm

by CyclistFromQuebec

Yea maybe I should ask carbonda directly for the rear rack limit. I think it's 1.5kg for each front arm at the front? Which is plenty enough for two salsa anything cages with say one sleeping bag and a mattress.

PoorCyclist
Posts: 783
Joined: Wed Dec 07, 2011 1:26 am
Location: California's country side

by PoorCyclist

CyclistFromQuebec wrote:
Mon May 02, 2022 7:32 pm
I've recently (this winter) built a bike around the CFR696 and I've been loving it so far! Although I didn't do gnarly gravel yet it's been amazing on the trails around the mountain at the center of Montreal island and it's also been super comfy riding on the pothole filled streets. Plus they didn't really clean the streets yet so there's lot of sand/rocks/trashes on the side of the roads where cyclists usually ride.

My question is, I'm planning a very casual trip with some friends in August (like 3-4 days of light bikepacking) and although I did buy the frame because it had tons of mounts, I don't think I saw much builds with actual racks on them. My plan would be to pack very light (since the fork is carbon) so probably just the sleeping bag/mattress on each side of the fork. As for the rear I have a 10l bikepacking saddle bag, but if I could I also have a rack and some panniers laying around. Anybody have any experience running a rear rack on this frame? I know it's technically built for this and it should be plenty safe, but I'd like to hear about some of your experiences (even experience about some salsa anything cage or similar on the fork would be appreciated as well).

Image

Sorry I was taking the picture for a non-cycling friend so I didn't bother aligning the valves/removing the bottle and putting in the big gear and whatnot :mrgreen:
Hi, I have seen another brand selling this frame and they listed in the specs 3 pounds per side of fork.

I have been thinking about a rear rack, 1 pound rack, bag, and a 4 pound laptop, but also charger, shoes etc, but I have not been comfortable about doing that myself because I don't trust holes in the middle of chainstay. I think it's more for fenders.

I have seen some people load this with a lot of stuff but it's utilizing huge bags that hang off the saddle rails and also frame triangle and top tube bags.

CyclistFromQuebec
Posts: 41
Joined: Sat Jun 06, 2020 5:49 pm

by CyclistFromQuebec

PoorCyclist wrote:
Wed May 11, 2022 2:31 am
CyclistFromQuebec wrote:
Mon May 02, 2022 7:32 pm
I've recently (this winter) built a bike around the CFR696 and I've been loving it so far! Although I didn't do gnarly gravel yet it's been amazing on the trails around the mountain at the center of Montreal island and it's also been super comfy riding on the pothole filled streets. Plus they didn't really clean the streets yet so there's lot of sand/rocks/trashes on the side of the roads where cyclists usually ride.

My question is, I'm planning a very casual trip with some friends in August (like 3-4 days of light bikepacking) and although I did buy the frame because it had tons of mounts, I don't think I saw much builds with actual racks on them. My plan would be to pack very light (since the fork is carbon) so probably just the sleeping bag/mattress on each side of the fork. As for the rear I have a 10l bikepacking saddle bag, but if I could I also have a rack and some panniers laying around. Anybody have any experience running a rear rack on this frame? I know it's technically built for this and it should be plenty safe, but I'd like to hear about some of your experiences (even experience about some salsa anything cage or similar on the fork would be appreciated as well).

Image

Sorry I was taking the picture for a non-cycling friend so I didn't bother aligning the valves/removing the bottle and putting in the big gear and whatnot :mrgreen:
Hi, I have seen another brand selling this frame and they listed in the specs 3 pounds per side of fork.

I have been thinking about a rear rack, 1 pound rack, bag, and a 4 pound laptop, but also charger, shoes etc, but I have not been comfortable about doing that myself because I don't trust holes in the middle of chainstay. I think it's more for fenders.

I have seen some people load this with a lot of stuff but it's utilizing huge bags that hang off the saddle rails and also frame triangle and top tube bags.

Carbonda answered me and indeed it's 1.5kg per fork stay. As for the rear rack they say 15kg is the maximum (rack included). I think you'd be pretty safe with the load you're planning. Just to stay on the safe side I'm not going to try anything heavier than say 6-7 kg. I have a 4 day ride planned in August and I'm going to use a rear rack with small panniers. I'll report back on how that went :)

vgcl
Posts: 13
Joined: Mon May 16, 2022 11:36 pm

by vgcl

emotive wrote:
Sun Jan 31, 2021 12:28 am
holem wrote:Hi all

Does anyone know of any open mould frames that would be suitable for mostly road riding with (very) occasional gravel rides?

I'm looking for a relaxed/endurance road style geometry on a disc frame that takes up to approx 35mm tyres. It'd be a bit of a do-it-all bike so I'm not sure there is anything out there?

Thanks
I’m not aware of any Allroad open mold bikes. Most bikes with 35mm clearance are aggressive CX bikes. Most open mold bikes with endurance geometry and clearance for 35mm+ are gravel bikes.

You could get an open mold gravel bike and run it with 32mm or 35mm tyres, I have a Carbonda CFR696 and it makes a comfortable and good handling endurance bike. As long as you are ok with the aesthetics of having a lot of clearance around your 35mm tyres?
Image

I had the same question a few months ago, and ended up deciding on a gravel frame, even if I'll only be using around 32-35 tires for the near future. It can do everything an endurance road bike do and more, and will be future proof if road tires keep getting bigger (when I started only 23 was an option). I also really wanted that extra bottle cage below the downtube, and I couldn't find any other frame that interested me more.

When searching about it I came across the pictures of your bike a lot, really liked, and now I'm building a similar one, hope you don't mind :D
I only ended up choosing ICAN over Carbonda due to shipping costs, the frame mold is the same (but they are independent factories).

Image

I have a question... The wheels I ordered have 19.5mm internal, 29mm external and are 50mm deep. I'm almost decided on the Pirelli Cinturato Velo, right now I need to put a lot of miles and don't worry about punctures. The size 32 should measure 31 in my wheels (bulging the tires 3mm from the rims), and the size 35 should measure 34 (bulging the tires 5mm). Which one do you think will fit/look better? The 35 will look too big?

The profile:

Image

Thanks!!

emotive
Posts: 613
Joined: Tue Nov 01, 2016 10:40 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

by emotive

vgcl wrote:
Thu Jun 16, 2022 8:08 am
When searching about it I came across the pictures of your bike a lot, really liked, and now I'm building a similar one, hope you don't mind :D
I dont mind at all, glad you like my build.
I have a question... The wheels I ordered have 19.5mm internal, 29mm external and are 50mm deep. I'm almost decided on the Pirelli Cinturato Velo, right now I need to put a lot of miles and don't worry about punctures. The size 32 should measure 31 in my wheels (bulging the tires 3mm from the rims), and the size 35 should measure 34 (bulging the tires 5mm). Which one do you think will fit/look better? The 35 will look too big?

The profile:

Image

Thanks!!
In my photo above, I am running 37mm measured width tyres on a 28mm wide, 36mm deep wheel. This is about 4.5mm bulge over the wheel width. I dont think the 35 will look too big on the 29mm rim.

I have also mounted these tyres on a 32mm wide, 50mm deep wheel. This resulted in a 38mm wide tyre, and a smaller 3mm bulge over the sidewall. I prefer the look of a close match between the tyre and the wheel on deep wheels, so aesthetically I would recommend the 32mm tyre for your wheels.

Another consideration is handling in cross winds. If you often incur strong side winds, and are a light rider, I would recommend you go for the more narrow tyre, as this will match the wheel profile better and catch the side winds less. If you are a heavier rider, or dont ride in side winds, then you will be less affected, and it doesn't matter.

mChavez
Posts: 4
Joined: Wed Mar 30, 2022 12:22 pm

by mChavez

Has anyone tried using extra long reach (73mm) brake calipers with these frames? It looks like mine can take a nutted caliper and still allow a 700c rim with a 35mm tyre...
Bike is built in its draft form and it seems to ride quite well, apart from the dang disk brakes that never seem to work with road levers.

by Weenie


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Great Prices ✓    Broad Selection ✓    Worldwide Delivery ✓

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