Hello and good day to you from episode 31 of our podcast series Project Breakaway. A metaphorical and literal time in the day when we here at Predator cycling take some time away from working in the back shop to come and share with our listeners what we're doing, how we're doing it, what it takes to do it, our ideas, our innovative success stories, and even our missteps and failures. If you find yourself with an interest in bicycles, composite manufacturing, out of the box design, or even curiosities beyond. I encourage you to stick with us, settle in and learn a little. I'm Courtney B, co-owner and project manager of Predator cycling. I'm here with my partner, Arm Goan, the other co-owner, CEO, lead designer and engineer, and second time daddy. How's it going, Arm? Oh, it's going really well. Yeah, I am a second time daddy. You're second time mommy. Yeah, so it's been a minute. It has. We added a new future employee of Predator cycling. Yep, trying to expand the team here. Expanding the family business. So we had our second son three weeks ago. Yeah. And he is currently here at the shop. Just like the first one, spent the first year here at the shop. Um, causing me pain and drive. Uh, it's not always easy, but. Uh, yeah, so. If you hear a uh baby crying, that's the reason. Yeah. It's our baby. Or it's me. One of the two. Okay. So, uh, let's jump in, we obviously had to take a little um maternity paternity time. Self uh self-induced maternity time. And when you own your business. I don't I don't know what it qualifies. I don't know. I know I'm not getting paid anymore. So, uh, no, I think we were actually still um doing emails from the hospital. It was. And um we did take a week though to get back to the shop. Which is I think four more days than last time with the first one. Yeah, something like that. So, you know, a little self-care. Yeah, no, I just. I would come in to do shipments and get stuff out. Um. That's it. And process a couple orders and things. Yeah. Yeah. So, we're back and we're trying to um get into the swing of things. Which is difficult. Because I'm so tired. It is difficult balancing it all. But um. We are doing our best, so. Yeah. Back in. Firing on all cylinders. So. Let's jump in. Yes. Uh, firstly, as we mentioned in the last episode. Which I can't remember when we recorded that. Not. It's like a month ago. It was pre pre 2.0. Yeah. Anyway. We talked about opening up the wholesale on the website. Yep. For uh shops and bike fitters and uh people of that nature. Yes. Um. So that is now up and running. Yep. So if you have an interest in uh purchasing wholesale, um go to predatorscycling.com. And you. And you scroll down to the bottom. Yep, it's on the bottom there. And you click wholesale. Mhm. You will fill out the preliminary questionnaire. That will come to us and then I'll do some investigative research. Yeah. And make sure that you are a legit company. And worthy of my wholesale. And uh then we will send you a contract and then upon agreement and signature. And you signing away everything to me. Uh, we'll sign you up. Uh, yeah, so. We do have already, I think it was up for a day and we had an application already. So yeah, we've already got a couple applications and people set up and actually ordering on wholesale already. So. Um, it's pretty cool. So we're trying. We're we're doing our best to fill that need. Um, I know a lot of people have reached out to us about it, so we're we're trying to. Make sure we do it and we we are going to. Um, if you are a wholesale and you log into wholesale. The the the um the look and feel of it is not quite finished. I'm I'm waiting because we're going to have a website update here in the next couple months. And then it'll integrate better. So. Just for warning. Oh, I haven't actually looked at it. It was not it's not friendly. No. It's fine. It just like the where it says like the wholesale price on the products isn't like aligned perfectly and shows up perfectly on all the product pages. Because the different product pages have different custom custom settings in them. To make them work. So you get the full discount codes and everything on your on your checkout page. It clearly tells you your discounts. Um, but it doesn't always show it to you nicely on the product page itself. Okay. So I'm just it's a it's a work in progress. It's like the website designer stuff. Yeah. And it just. Anyway. Anyways. Our arms trying to sell me on a new theme here soon, so if I say yes. I'll be purchase it, it'll look great. Yes. Okay. So it'll probably look great here in a month or two. Okay. Um, anyway, um, so today is October 21st. Mhm. But yesterday. It was October 20th. Whoa. Yeah. Time. And so yesterday the Ansis level up 2.0 virtual conference took place. Online streaming versus via Ansis's website. Um, and we have mentioned it quite a few times on the podcast leading up to yesterday. Um, and that you had recorded a chat with um friend of the podcast and friend of Predator Cycling Kurt Chan. Mhm. Who is senior product marketing manager at Ansis. Yeah. And um, I think it should still be available to stream even after the fact. If you go to their website and you're registered. I wasn't registered, so I couldn't get in. Oh, okay. But I think if you're registered. It should be up. I think I think they're still up. I believe they are. Yeah. I can't imagine them taking it down. So we mentioned that you were having a discussion about simulation with Kurt. So break that. video down for us. Yeah. So basically, Yeah. you know, I mean, as we've said many times on this podcast, um, simulation is really important to us. It's an integral part of our business, it's how we design product. And it's also how we actually run our business. Um, so we used um in the in the chat. We basically talk about um how we how we rely on simulation. Um, for not only just the composite side, but our our additive side and how we use it in the product development stages. Um, so it's it's kind of an overview of what we've talked about in different episodes on this podcast. Um, but it's a I think it's a good conversation especially around the idea of how to leverage uh simulation. topology optimization AI. You know, um, if you have high-powered CPUs, um, and GPUs. to um um really enhance your product development. Um, especially for additive. Great. Yeah. So you were talking, oh, so that chat was more about additive. Well, I mean, like both. We talk about additive because that's like the most um, it's the most, I think it's one of the more interesting conversations to have around simulation. Um, we talked about that, we also talked about the RF 20 and the composite side and how we use it for a composite side. So when you say additive, you're talking about 3D print materials. And when you say composite, you're talking about carbon fiber layup. Yes. Okay. Just. Yes. Just getting that clear. Yeah, I will actually. This is kind of confusing because, I mean, in most people make the argument that composites is also additive. Um, it's an additive form of manufacturing. But anyways, that's a. debate for a different discussion. Well, I mean, it's it's just a material that you're forming something with. So how is that? So would you say like steel bikes are additive? Because you're taking steel tubing. and putting it together. Well, but you're taking steel tubing and cutting them up into pieces. And then welding them together. So it'd be relatively considered a subtractive process. Most composites, like we have our net waste. I mean, it's very little. Especially in. Anyways. It it it's a it's. You can get into a really. I make the argument that it's it's not a typical subtractive manufacturing. Now, the tooling and some of the processes in order to make the composite parts is definitely a subtractive part. So. Anyways, that's an interesting. Yeah. Anyway, uh, so simulation for 3D. Simulation for 3D printing. Yeah. is different than 3D simulation for composites. Absolutely. Same theory. Use the tools differently. But the simulator itself needs. So you throw in all the the the information. It spits it out. So the simulation is different. Like it's. Yeah. Well, yes, it's working differently. So in in um in 3D printing, you can use uh topology optimization really effectively. Um because so topology optimization. The basic premise of it is is you have a solid object. You have an object. Um you have forces and loads that are being acted upon it. And then the computer basically figures out where those loads and forces are, how they're affecting the part. You set parameters of what you want the part to achieve. And it tries to find the minimal amount of material in order to achieve those points. Mhm. So it's actually kind of like helping you design. And we've talked about this before. Especially since we have our P620 workstation with RTX A6000s, we can just plow through that so fast and solve those questions so quickly. That we're able to do it in a in in real time. Um and see the part being formed in front of us. Um when we do that for composites, we we do actually use topology optimization for composites. Um but we use it in a different way. We're usually not looking at the actual structure of the bicycle frame or the component, we're actually looking more for um more so at the layup schedule of the actual bicycle. And helping us assist us in which way to lay up the part. So we use it in different ways. We use topology optimization in both. Um. In 3D print though, you can actually make this crazy shape that you get. And that's how the genius um water bottle cage is designed. So you're using simulation and 3D print for the actual like starting off, jumping off point for the design phase, phase one. But we use the simulation for composites basically kind of like in not design phase one, like the phase three manufacturing and layup. Maybe phase 1.9. And then also like the ladder phase, oh, I guess you're using it both in the ladder phase when you're doing your checks, like level like phase four, like QC. Absolutely. And then also like you have to remember like the whole validation process we have. We're actually validating our our physical test results to our simulated results so that we can validate the manufacturing processes as a as a quality as a QC check. I feel like that phase of simulation is what people are normally used to seeing. Absolutely. Like, oh, hey, here's an entire part in construction. And look at the simulated and it's moving and it's working. Right. So like, I mean, you have to remember too. Like historically when you have a part, you have. You know, your um brainstorming idea team, which is part of your industrial design team. You then have an industrial designer that actually designs the part and makes a mock-up. That usually gets sent off to an applications engineer or product engineer that's actually going to kind of figure it out. And then that's going to go back to your industrial designer who's actually going to do all the surface modeling. Once that's done, it goes to engineering to actually make the part work. Then once the part works, then it goes off to molding and tooling team who's going to design the tooling and molding for it. during that process is when the part gets simulated. Um, so you're typically starting the simulation process very late in the entire process. Like that's historically how it's done. Um, we kind of change, we change that. We're changing history. We're changing history. We change that workflow. I mean, the other thing is we're a small team, so there's, you know, essentially the two of us are designing and doing all these parts. Well, well, well, you're forgetting the new guy. Right. But he's, he's, uh, um, he's an executive. He doesn't, he doesn't deal with a bunch of that. Oh, he's just like executives, man. He's an executive, he doesn't really do anything. He shows up for the conferences and eats the cheese. Oh, yeah. Is there food? No. I wish there was. Uh. But, um, no. So like, I mean, the we're a small team, so obviously, um, uh, we're we're doing a lot of different parts. But I I don't. We don't. Here, we don't think of the project in stages like that as roles. Those roles are all merged together into the product development cycle. So we're coming up with an idea directly in modeling. And then directly simulating that mock up. Mhm. I mean, within, I mean, hours. Like, I mean, I mean, I think, I mean, the genius cage. I know that I designed it. The initial design for it. And I was into apology optimization within within less than an hour after making the part. Um, RF 20 was, you know, the first day. I mean, before I started in the morning, before lunch, I was already simulating stuff. To see. Understand how, um, CF was affecting it. How composite layouts were going to affect it. Like, you know, just quickly kind of like quick and dirty mocking things up in simulation just to understand how the shapes were affecting the parts. And the performance of the parts. So, So I could be completely wrong in projecting my own thoughts on the Ansis level up 2.0. But I kind of scrolled through it. And it seemed like a lot of the streaming videos were just like engineers talking about like a part they're making. And like how the simulation and like like kind of like a tutorial. This is what I did. Blah, blah, blah. This is what I did. But your streaming thing is more like, I'm a small business. I'm using simulation in this manufacturing philosophy. It's more like that. Instead of a step one, step two, step three. This is something cool I made. Well, also. And like, you know, you know, a dream part. You're making the physical parts that are literally on my shelf that I'm putting in a box and packing and shipping away. Yes. And. Well, also level up is his. I mean, it's been primarily for, um, um, structural. They're their structural products. Um, and they're more enterprise products. Um, so it gets really into like a lot of the nitty-gritties. of how, how to set up simulations. There's actually a couple of really interesting ones that I'm. I want to go maybe this weekend and watch. I didn't have a chance yesterday. Oh, yeah. When are you going to do that? During nap time? I guess. Nap time. It's every two hours. Right. Oh, for you. Um, well, I better take advantage of it. Um, but yeah. So I there's some really interesting ones. Um, there's some really interesting use cases. And yeah, historically, Ansis, a lot of the conferences, a lot of the the the talks that you go on are geared very much towards um, um, very nitty gritty on how things work and complex problems and solving those problems. Um, Right. Well, um, so Ansis also, you have that. And then Ansis also the same week released their second or third, second? Second customer highlight video. Yeah. I think it's second. I know it's a three-part series, but I can't remember which one it is. Um, they did the second customer highlight video. And that video specifically showed how we use simulation for composites. And kind of highlighted our bikes. Um, as opposed to the first video, which was kind of an uh, general overview. General overview and I think we're kind of it was more geared towards the 3D print. Yeah. And then so, um, and as we said, composite simulation is a little different because there's a multitude of factors and material composition as well. So like thickness, layup orientation, temperatures, etc. Um, and I'll try and add the embedded link for that video. Yeah. Once I find it. I assume it's on LinkedIn or something. It is on LinkedIn. I I don't know where else they're they're they're they posted it. So. So I can post that there. I'll post it with it. So, um, yeah, so that video. What do you want to talk about that video for? Um, so in that video, uh, we kind of really go through the RF 20. And how we use simulation in the RF 20. And it was actually like a super important um, to have simulation for the RF 20 because the RF 20 was a project that we've been working on for a very long time. And it's, you know, to to prototype, anyone that's done composite products in the past, knows how much time and money goes into building prototypes and physical products. And then fixing things that went wrong in it and then validating the test results. Um, with Ansis, we were actually able to fully simulate not only just the part, the layup, but also fully simulate the manufacturing process of the part. Um, so that allowed us to find flaws in our design. Um, and and how we were approaching it very early on. When, you know, we knew that, you know, this shape wasn't probably the optimal shape because we were getting an issue here. With the creasing problem or we were getting, um, you know, during the molding process, we were getting voids right in this spot. Like we could figure a lot of that stuff out. Before we had to actually make the part. Um, we also talked a lot about here that, you know, we we are a small company. So there are um, budgets on projects. And the budgets are not usually um, extravagant. Um, so, What? But um, so, you know, for us, cutting a mold for an RF 20, um, front triangle is is very expensive. It's it's not a a um, undertaking. So if we cut that mold and there's something wrong with it, that's going to cost us a lot of money and put a lot of delays into the project. Um, and that's originally what actually slowed us down on the RF 20. was those types of issues. Um, once we introduced Ansis into that workflow, we were able to drastically, um, reduce our cost and being able to produce the bike much quicker. So, it's been a big game changer for us. Yeah, and it was nice that Ansis likes us so much to come shoot a video. Yeah, it was, it was very, it was very flattering that a company like Ansis had an interest in in what we're doing. Right, they're a big company, but they have an interest in small companies because I think they know, going forward that that's their future. Well, I, I think, yeah, I mean, I think, I mean, I, I think smaller companies are going to be, um, doing more innovative things, but I think it's also an issue of, you know, we're, we're trying to innovate the way we work and trying to improve upon how we've done everything in the past. So I think they've taken an interest in that philosophy. We kind of bring to it. So, Um, plus, I mean, I don't know, I love, I love uh, tech. It's cool stuff. So. You love tech? Yeah. I just, I like this stuff. Um, cool. So, uh, is there anything else you want to talk about the simulation and Ansis and this week and what's going on? Um, yeah, if you haven't checked out, um, um, level up, check it out. There's a lot of cool courses. There's a lot of interesting topics. Um, if simulation concepts like this interest you, check out our, um, our uh, talk. Um, you just have to register, and you should be able to still see it, I think for the next for a little bit still. You can watch the course. Um, and we'll also put the video of the, um, the composite workflow, um, video that Ansis made on our page. Um, but yeah, I think that kind of covers. And I think that's one of the last conferences to round up the year. Yeah, we're supposed to do. Hopefully. I was supposed to do GTC, but I we we passed. Oh, what is that? That's in November, right? It's like next week. Oh, yeah. Well, and the recording was going to be right during the due date for our little guy. Who I now have to hold here because he just, he loves to be held. He does love to be held. Um, some things to mention. Yeah. Uh, we finished the conferences, we are doing pretty well with all of the adapters. selling on Amazon and the website. Um, so you're going to start refocusing on the RF 20. which was just paused just because of life. Yes. Um, because you were doing a lot of design work, um, for the cleat adapters. and you were busy. and I was creating life. So I was doing much more. much more important work. Um, and so, um, you're going to start working on that. and we're going to ramp up the manufacturing on that product. Yeah, so we've been, um, like Courtney said, been super active on the cleat adapters and, um, the pro custom cleat adapters. um, the safeguards, the pedal washers. The safeguards are doing really well. Yeah, it's I I I'm kind of surprised on how well they're doing. I mean, to me, I'm like, that's just a piece of metal in your shoe. But I guess it's important to cyclist. Yeah, it's a yeah. That's that could actually be a whole topic. on its own. on what. There's people that love it and there's people that don't love them. Um, but basically. it's a a piece. of metal that goes between your speed pay cleat and your base plate adapter or the shoe. depending on how you have your setup. And ours is a stainless steel piece. that goes right there. So that when the pedal interfaces it, it doesn't hit the base plate or the cleat adapter or the shoe. Does it just feel like stronger when you pedal? Is that why people like it so much? One of the reasons people like it is because it actually protects the shoe and protects the base plate. So overall, it creates less wear. There's another argument that if you have inconsistent wear on a base plate like that or a safeguard, like what we call it. Um, then your cleat is not adjusted properly. So it. There's an argument to be made there. Well, check out our whole episode on bike fitting. Which was two episodes. Yes, that's that's a bike fitting question. Um, the other thing too though that the safeguard, I think does is the speed pay cleat system is very reliant that the system is flat. It has to be perfectly flat. So my belief is is that a shim, a safeguard actually helps make that area a little bit more flat and more rigid. Um, so it actually could make the cleat engagement slightly better. Um, I think that's kind of it has to be more explored, but it's something that when I did bike fits, I actually like them. I like the shim that they that speed play used to make back in the day. Um, but it was hard to get. Mhm. So, um, I saw that Wahoo was no longer making it and they said they weren't going to support it. So we decided to make it. And people seem to like it. Cuz I'm packing a lot of them. You are, so. So that's good. And then you're also working on website updates. We mentioned you swinging around new theme idea. Yep. Um, and then once I find some time in between my daily tasks and catching up and feeding this baby, uh, we'll be updating the website with new content and photos. Yeah, new content, photos, maybe some videos on some of the products. Yeah, and um, we actually are waiting on our new Google Pixel 6 phones. So maybe uh, I can find some room in between all the pictures of my children and the dog and my pumpkin spice latte selfies and take some awesome product photo like pictures. That'd be cool. I feel like that'd be easy, right? Cuz in setting up the big camera and. And all the photos and lighting and stuff. Maybe. Lighting. I don't know. It's supposed to be a super phone, so I think this could be a really game changer for. Super phone. Is this a new status? A super phone that could be a game changer for a busy marketing lady who's holding a baby and needs to take a product photo. I'm interested to see how it works. I'm all for it. If you see a website update and all of our products have a baby next to them. you know what happened. I'd definitely change the theme. Uh, for sure. Um, the only other thing that maybe we should be just touch on real quick is um, it's come up once or twice now about uh, we sell our products on our website, obviously everything's available on our website. And some of our products are available on Amazon. Um, and a select few of those products are available on Amazon Prime. So they're FBA to fulfill from Amazon. But that doesn't mean next day. It does not, it means that it's, I mean it's Amazon. So it's usually two days. Sometimes same day, sometimes next day. Um, yeah, um, it's faster delivery if you're an Amazon Prime member. Um, our website, um, we do offer free shipping, but that's at $150. Yeah. Um, we offer free ground shipping. We're in Tennessee, so you can kind of figure out how far how long it takes to get to you. Um, yeah, just, you know, just just a disclaimer. Um, they are available, some people like to get on Amazon. Some like to buy it direct. The price is the same. Um, the difference is the shipping and the handling setup. Shipping fees apply. Shipping fees apply. We do have to pack them. And then ship them. And we're a small business. We're not Amazon. Yes. So we're trying to balance how it does. But the basic philosophy that we have is, is that our smaller items like um, like the cleat adapter, safeguards, uh, pedal washers, things like that. Um, we're trying to stock on FBA on Amazon as well as we can. Um, and our more expensive items, we are just selling through Amazon. But we'd be shipped from us here and we're selling through our website. Just so people kind of have an idea. How it works. Um, and we'll be trying to somehow integrate that into our site. Yeah. So we should hopefully get that up and running. And people get their shipments quickly and, you know, we're not Amazon. But we are getting stuff out as quickly as possible. Yeah, we're pretty quick too. So, I need to ship a cheeseburger into my mouth right now. Or a taco, or some pizza, or something. Because, you know, I'm hungry. And I'm holding a baby. Well, let's get hungry. I'm hungry. Let's not get hungry. No. So let's wrap her up here. And we thank you for choosing to take some time with us. We look forward to future breakaways. Look for us on Instagram and LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and in person here in Tennessee. We ask our listeners to please share, like, and subscribe. We're available on all major streaming platforms. Thanks for listening, have a good one and find some time to break away.
EpisodeOct 21, 2021 · 26:32
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Project Breakaway with Predator Cycling
31: Ansys Customer Highlight Video Part 2: Simulation Exploration, Ep. 31
Join Predator Cycling's Courtney B. and Arm Goan as they share an update on their growing family and the launch of their new wholesale program. Arm then discusses his recent Ansys Level Up 2.0 conference video, exploring how Predator Cycling uses simulation for advanced product development. Discover how they leverage these tools for additive manufacturing (3D printing) and composite design, including topology optimization and AI, to innovate bicycle components.
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