By blackmountaincycles,
Filed under: Uncategorized
In order to make the SRAM OG-1090 Power Dome cassette, a 10 pound ingot of steel is used. That’s ten pounds to make a part that ends up weighing (according to SRAM’s website) 160 grams. That’s about 9.6 pounds of waste when the finished product pops out. Wow! Now, I’m sure that SRAM recycles that scrap (maybe into cheap 8 speed cassettes?), but that’s a lot of left overs.
Obviously, that cassette isn’t solely responsible for the shortages in steel or the rising prices that the bike industry is preparing to pass on down the chain, but, to me, it’s an example of a situation that doesn’t really need to be. There are plenty of other bike parts made that produce waste/scrap and I’m not riding a hemp framed bike yet, so I’ll not be casting stones lest I hit myself.
This image, along with some recent articles in Bicycle Retailer and some various on-line info got me thinking about this coming of price increases in the bike industry. I’ve got some thoughts that I’ll be putting to words soon.
(What’s playing: The Raconteurs Salute Your Solution from MPR’s The Current)
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The scraped metal will obviously be re-melted and re-used, just like it happens in every other instance of manufacturing through abrasion (tipically called cnc machining). It's a process which requires more time and energy than a simple forging but there are no wastes of material.