https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/14/23873153/nasa-bike-tire-shape-memory-price-smart-specs
No more bicycle flats, forever.
No. It’s a Kickstarter that might ship next year. The headline should have been “Bike tires made from NASA’s bizarre shape-shifting metal might be available to buy next year if the crowdfunding campaign isn’t a scam”
The second I see the words "kickstarter or indiegogo" I already know whatever I saw may as well be unobtanium
If it makes its way to a storefront then I'll consider it, otherwise I'll just move on and keep my money
Tbf if it's indigogo, it's a scam. If its funding is flexible, you might as well just throw your credit card into the trash bin. If it's on kickstarter, you might at least get some product an few years late (or it's just a normal pre-order with some extra steps and more expensive)
In this case it's almost flexible funding. They set a ridiculous low target, $25k. That wouldn't pay any tooling.
I never looked at their campaign, but did just read over it for fun. I didn't do any further research and just assume no lying in the parts that can be checked without having knowledge about their specific products / industry.
First things first: It's kickstarter, not IGG. It's not using flexible funding (as that's only on IGG, if they still allow it). They have a working prototype. That's nice!
Having won all these awards is nice, but without knowledge about the specific awards, this information is useless. They seem to have a contract with NASA which gives them access to materials and technology. That's a plus. They also seem to have a real working prototype.
$25k as a target is very low for product development. But they may be an established company and may get extra funding from other sources, so it might be a campaign to check the market and do some PR. Remember how I said many Kickstarters are essentially preorders? They're not quite there yet in the product development cycle, but this might explain it with other funding besides kickstarter. But this should be researched further before backing.
The whole campaign feels more PR and sales as I've seen with the last campaigns that I actually backed (or at least checked because of an interesting "product"). I can't help but it somehow reminds me of something...
Also after all this talking about space technology, they say it wouldn't work on earth and needs to be adapted (so no space technology anymore, but still space technology?). I get that they need to do this and that its a bit unfair to point at it, but did chuckle when I read that. Especially when they continued talking about space technology right after.
I was wondering the whole time, whether their tires really last "the whole lifetime of a bike". I usually change tires, because they're worn out and the profile is low. Modern tires are quite good at preventing a flat. So the upside of this tire for me would be... no checking if I need to refill some air. They prevent this by making this part of the tire exchangeable (and if it works, $10 is fine as it's still cheaper than a regular new tire). But then... it lasts the lifetime of your bike, but not specific parts of the product.
How easily can you get access to these spare parts after the campaign? How much trash are they really saving? And as they're saying their approach is more environmentally friendly - did they research all the new materials used and their production?
So, for me it's a product I wouldn't back on KS. It's a product, that would require me to get spare parts to be used meaningfully. It needs to be established on the market for that. Otherwise it's nice in the beginning and then it was a waste of money.
Oh, speaking of money - I didn't check yet how much id have to pay for a ti... WHAT? $500 for two of them? 2 Full wheels are starting at $1,300 and can be up to $2,300 $5,000 depending on your choice of material?!
I can get a fully featured, brand new luxus eBike for that!🤯 Nah, not gonna happen. Talk about the environment as much as you like. A full set of good tires with anti-flat technology for my bike starts at around 40-50 bucks (non US, but shouldn't be that different in the US?) and lasts a while. I can get 10 sets of tires for the price of this starter set and I'd probably get a few more when I have to pay for a few Tread replacements in between. Talk about the lifetime of a bike. LOL.
