15mm axles are here to stay

In the end, whether they switched for the simple sake of sales they might lose or because they changed their mind about the benefits of 15mm,

So what are the benefits of the 15mm over the 20mm???
Weight - Nope - Maxle Lite weighs the same amount.
Stiffness - only a marginal difference over the 9mm.
Versatility - gota buy new adaptors and some hubs(shimano, king) are 15mm only or 9 and 15.

So thats a non-started for me as well as most people I ride with.

was just chatting to a friend about this and he mentioned that a dt 240 hub is a whopping 3g's lighter in 15mm vs 20mm….I have more than 3grams of dirt and mud on my bike at any given time!

what is the weight difference between say a 20mm maxle light [HTML_REMOVED] a 15mm?

like many other large diameter tubing applications, could one argue the 20mm would offer a greater strength to weight advantage than the 15mm. ie, with a thinner section xc / trail specific axle? i bet it would be close to a wash in terms of total system weight.

i think a 20mm carbon / ti xc maxle would be rad.

That's my thinking.
Why not go for standardising the 20mm axle for every bike. The weight saving/gain is a non issue as has been shown, a lot of the new 20mm axles are just as easy/fast to remove as a standard QR skewer, 20mm is obviously stiffer, and having a standardised front hub will mean a reduced parts inventory which can lower manufacture costs and increase parts availability while reducing end user cost.
I don't buy the liability issue, since a lot of FR/DH bikes could already use the rear wheel from a marathon XC bike with the 135mm rear hubs.

Stiffness - who says marginal? One guy? What are you going on? Fox says it's stiffer and to be honest, I trust Fox. Not every company, but Fox I trust.

Versatility? I never claimed that was a benefit. You only need a new adaptor or hub if you buy a new fork. And you're not FORCED to get a 15mm fork! You can buy another 9mm one if you want.

was just chatting to a friend about this and he mentioned that a dt 240 hub is a whopping 3g's lighter in 15mm vs 20mm….I have more than 3grams of dirt and mud on my bike at any given time!

Damn you, DT! I did a bit of checking too and it's true, not much between 15 and 20mm hub weights.

There is an intended use issue here, too. 15mm has never been put forth as a FR/DH or DJ axle. If 20mm was done across the board, it would muddy those waters. Yes, people are DJ'ing on 15mm forks, but that doesn't mean they should be.

Damn you, DT! I did a bit of checking too and it's true, not much between 15 and 20mm hub weights.

There is an intended use issue here, too. 15mm has never been put forth as a FR/DH or DJ axle. If 20mm was done across the board, it would muddy those waters. Yes, people are DJ'ing on 15mm forks, but that doesn't mean they should be.

What of the Fox 831, which is marketed as a dj/slopestyle fork?

i went 20mm on my new G-spot..

15mm wasnt even a consideration..no sale…

What of the Fox 831, which is marketed as a dj/slopestyle fork?

I think this is an example that enforces my viewpoint. Why not make the 831 a 20mm axle? It would make sense, but I'm guessing that the lowers are the same casting as a Fox 32, so they did it to save money. There is a lot of money to be saved by minimising inventory, and a single axle standard would do that.

Pete:

You make some good points, but I think you're missing some as well.

For me, personally, I own a few bikes. I tend to favour durability over light weight, so I outfit my little bike fairly similarly to my big bike. Same brakes. 20mm wheels. Same bars and stem. That sort of thing. I really like the thought that if something breaks, I can swap some parts between my bikes. I never do, but it's comforting to know that I can.

You're right that nobody is forcing anybody to use 15mm. But, as the article points out, some parts are already being replaced by this new "standard". Lightweight 20mm wheels are getting harder to find. So, if I am in fact looking for a lightweight 20mm wheel, I'm now forced into a lightweight 15mm wheel. More choice creates less choice. Or, the product managers choice on my new bike forces me to change what I do.

So yes, in absolute terms, perhaps this standard makes sense for this style of product. But do we really need all of these new standards for such marginal advancements in bike technology. I realize that there's a very fine line between progress for the sake of progress and product stagnation…but I think that you and the rest of the bike industy should understand that people might get a bit sick of this lack of compatibility between parts.

Regardless, I don't think an article that discounts peoples misgivings of a new standard and that so heavily promotes the industry position is healthy.

Pete:

You make some good points, but I think you're missing some as well.

For me, personally, I own a few bikes. I tend to favour durability over light weight, so I outfit my little bike fairly similarly to my big bike. Same brakes. 20mm wheels. Same bars and stem. That sort of thing. I really like the thought that if something breaks, I can swap some parts between my bikes. I never do, but it's comforting to know that I can.

You're right that nobody is forcing anybody to use 15mm. But, as the article points out, some parts are already being replaced by this new "standard". Lightweight 20mm wheels are getting harder to find. So, if I am in fact looking for a lightweight 20mm wheel, I'm now forced into a lightweight 15mm wheel. More choice creates less choice. Or, the product managers choice on my new bike forces me to change what I do.

So yes, in absolute terms, perhaps this standard makes sense for this style of product. But do we really need all of these new standards for such marginal advancements in bike technology. I realize that there's a very fine line between progress for the sake of progress and product stagnation…but I think that you and the rest of the bike industy should understand that people might get a bit sick of this lack of compatibility between parts.

Regardless, I don't think an article that discounts peoples misgivings of a new standard and that so heavily promotes the industry position is healthy.

very well said!

I laugh at the guys who support anything new and different no matter what.

Name one _real _advantage that 15mm has over 20mm.

It doesn't take riding the "shore" to find flex in a fork. I ride in smooth and fast Kamloops and my 32 Fox 15mm fork is a wet noodle. I equate it to a long travel SID. lol…

Its easy to separate out handle bar and wheel stiffness, amongst other things. Com'on Pete, that's silly. I had a Revelation with a reg q/r and pinner wheels and it was every bit as torsionally stiff as this Fox.

New standards can be great. Like 2x10…. standards that are an improvement or offers something better for a certain segment of riders. 15mm does neither. Remember when you guys were saying how revolutionary 1.5 was? Now its not anymore but tapered is the way to go? :lol:

If you are used to riding a 20mm axle fork with 36mm/35mm stantions for trail and AM the 15mm will be a loss in performance for you. If you were riding a 9mm fork it's going to be better.

I think it kinda sucks that RS folded on the issue, but it's business. It sounds like the 9mm is going to go the way of the Dodo bird so they might as well get a piece of the 15mm pie now.

I rode a Fox 32 with the 15mm axle fork on a Rocky Altitude for the Four Jacks last year. We covered every type of terrain imaginable from XC to a Garbo DH, I felt for my personal level of riding it was a little under gunned, but I suspect that has more to do with the 32mm stantions. I'd like to see some hard numbers on actual stiffness comparisons between the different 32mm forks and the 36/35 forks.

How are lightweight 20mm wheels getting hard to find? Everyone is going lighter. The point has been made that 20mm hubs are virtually no heavier than 15mm hubs - which I gladly conceded. If you mean XC light, then you're asking for a niche product, and then you can't be making points in terms of generalities. There are a myriad of 20mm hubs out there, rim choice is as good as ever - and whether or not pre-built lightweight 20mm wheels are harder to find, you can easily have one built (and let's not argue about machine-built vs hand built wheels and cost and value).

If it were up to Fox, there probably wouldn't be 9mm forks offered anymore - they continue to do so in order to minimize the impact of the transition to the new standard. Whether or not it is a marginal improvement, let's remember we bikers do things bordering on silly to save small amounts of weight or gain small amounts of stiffness, so marginal is anything but insignificant. And the reality is that as bikes get more and more refined, marginal improvements are what we rely on but when they start to add up, the improvements are no longer marginal, they're significant. There are scant few technological leaps to be made anymore in this business. Sad to say, but true.

I disagree that Stu's article "so heavily promotes the industry position" or "discounts people's misgivings of a new standard", however. He presented the facts that were presented to him, as well as an opinion. That's editorial. Which, if you cast about, you won't find much of on other bike sites. Lots of regurgitated press releases. Not a lot of opinion pieces. That Stu thinks choice is a good thing, and that it's good that Rock Shox has toed Fox's line hardly seems like grounds for criticism in my mind, but that's an opinion, too.

I laugh at the guys who support anything new and different no matter what.

Name one _real _advantage that 15mm has over 20mm.

See, now it's my turn to laugh at you. Because nobody is comparing 15mm to 20mm. The 15mm standard was introduced as a better alternative to 9mm.