Better flickington of my new whip: The Take Ivy 5 BMX Frame

Eastern Venus Hubs: Variety Is The Spice of Life

Eastern Venus Cassette Hub

Eastern Venus Front Hub

    This is the recently released Venus BMX hub set from Eastern Bicycles.  If I was going to build a new wheel set regardless of price I would use these hubs.  The front hub is your standard female axle 3/8" model, looks like the cones just pop in, interesting is the fact that it comes with a plastic snap on hub guard.  Comes with a 7075 alum center axle, I think it also comes with a chromoly center axle too for peg riders. 
    The rear hub is where things get really interesting.  It comes with the same bi-rection driver as the bi-rectional hub, so you can switch the drive side easily.  It also has the same pop-n-lock guard lip as the bi-rectional hub but does not come with the guard, unlike the front hub.   It does however come with no less than three axles for optional setups.  It comes with both a 7075 alum female axle for pegless, a heat treated cromo for peggers, and also a special cromo axle with a traditional threaded 14mm side and a female on the other for a super tough peg setup.  It uses 3/8" bolts for the female setup with built in 14mm lips on the hub.  The point of the three different axles is to have the lightest setup possible for your needs.  It's only $130.00 for the rear hub, making it cheaper than most hubs made of the same material with half the features.  IMO it is the best hub option for weight wienies for any price. 

The Way Of The Future: Thermalite Resin

Who buys light blue pegs?

Thermalite is a resin that is made from 80% coal ash and other recycled materials.  You can make blocks out of it and use it in construction like concrete bricks, but they are lighter and easier to shape and cut and form an incredible insulation barrier.  The bike company Stolen used it in three bike part models so far:  the pegs pictured above, a pivitol 25.4mm seatpost in two lengths, and some pedals.  

I can't speak for the pedals but they look good.  I have been using the pegs and seat post for about 3/4 of a year and can give an honest review.  The pegs slide great on anything but steel.  They slide like butter on waxed concrete.  If you weigh a lot or slam down on your pegs a lot or aren't diligent in rotating them then they might break.  but mine have been holding up great.  If you grind on rough stuff that has nails or screws sticking out if it then it might gash your pegs.  They come in 10mm and 14mm but the plastic part is universal, so you can switch the front with the back when rotating if you have a one sided set.  The only real problem I have with them is that they require quite long axle for the thick base.  If you have already cut your axles or use alloy nuts that require a lot of thread to not strip or just have short axles these might not fit.  I have never tried it but you could probably take the anti-spin plate off for a little extra room if you need it. 
The bottom line: Being able to grind waxed ledges like metal is crazy, and worth every penny for a 10 dollar peg when some of the heat treated cromo pegs cost 20.  If you grind lots of metal, like at a park or you're just burly and ride lots of rails then metal pegs are the way to go but for your average rider they are awesome cheap ultralight pegs.  The seatpost is a seatpost, its not metal so you have to wrench your bolt down tight to get it to not slip, and its got kinda a bulky look to it but its still a very cheap seatpost and also incredibly light and the only way i see someone breaking it is if you are super burly and run kinda a high seatpost and throw your bike down strairsets a lot.

Absolute Sickness: WeThePeople C.R.E.A.M. Frame

I'm kinda pissed this frame doesn't come in 20.5" and the back end is so short but it's still literally the most technologically advanced BMX frame to date.  It is designed and marketed by the German BMX company WeThePeople and made in Taiwan out of heat treated 4130 cromo.   It is the first BMX frame in history to make use of investment casting for the head tube and the seat tube junction.  WeThePeople used the investment casting technique for the dropouts on the Warriors frame before and has used it for the integrated seat post clamp on most of the frames for a few years. 

EDIT: wtp released the weights on this delayed frame and the fact is you probably shouldn't buy it because it weighs over 5 pounds for the 20.75".  supposedly its cheaper to make them this way, or it will be, or something.  

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