Mercury Wheels' Mystery Fiber-X Rim Material - Taipei Cycle Show 2019
Mercury Wheels have been an under the radar brand for about ten years but they are hoping to burst onto the scene in a big way with their new mountain bike wheelsets that feature a mystery material called Fiber-X.
The American brand have incorporated a strip of the material in the middle of the rim and it is apparently two times as strong as carbon but also more ductile, solving the main two problems Mercury sees with carbon wheels - impact resistance and stiffness. All impacts on the wheels are channeled towards the strip and it is apparently able to absorb them far better than a normal carbon rim.
The Fiber-X could have been any colour but Mercury went with silver to fit in with the brand name and stand out from the competition.
So what is the material? Well Mercury says that it "absorbs like Kevlar on steroids" and can resist a double impact of 120 joules but they flat out won't tell us what it is. We do know that it is a material that is widely available on the market but by keeping it a secret Mercury are hoping that they can stay one step ahead in the competitive world of wheel manufacturing.
Embossed logos mean no decals and a super premium finish.
The technology is currently only available in Mercury's X1 wheelset that are available as either an enduro or ebike version in 29" or 27.5". The enduro wheels have a 30mm inner width, 38mm outer width and 24mm depth. The wheels also use Mercury's own hubs that have a 6 pawl system with 3.5° of engagement. The wheels weigh 1,729 grams (29") and retail at $2,399USD for a pair.
More information here.
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www.crever.it/en/alutex
I think that boron is more brittle than carbon for an equivalent strength, which might explain why it's not being used at the bead edge, but I guess we'll see!
Don't think dyneema is great under compression? Anybody wanna weight in there? I think it's similar to Kevlar in that it's a "tension only" material.
Coming from the sailing world I'm used to see/try/sail/work with hi tech materials years before they become standard in cyclyng world. Same was with kevlar, carbon and titanium
And by keeping it a secret, they will also stay many steps behind their competitors in sales....who is going to pay $2,400 USD for a wheelset from a little known company, using an unknown material on an unproven wheelset? And for one of their first offerings to be for an e-bike sends a very strong message as to who they feel are their target market.
Basically her rear wheel got run over by some jackass in an F-150 in a parking lot (he looked in the mirror and gunned it, so he knew he did it) and I evidently slammed a rock too hard on mine and cracked it (even with Huck Norris). I have to say the Mercury had less damage to the actual rim. Mine was still good enough to ride for a couple days, but wouldn’t hold air to run tubeless. Anyway, both companies replaced them with my proof of purchase.
What’s about Yishun graphene rims?