Hollow Wheel Manufacturing & Shipping Update #19

 Hey Everyone,

Just wanted to post a quick update on production.

Timeline: 

Right now, it is a race against getting the wheels completed before Chinese New Year which typically takes place in the middle of January and ends middle of February; about a month. Chinese New Year is not accounted for in the timeline; basically all of China goes on a national holiday and no one works.

We are currently waiting on material still; we are in a holding pattern till we get that. Our material is imported from Germany. I am using on the best materials that I could find. Currently they are in production of the material and then it has to be sea shipped to China.

In the past, we were air freighting small quantities but for this batch, we are shipping well over 1000lbs and I cannot afford air shipping at that weight.

I have passed this timeline through to my vendors and they have approved of the timeline. I am trying my best to move up several tasks closer in order to save more time. 

It's very difficult to estimate sea shipping. In some cases, sea shipping has 6-10 weeks, which this takes most of the time. Hopefully the ports will calm down and it can ship faster (in Pre-pandemic times it usually took 4 weeks).

 

Logo Printing:

While we are waiting for the material to arrive, we have finished the tooling for the wheels. Note: the wheel used for logo print testing is just a scrap wheel and we were testing, which why there is a huge hole in the middle. The color of the wheel (the polymer) will be black for the first batch. Moreover, the color of the words "Momentum" and "Hollow Wheel" will be white as the wheel tread will be black (it will look like rendering picture below).

The portion of the wheel in which the logo is printed on will not contact the ground so it should last as long as any standard logo printed on most wheels.

The wheel will look like this in production (this is a rendering):

Suspension Inserts

I am still durability testing the suspension inserts to make sure there are no problems with them. This is far easier than the wheel itself. I just wanted to make sure there are no unforeseen issues here. Those that ordered the suspension insert may receive them after the wheels ship; they may be a separate package. The reason they may arrive as a separate package is because the interior of the wheel changed quite a bit and I have to change the molds to accommodate the geometry change. I would estimate that there is a 80% chance that I will get them done in time along with the wheels. 

The left wheel is from the very early batches. The right wheel is from the more recent batches. You can see the interior drastically changed.

Here is the picture of the suspension insert:

 

The left suspension insert (made from a production mold) is for the wheel on the left (picture above). Right suspension insert is a 3D TPU version that I am currently modifying and making sure it won't cause some durability issues. Clearly the old style (left) won't fit in the new wheel (right wheel in picture above) because I had to add the ribbing inside the wheel.

We are almost to the finish line. Just requires a very close eye and constant communication. I appreciate the patience. You guys are the best.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Thanks,

Doug