The Taipei Cycle Show is an opportunity to check out the latest bikes and components from brands big and small.
Earlier this week, I shared some of the weird and wonderful bikes that caught my eye at the show, but saved two relatively unknown, but highly intriguing, brands for this round-up.
Yasujiro and Wiawis both produce bikes, but whereas one works with steel – and has a history dating back to 1920 – the other is new to the world of cycling, implementing carbon fibre know-how from elsewhere in the world of sport.
Let's take a closer look.
Stunning steel from Yasujiro
Tange has, for years, been Asia’s finest steel tube producer, thanks to the likes of the Prestige double-butted range, Keirin specialist tubes and Champion frames.
What we rarely see, however, is these simply stunning Yasujiro frames outside of Asia.
Named after Tange’s founder, Yasujiro Tange, the Yasujiro range is a fitting tribute, with attention to detail and craftsmanship that’s as good as any steel frame building I’ve seen worldwide.
Yasujiro Nudity Road
First up, it’s the Nudity Road frameset. This perfectly fillet-brazed frame shows the accuracy and technique behind Yasujiro’s craftsmanship.
Rather than paint over the work on this bike, Yasujiro simply clear-coats it. The slender Prestige tubes look stunning with the heat discolouration left on show.
Yasujiro Cameo
Next, it’s the Cameo, made from Tange’s slender (and ultra-light) Ultimate steel tubes, fabulously hand-cut and with chrome lugs to create this showstopper.
Yasujiro Tange 100th anniversary bike
My third choice from Yasujiro is the Tange 100th anniversary bike, which is a first for the brand because it features disc brakes on a road bike.
Until now, Yasujiro has only had the Nudity Plus gravel bike with discs.
This Tange Prestige-tubed race bike features dropped and kinked stays, realised in slender steel. With internal cable routing and flat-mount discs, it's great to see a modern frame shape and design interpreted by Yasujiro’s craftsmen.
It’s a stunning bike in the metal.
Yasujiro Svelte
Finally, a bike well hidden on Tange’s stand was perhaps the most impressive. The Svelte is claimed to be the world’s lightest steel road bike.
It's made from Tange’s Ultimate extra-light tubing and features a build centred around a SRAM Red 22 groupset and ultra-light wheels that are unbranded. The hubset looks as though it comes from Extralite, and the rims like classic tubular Campagnolo Hyperons, but they're in fact from Be King.
Tufo Jet tubular tyres, a Tange stem, Cane Creek eeBrakes, a Be King carbon post and a 70g Gelu carbon saddle result in a 5.4kg complete bike.
Korean brand Wiawis promises bikes as fast as an arrow
Here’s a brand new to bikes – Wiawis – from a Korean family-owned company with a long history in carbon fibre production.
Before Wiawis broke into bike design, the company was (and remains) one of the leading producers of competition-level carbon recurve bows and carbon-shafted arrows for archery. It has supplied state-of-the-art equipment to the Korean Olympic team, Team GB and others.
Aside from bows, the company has made carbon-fibre equipment for multiple Olympic disciplines, including track and BMX.
Another carbon brand is nothing new, but Wiawis aims to do things a bit differently by bringing its knowledge of carbon fibre into bikes. That, according to Wiawis, involves the inclusion of “carbon nano-tube technology” and graphene layering, both of which already feature in the company’s carbon bow tech.
According to Wiawis’ newest consultant, Alessandro Colnago (yes, from that Colnago family, nephew of Ernesto Colnago) “the nano-tube materials can be introduced into the resin that binds the carbon fibres to eliminate any voids or pockets in construction, making for a stronger frameset that’s also lighter than a standard carbon frame”.
Wiawis also uses layers of graphene within its top-of-the-range frames (sourced from the UK). This apparently enables it to greatly reduce frame material for the same strength and stiffness qualities, and Wiawis sees graphene as a large part of the future development of its bike range.
Of the Wiawis bikes on display in Taipei, the first that caught my eye was the Venter.
Wiawis Venter
This is a classic round(ish)-tubed road bike, without (yes!) dropped seatstays and with reasonably slender tubes by modern standards. There are significant nods to modernity in the form of internal cable routing and disc brakes, though.
The Venter frame is impressively light at a claimed 686g (medium), with the full bike – equipped with Shimano Dura-Ace Di2 and DT Swiss ERC1100 wheels – coming in at 6.5kg, according to Wiawis.
Wiawis Aero Pro XP
Next up is the Wiawis Aero Pro XP.
This is a UCI-approved frame that uses the nano-tube and graphene tech mentioned earlier. The aero road frame weighs a claimed 885g.
Wiawis Liberty
Last up – and this is my favourite from Wiawis’ debut range – is the Liberty, which looks like a classic tube-to-tube carbon bike in the classic style of Colnago’s C-Series.
Unlike those old tube-to-tube designs, the Liberty uses unique threaded lugs and tubes to connect the frame pieces when bonding. The tubes also use external and internal carbon layers to sandwich a special foam core.
This core, Wiawis claims, adds a layer of vibration damping to the frameset, with the aim of giving the bike a ride feel not unlike quality steel, but with a frame weight of 990g.
The Liberty build on show was put together by Japanese specialist shop N.CycleFactory, which sourced a classic 11-speed Campagnolo Record rim-brake groupset, an original Selle Italia Flite saddle and some cool contemporary parts for a modern-retro build that almost had me reaching for my credit card.
No pricing has been set for the Wiawis range yet, but they were a joy to look at.
