Integrated Headsets Explained (continued)
March 2002
What
is an "Integrated" headset?
It is a bicycle frame, fork and bearing system designed to
eliminate the humble headset cup. To integrate means to combine
and hopefully to simplify. What has been "integrated"
by the integrated headset? The bearings now rest inside the
frame instead of inside pressed-in cups. All of this trouble
and confusion is to remove two 12 gram headset cups from the
front of your bicycle. True, an integrated headset can give
the bike a nice, smooth looking front end, but the consequences
of this change to your bicycle are significant. Simply put,
the performance and lifetime that you expect from your new
bicycle will be reduced, most severely in aluminum mountain
bikes.
All bicycle frames that use integrated headsets will ultimately
have substantial performance and reliability problems due
to the inherent flaws in this design. The largest flaw is
a bearing system that does not positively attach the bearing
to the frame, leaving the bearing to "float" resulting
in wear and impact damage to the frame. As an additional complication,
each manufacturer seems to be doing their own thing, with
no real standardization to date. As a result, there are multiple
bearing types and sizes (some of which have been discontinued
with no replacement options) and the frame builders and bearing
makers are not all working from the same drawings.
Lack of standardization is a bad thing for everyone. It means
that you may not be able to get replacement headset bearings
for your bike, and you will need them.
