Carbon Fiber Gear is all about covering the latest in carbon fiber, and finding unique carbon fiber products, parts, & accessories.

So, let me tell you a little bit about myself, now that I have joined the Carbon Fiber Gear family, I am the absolute complete opposite of Dave. While he is the technology and gadget lover, I like things to be a bit simpler. My philosophy is ‘if it ain’t broken, don’t fix it’ and I always stick to the originals. This next product, however, has me quite intrigued seeing as I live in a tiny apartment just outside of crowded Washington, DC. It is a collapsible bicycle by Cube called the Urban Street Concept Bike (USC).

A student at the University Coburg/Germany, Gregor Dauth, designed the USC. Dauth based the idea of the USC off the Swiss Army Knife. There is a central hub located just behind the handlebars, which the bike collapses around, folding small enough to fit in the truck of a Smart car in just a few steps. The frame of the USC is made with carbon fiber, allowing the bike to be so lightweight (17kg).  The USC was first debuted at the Eurobike Convention in 2007.

Unlike other folding bikes, the USC is loaded with goodies! It has front and rear disc brakes, LED lights on the brake levers, which automatically switch on when it becomes dark, 28” wheels for added comfort over city terrain and an internally geared 8-speed hub. While the majority of the response on the USC has been positive, some people are not happy that in order to fold the bike completely up, you must take the wheels off. Others were unhappy with the bikes weight, 17kg and that there is no place to store daily office gear, water bottles, etc.

While there is no information on a release date or a price, I will keep my fingers crossed for you

Videos

Walk Around

3D Animation Of Bike Folding Up

Video Of Actual Bike

[Sources: Product Page, Treehugger, Tuvie, Wired]

With the Smart Fortwo introduced in the US this past January, the iPod Nano in everyone’s backpack and everything else getting more and more compact, it was only a matter of time before someone took it to a completely new level. Nicholas Notara designed a collapsible surfboard whose frame is made of carbon fiber.

Notara carefully designed the board to maintain the balance and weight of a traditional surfboard. The surfboard breaks down and becomes half its usual size with the help of a quick release level and flipping two pins. The board can also adapt to the rides needs with its swappable fin system.

While the collapsible surfboard is not a new concept, Karl Pope first conceived it for Pope-Bisect in 1964 and dubbed it the ‘Travelboard’, Notara’s carbon fiber board has been receiving a lot enthusiasm from the surfing community. The only concerns voiced have been those of cost, loosing the pins or fins, and the board of metal pieces heating up in the hot sun and burning the skin.

While the board is a beautiful example of great design, it is unfortunately just a concept at this time.

Check out the surfing category in our store for more carbon fiber surf products.

We’ve brought in our first contributing editor to the Carbon Fiber Gear team.  Her name is Alyson, and you’ll find posts written by her from time to time (You’ll find her first post tomorrow morning):

You can see that Alyson is a pretty attractive young lady, and also happens to be one of my best friends.  That is actually me in the background taking a picture while we were in St. Croix last year.

Alyson is 25 and has a bachelor’s degree from University of Maryland Baltimore County, where I met her.  She currently works in HR for a government contracting company in the Washington DC metro area.  Feel free to post a comment and welcome her to the team

Carbon fiber is being used in a number of high-end watches, like the Bell & Ross watches we’ve written about in the past. It’s a unique feature that allows a watchmaker to differentiate themselves from other companies. That’s where designer John Pszeniczny comes into play for his Montre F1/Carbon GMT watch concept which he designed:

The watch is inspired by an F1 car, utilizing a variety of materials you’d find on the car itself; rubber, carbon fiber, and metal. On top of that, you’ll find Swarovski crystals, and 18 rubies that represent the 18 different F1 tracks around the world. Speaking of the 18 F1 tracks, the digital display can show the time at any of those tracks. On top of that, it also features a lap time function and a stopwatch.

This unique piece will run you well into the 5 figure range. I’ve read anywhere from $20,000-$40,000.

Kohler was looking for a new way to really re-brand themselves and make a product that showed off the companies “out of the box” thinking. That’s where the slogan came from: New. Life. Form. Karbon. Utilizing silver carbon fiber, Kohler came out with a really sexy, innovative, and functional sink faucet that’s called Karbon.

The Karbon features a stainless steel and silver carbon fiber design. The unique design also offers 3 pivoting points that literally allow you to point the faucet in whichever direction you’d like. A separate piece to the faucet allows you to change the water from regular to spray.

Kohler also had a really amazing looking commercial created which turns spouts of water into the actual faucet, allowing you to see the anatomy of how it all works. See for yourself:

There are a few more videos like the introduction and people using it. Check them out for yourself:

I couldn’t embed this video, but if you’re thinking about buying one, watch this one.

From what I’ve seen, the cost of the faucet is about $800 or so. In the introduction video, the Kohler executive stated that we should expect more carbon fiber to be used in the future. I’m hoping we can expect a “Karbon” line. Either way, the future of carbon fiber is an exciting one.

After launching our new design, we’ve finally revamped our store to integrate it into the site.  We still have some content to add to the store, but the majority of the work is done…at least enough for you guys to use it.  You’ll find the store categories in the categories box.  We’ve also added a store search to the search box, so you can search for products in the store from any page.

There has been a bunch of little things here and there that we’ve done to improve on the new design…and we have a few more things on the list.  Starting next week, we’ll be once concentrating on adding new content for the blog.  We have a few really cool posts that we’re excited about, so look forward to that.

As always, your suggestions and feedback are appreciated.