
Originally Posted by
Forest
I didn't mean to imply that they are made from tissue paper - because they aren't.
They sort of were. Well, paper mache. Thin-shell “monocoque” structures in any composite material can be hugely rigid for their mass. Until something disrupts the surface shape. So yeah, not particularly abuse resistant or crash-proof. Doesn’t make the technique invalid for a lot of structures, without it F1 cars would be totally fookt.

Originally Posted by
MSTRS
As technology in materials progresses, we may find bikes like the Britten are suddenly possible.
Exactly. There’s been clever bastards around long before most of us shat yellow, so there’s not too many “new” ideas. The successful innovations are invariably a mixture of adapting and refining old ideas and reviewing modern materials and construction methods.
It’s also true that Bike manufacturers are not there to entertain us technophiles, they’re there to sell bikes. That means minimising design risk, optimising build techniques to suit mass production and spending lots on marketing. See, we SAY we want radical, but we BUY the run-of-the-mill low tech stuff on offer. When consumers do that long enough all the clever bastards give up and fuck off.
Go soothingly on the grease mud, as there lurks the skid demon
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