Originally Posted by
alathIN
These things are all great. I've got a fat bike myself and love it, and about to switch it to tubeless.
But that's not really a game-changing breakthrough.
There's nothing on that that a bike mechanic from the 1980s would look at and think it was science fiction. They're all evolutions of previous technology.
Take my hydraulic discs, 27.5+ tires, tubeless mountain bike in a time machine to 1980 and show it to a bike mechanic; you'd get a wow, cool, but nothing unimaginable. Big tires, disc brakes, and tubeless were all well known in non-cycling applications at that time; would not be a huge stretch to imagine these things on a bike.
Take my iPhone to 1980 and show it to a telephone company technician, and his head would explode.
Nothing against any of these developments in bike technology, but they're all marginal/evolutionary improvements. We will see more of them. But I do not think we will see any major breakthroughs that totally change the face of cycling.
I went straight to tubeless on my new used fat bike. Orange Seal, rim strip and one layer of 78mm tape. No leaks. I wish all tires were that easy to remove and install. While not on the level of the iPhone, it certainly is a leap in technology that brings mountain biking to a new level. I really hate falling off my bike, and anything that helps in that regard is a great advance.