Another new prototype mountain bike component lurking on that Flowrider project bike we featured last week is a new Swiss-made, superlight carbon downhill handlebar – the Ceetec C1 DH bar. Teased there as a prototype, the new ultra-lightweight & tough carbon mountain bike bar has now made it through testing, and is ready to buy as the Phenum C1 DH – under Ceetec’s international bicycle component brand name.
Beyond the new bar, the bike also was sporting a number of other lightweight Ceetec carbon components worth noting, a number of them customized: a Revolution27 wheelset, C1 bottle cage, custom C1 Seatclamp, custom C1 saddle, custom C10 Axle & titanium rotor bolts.
Ceetec / Phenum C1 DH carbon mountain bike bar
Developed in a partnership request from Flowrider Racing starting last summer, Ceetec designed the C1 DH bar to meet the needs of modern gravity racers, but at an incredibly light weight, that makes it suitable for any aggressive trail riding, too.
Marc Wohler of Flowrider asked for the 800mm width, 25mm rise & 7° backsweep dimensions. So, Ceetec set about creating the total shape of the bar, then developing a carbon layup to survive DH-level abuse. The original prototype bar on this project bike weighed just 209g.
By the time of finalizing the production layup and surviving a full 1.5 million load cycles of independent testing in Aachen (where it broke three stems and an M10 clamping bolt in the process, apparently), it only added a few extra grams. It also seems to have impressed the engineer at BikeTest Aachen running the destructive test, setting a new light & strong MTB bar benchmark for their lab.
Phenum C1 DH carbon MTB bar – Tech details, pricing & availability
The production DH bar is set to debut under the Phenum brand name (first set up a few years ago as the Ceetec design, engineering & manufacturing side of things began to open up their component production to a larger international audience). Ceetec says Phenum is slated to be the new home for their low-volume, premium production series components… and we’re told many more big Phenum projects are in the works. The C1 DH comes in one size: 800mm wide, with 25mm rise, 7° backsweep, 5° upsweep & a wide 31.8mm clamping area.
The unidirectional carbon Phenum C1 DH bar will sell for 329 Swiss francs (~ $340 / 310€) and be offered in both UD or 3K weave finishes with black or white logos. Ceetec claims an official weight for the production downhill bar, which is almost ready to ship now, at just 212g. The bar will be up on their website starting next week, but you can already contact them directly to get yours now.
More light carbon Ceetec components on the Flowrider bike
Beyond the bar there is plenty more light carbon made by Ceetec in Switzerland (which it seems will gradually transition to the newer Phenum bike components brand name in the near future)…
The Ceetec C1 Fiber Cover Soft saddle balances a full light carbon construction with a thin memory foam top, and a custom vegan synthetic cover to match the project bike. At 486CHF, the 152g saddle is pricey but promises durability & comfort at a crazy weight.
Light bottle cages aren’t hard to find. But Marc of Flowrider claims these 23g, 87.50CHF UD carbon C1 Race-Cage MTB cages manage to hold bottles securely off-road thanks to the right mix of stiffness and flexibility.
The C10 Carbon Axle sheds a few more grams too with its carbon thru-axle shaft bonded to machined alloy threads & head, with a thinned titanium connecting rod in between. It was a prototype when we last caught up with it. But the 32g axle is available now for 119CHF in custom, color-matched alloy colors to match your project super bike.
The Ceetec C1 Seatclamp might be the lightest we’ve seen on a mountain bike at 7.4g, but we’ve seen it repeatedly stand up to World Cup mountain bike racing. It costs 75-96CHF and is pared down to the absolute essentials – a pair of continuous fiber carbon loops, color customized alloy nuts & a titanium binder bolt. Mix and match or colorizes the hardware to your heart’s (& wallet’s) desire.
Ceetec’s Revolution27 29er wheels debuted at the XC World Cup in Nové Město three seasons ago, being ridden to a podium in their first race outing. Already light for a cross-country race wheelset at 1335g (w/ DT 180s) for 29″ tubeless wheels with a 27mm internal width – the asymmetric, Swiss-made, impact-resistant carbon rims build up into a trail-tough MTB wheelset, it seems. Flowrider managed to get Ceetec to build up a set with Onyx Vesper hubs and ceramic bearings, for a slightly heavier but more burly all-mountain setup at 1545g for the set. (They added Cush Core Pro tire inserts to protect against rock strikes on the most technical gravity trails.)
And finishing the bike off, specially made titanium disc rotor bolts shed a couple extra grams without sacrificing safety. The ti bolts feature extra large T25 heads, rolled threads, and get anodized in Titanium Gold.
