Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Design Case Study : Thomson Elite Seatpost

Readers will remember that a couple of days back, I ran a controversial story of a Thomson Elite seatpost that broke off at one of the bolting ears due to a "fall". I placed known marketing information about the product alongside the given failure situation. Why some readers were irked is hardly surprising, since the Elite is widely considered as one of the best designs in the market. For many, it has provided years of faithful service.

Did you know that the Elite seatpost has an elliptical bore?


So what has made this seat post so popular? It must be in the design, right? Please see the latest update to my previous post. I go through most of the design features of the seat post and comment on its attributes with the help of high resolution photos. I also run through the product manual and high light some of the factual installation warnings that Thomson has made clear pretty upfront. A seat post failure while riding can be absolutely dangerous, no question about that. Hence, installation directions and warnings cannot be taken for granted and ignored however mundane reading them maybe.

See you there.


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3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Great writeup. What are those marks on the tube?

Liz, UK said...

I just visited your blog for the first time this afternoon. Pretty impressed with the sheer volume of information presented here. I think your choice of the cup of coffee on the top is pretty apt! I think I need a lot.

Anonymous said...

If it came back to the company I am working in, the first thing I would check would be the materials in the post with a keen interest in the grain structure.

I've now been reading this for some time and I am increasingly getting ever disappointed that there has been no request, mention, or inspection of the material used to make this post.

As if we should assume that just because this was made in the US the materials are perfect.

- Ryan