The Venom peg uses a two-piece steel/plastic design based on the ‘classic sleeve’ system. Our aim was to create a plastic sleeve peg with a diameter similar to a standard steel peg. This lead us down the route of a steel/plastic design with a slim crmo inner peg wrapped in a generous thickness of our specially developed (for the Nathan Peg) hardwearing nylon compound. This interview was first seen on ride US and gives you an insight into the development of the peg itself.
An Interview with Rich Shaw, Product Designer at Éclat.
Why is this peg any different from any other plastic peg on the market?
Well on the market right now are alloy/plastic pegs and also a few steel/
Plastic pegs, and then of course there is the Nathan peg which is a one
piece steel/plastic design. The Venom peg uses a steel/plastic sleeve set
up and the advantage of this is that the steel can be thinner than on an alloy
peg, that means the whole diameter of the final peg can be smaller and more like the size of a regular steel peg.
How long did it take to design?
The peg was in the works for 3-4 months then around 6-7 months of testing and tweaking.
What materials did you use?
The peg uses the same nylon fibreglass compound we developed for the Nathan Peg. This material itself was around 6 months of testing and development to get the perfect balance of hardness for long life and fast grinding without being so brittle that the plastic would shatter.
How did the testing go?
The testing went pretty smoothly compared to some parts, mainly because we already had learnt so much from the Nathan Peg. We had a few diminution changes here and there. The main thing we found during testing was that we had to increase the thickness of the plastic close to the dropout, when you lock into a grind especially on rails, the rail tends to sit in the v shape created between the peg and the hub guard. This means you get more wear in this area, so we adjusted the design to deal with this. The other little tweak we have to make was the pegs sometimes were slipping and spinning on the inner peg, so we corrected this with a little update to the sleeve tooling. Feedback from riders was overwhelmingly positive; “these are the best pegs ever” was dropped a few times which is always reassuring. Unfortunately we didn’t have a massive amount of samples to give out so what we had was fiercely fought over.
The inner pegs look like they could actually be used as regular metal pegs?
Yeah, well the inner steel core is made from a heat treated crmo, which in itself is strong enough to use as a peg.
Tell us about the sleeve?
There is a minimum of 4.5mm thickness of plastic on the sleeve, with even more at the dropout side. This is thicker than a lot of the sleeves that are around and it makes them last longer, especially due to the compound. The outer diameter of the peg is 36mm, which is pretty much standard for a regular steel peg, so these are plastic but not super fat looking.
When are these out in shops?
The pegs will be out Jan/Feb time. Ask your dealer about the Venom Peg from Eclat and go get your grinds on.
