Enduro Innovations
Born more than twenty-five years ago out of the simple need for a better suspension pivot bearing, Enduro Bearings has been working to improve bearing performance ever since. Whether evolving and improving bicycle bearing designs, optimizing material application, or advancing manufacturing processes, every one of the 1000+ bearings and components Enduro manufactures has a product development story to tell. From the innovative new Maxhit™ back to our original breakthrough MAX® suspension pivot bearings, here are four bearing technologies that have revolutionized bicycle performance and dependability.
Maxhit™ Components are machined entirely from 440C stainless steel and ‘guaranteed for life’. Final Maxhit assembly includes proprietary double-lip labyrinth seals and Enduro’s ‘extra high pressure’ grease for headsets or ‘high-performance speed’ grease for bottom brackets to ensure a lifetime of trouble-free, heavy duty performance.
Maxhit Science and Testing
At Enduro, we only use 440C stainless steel. Many bicycle bearing makers use grade 440A or 440B stainless steel and bypass costly cryogenic treatment to stabilize bearing race shape. 440C is capable of attaining (after exacting heat and cryogenic treatments) the highest strength, hardness and wear resistance of all the martensitic stainless alloys, making it a perfect match for high-impact, wet-condition riding where big hits, salt and muck conspire to destroy lesser bearings.
Compared to industry standard, Maxhit™ bearing balls have up to 8-times the mass and a larger bearing-to-race contact area. They can withstand more than double the force loads, leading to exponential increases in durability and performance. Another benefit of the larger Maxhit bearing balls is ease of installation; preload can vary significantly from ‘very light’ to ‘very tight’ and Maxhit will still spin perfectly. By contrast, many industry standard components must be carefully installed to precise torque specifications to ensure friction-free spinning and prevent dramatically shorter lifespans.
After a hundred-plus hours of machine testing, Maxhit™ has been proven to offer significant durability increases as well as wattage savings when compared to a range of leading brands. Once testing in completed later this year, complete results will be published and include independent, third-party analysis.
An Enduro exclusive, XD15 is the pinnacle in bicycle bearing technology. XD15 ceramic-hybrid bottom bracket and hub bearings combine silicon nitride grade 3 balls with an advanced, nitrogen-infused, aerospace stainless steel bearing race that will never rust or corrode. The bearing race is so tough that should grit find its way through our double-lip labyrinth seals to the inside of the bearing, the surfaces will not pit. The grit actually polishes the bearing races smoother.
To ensure ultimate longevity and performance, Enduro surrounds these super-smooth, super-fast bearings with our proprietary XD15 ‘speed’ grease. No one else in the bicycle industry offers XD15’s combination of speed and durability for hub, bottom bracket, and jockey wheel bearings. Guaranteed for life, Enduro XD15 are the last bearings you will ever buy until you N+1 your inventory.
XD15 Science and Testing
XD15 starts as a very high grade of martensitic stainless steel which is re-melted in a precisely-controlled nitrogen filled chamber. This process produces a homogenous material free from coarse carbides, creating an alloy that is unequalled in fatigue-strength and corrosion-resistance. XD15 post-machining includes precision heat and cryogenic treatments to ensure shape and resilience.
To validate the efficiency and life expectancy of XD15 bearings, Enduro designed a bearing testing machine that replicates real world cycling rotational speeds and multidirectional loads. Hundreds of hours of testing confirmed three XD15 performance characteristics. First, XD15 bearings will not pit, slow down or degrade, even when running in salt water or whatever caustic sport drink solution you might want to marinate them in. Second, should dirt or sand somehow make its way through the seals, it will not induce premature wear; it simply polishes the races smoother. And third, Enduro XD15 bearings not only roll fast on day one, they roll faster and smoother with time and use. You will save watts and also save maintenance time.
Enduro Directline™ Pulleys spin on corrosion-proof XD15 ceramic-hybrid bearings for ultimate performance. Both the machined Delrin wheels and the stainless steel, ceramic-hybrid bearings are backed by a lifetime warranty. Directline pulleys are designed to perform flawlessly in adverse conditions and feature CN (tight clearance) XD15 bearings in the upper pulley to maximize shifting accuracy. A C4 (floating clearance) XD15 bearing in the lower pulley greatly improves chain alignment and drivetrain efficiency.
Precision machined rather than molded from Teflon infused 500 AF Delrin, Directline™ pulleys are extremely rigid and greatly reduce friction between the pulley and the chain while offering significantly less drag than aluminum or titanium pulleys. And with no holes, Directline pulleys don’t load-up with greasy dirt and are easy to clean. The Directline “hubcap” nests securely in recesses as a bad weather shield while offering an aerodynamic upside.
Directline Science and Testing
Since 2012, Enduro has refined and tests its jockey wheel designs and materials in parallel with its exclusive XD15 super stainless, ceramic-hybrid bearings. 100,000's of trouble free off-road and on-road miles have led to Directline's lifetime warranty.
An Enduro creation, our Torqtite™ bottom bracket presents a multi-faceted solution to the press-in BB blues. Enduro bearings are housed in precision machined aluminum cups that thread together, providing secure, creak-free installation in non-threaded bottom bracket shells. Precise thread tolerances ensure parallel alignment regardless of bottom bracket shell design or manufacturing inconsistency. Torqtite bearings are positioned as far outboard as possible (closer to the crankarms) to provide high-load stability across the width of the bottom bracket to dramatically improve bearing performance and durability.
Available with XD15 ceramic-hybrid bearings or 440C stainless steel bearings, Torqtite is the ultimate press-fit bottom bracket solution; guaranteeing best installation results with no unwanted friction…or noise. Torqtite components include proprietary bearing seals to keep dirt out and low friction grease in, and are available to fit a wide range of frame designs and crankset combinations.
Torqtite Science and Testing
A novel BB system solution, Torqtite consists of a double threaded internal sleeve to tighten the right and left cups against one another. The internal sleeve thread design compensates for bottom bracket shell misalignment while eliminating bearing and cup movement or internal fretting in carbon fiber or aluminum frames. This guarantees parallel alignment between the left and right side bearings regardless of frame manufacturing tolerances and variations. Noises are annoying and internal friction saps energy and wattage output. TorqTite guarantees silent running and eliminates lost energy.
Torqtite has undergone eight-years of worldwide field testing by professional riders and team mechanics, leading retailers and multitudes of weekend warriors. Torqtite bottom brackets have been installed in thousands of frames offered by hundreds of bicycle manufacturers. This real world, real conditions testing validates everything we’ve learned from our own in-house bearing testing. Torqtite is THE solution for noisy, misaligned press-fit bottom brackets.
The first Enduro Bearings bicycle product, MAX ® bearings were pioneered specifically to solve premature bearing failures in high-load, high impact, low rotational speed MTB suspension systems. To address this need, Enduro co-founder Matt Harvey drew inspiration from the full-complement design of massive mast-guide bearings found on forklifts. By eliminating the ball retainer from the bearing, space becomes available to add additional balls (aka full-complement), which dramatically increases load capacity 35% to 40%. This is accomplished by a special design where the maximum number of balls are inserted via a ground slot in the races. This also significantly increases bearing reliability and longevity. A plug-in innovation that fits within the same small footprint previously occupied by traditional retainer and plain suspension pivot bearings.
MAX® suspension bearings are filled with Enduro MAX ‘extra high pressure’ grease and represent today’s industry-standard among bicycle manufactures. Enduro also offers MAX angular contact type bearings in both sealed and greaseable versions. Take a look, they’re probably already in your bike.
MAX Science and Testing
Enduro’s MAX® line includes only the highest quality 52100 chromium steel and 440C stainless steel coupled with black oxide, heat and cryogenic treatments in a rigidly controlled manufacturing and assembly production environment. MAX bearings provide more lateral support and can more capably withstand the harsh twisting and multi-directional forces that mountain bike suspension pivots encounter every time the bike is pointed downhill.
Enduro has been supplying leading mountain bike manufactures with both standard MAX® and bespoke MAX suspension bearings in a variety of configurations for more than 25 years. In addition to countless hours of in-house design and lab testing, MAX bearings have been subjected to decades of real world testing in the worst conditions imaginable, resulting in the best validation possible: loyalty. Annually, over 10 million MAX bearings are spec’d in the finest mountain bikes made, including these leading manufacturers: Santa Cruz, Yeti, Evil, Pivot, Niner, Alchemy, BMC, Giant, Atherton, Rocky Mountain, Orbea and Canyon.
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