Interview with Allen Millyard
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- Опубліковано 20 сер 2020
- We took a road trip down to the Forest of Dean to meet up with Allen Millyard and his sons Stephen and Sam and check out their latest creation, the Hyper Ride Suspension system.
It was a baking hot day in the midst of a heatwave when we rolled up to Pedalabikeaway in the Forest of Dean to meet up with the Millyards. Hot as hell, humid like a jungle, but dusty dry on the trails, it hardly seemed the ideal conditions for riding mountain bikes or motor bikes. A float down the river Wye seemed much more inviting. But since they’d made the hour and a half trip - Allen on a motorbike, his sons in their pickup truck - we were committed. Some obligatory mechanical faffing later, and we sweated our way up the fire road in the Forest of Dean for a quick descent down before catching up with Allen for a chat.
It was a hairy ride down for our US rider Fahzure as he borrowed Stephen’s bike - brakes still in UK orientation - and followed Sam blind down trails that might have been called Sheepskull and Ski Run, but on the tail of Sam went by in such a blur that it’s hard to be sure. Drops, ruts, turns and enough roots to make us glad of the dry conditions, we emerged at the bottom to find Allen and sit down for a chat in the shade before he headed home to cool off. As well as making things in his shed (oh how we wish we had arranged to see in there) he’s busy shooting a series of ‘Find It Fix It Flog It’ so this was his second day out in the heatwave in a row. Maybe he really was tired, or maybe he had a plan for whipping up some super efficient new cooling system and he was eager to get home to the lathe?
Quietly spoken, with his reading glasses on his head, he looks more like a sound engineer at a Stones gig than he does a mad inventor. And while he might not set much store by technical drawings, elaborate plans and mathematics, he’s no madman. He turns the idea that he has in his head into a finished creation using his hands rather than any computer model, but there’s plenty of thought going on in that head. With his sons riding the suspension systems he’s created, he’s safety conscious and has built them to withstand all the pressure that their construction - and the riding they’re out through - can throw at them. Watch the video to learn all about how Allen made the system and what he’s planning to do next.
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Allen Millyard is a genius of our time
Indeed his motorbikes are a work of genius too!
took the words right out of my mouth. never a truer word spoken
I call him a rocket surgeon, because he is the living embodiment of.
Allen is so easy going and just matter of fact in his approach to his projects. Love watching his video over here across the pond.
It's amusing how this guy doesn't get what Allen Millyard is about. 🤣
Yeah they really arent on the same page at all! The concept of not feeling a need to try and make money off of it seems to go straight over his head
Indeed. Had the interviewer searched Allen's name, on UA-cam alone, he would have possibly understood; who he was about to meet.
I just came here to make sure someone had pointed it out, how many times did he try and get across the point
British and American, very different attitudes
six cylinder kawasakis and V10 hemi bikes xD
"Any desire to learn CNC stuff?" Yeah that's like asking Hendrix if he ever though of learning to play the triangle... Where did they find this bloke?
Yes I did chuckle when he said that.
“I am the CNC” ... explains it all
I am the cnc basically 🤣🤣
Maybe he should have done some home work, before coming out with that comment 😂
@@acelectricalsecurity Yeah, or at the very least shown a little bit of enthusiasm or interest. It sounded like he was only there because he drew the short straw. "Oh jeez, _I_ have to speak to the weird English guys?.."
Allen handle that condescending interviewee very well 👍🇬🇧
Err..Allen is the interviewee?
guy on the right has no forking clue ,love the Millyards true visionaries.
Unfortunately this interview was painful, Allen deserves an interviewer that understands the passion and thoughts behind his projects, not some random interview in a park. Also Allen is right about weight not being a big deal, very keen to explore his designs!!
But also, Like Steve said. It's not even a prototype, but really a concept. There wasn't any stress tests or analysis. It was purposefully over built and was made in three hours.
Not going to lie... the interviewer needs to take an enthusiasm pill 🤣🤣
He didn't get that EVERY thing is manufactured in Allen's shed and bbq!!!!!
Dude just doesn't get it that Allen isn't it for the money. Just marches to a different beat. Thank God for that.
I don't think Allen needs the money, he does it for the love of doing.
Millyard has got to be the coolest dude out there and he seemed fed up with this interview
With good cause.
@@vk2aafhamradio that interviewer looked like he couldn't care less
Allen is a human genius. His channel is brilliant. His ideas are brilliant. I have air fox floaters and Rockshox on my giant anthem and I am over the cost, the unavailability of getting a “complete” seal kit not just the basic seal kit. I don’t want to return my shock to the manufacturer when I can easily do it at home because they won’t supply the unobtainium damper/lockout seals.
For fuck sake a $1 o ring and I have to go through a bike shop that then sends it to the manufacturer to rebuild and back again?
We need more Allen’s in this world and don’t get me started on $8000 dollar mtb’s....compare an $8000 mx bike and a mtb....seriously?
The thing to remember is MTB's are not made for people who've been biking all along. They are marketed as instant gratification lifestyle purchases and do far more miles on the backs of SUV's and uplift trucks than they do being pedalled from A to B. Current bikes are not designed to last or to be cheap to maintain, they're designed to allow people who have no interest in how bikes work mechanically or how to ride them to not kill themselves on rough trails and to keep them paying for servicing and parts until they realise that a new bike is usually easier.
Give me a mid to late 90s full suspension Alloy or Ti mountain bike over any of these new carbon shyt modern frames..get modern disk mounts welded on and there is your perfect 25lb 4inch travel trail bike
Allen is beyond a genius, I've known about him for at least as long as his completely custom Kawasaki 1300cc V12 Z1.....but Allen is also the person who doesn't want money, he doesn't want fame....he builds these crazy things and literally gives them away (most of his motorcycles are in a museum), and he goes over absolutely everything he builds and shows you exactly what to do and how to do it.... just like his suspension and his MTB's...who else would show off a completely new, trick piece of kit that could make him millions and say "it's simple, build it, I'm not going to patent it"? 😅 (He really should though, he'd be beyond wealthy if he built and sold all his creations, but he'd rather show you how)
I love this guy, never seen true genius like him before. I love how he just builds his own engines, shocks and whatever else he wants and is totally casual about it
If you go to his UA-cam channel and check out the Flying Millyard, his true genius is very apparent.
Been in engineering and design for 35 years. Its a long term fascination when to cut metal and when to stop the CAD? Ill make prototypes direct on lathe and/or manual mill. In many instances the final outcome is better/faster/different to that envisioned by CAD.
Have we lost what Alan has? The craftsman/designer who "sees" the finished solution as hes making it is a very very productive innovator. Totaly agree dont always reinvent the wheel, be aware of "old wheels". Thats an interesting shock concept, the simplest solutions are the best.......Orange Segment 29er rider.
Graham Sutton agreed
It's a very different world now a days, as you stated, we have to adapt. Crazy deadlines, the ability to share drawings between teams faster and more efficiently, and value engineering are top priorities. I am a product designer and it's the same. We no longer have the luxury of just thinking, designing, or building hand mockups (in many cases) everything is GO GO GO, cheaply.
@@2WheelsGood.01 Ive now retired after running a design engineering facility in good profit year on year for 44 years employing around 25 people so I was faced with the financial reality of design / production decisions day to day. Getting as many heads together as effectively as possible juggling peoples egos with team focus was the key. Working from home in COVID was the nail in the coffin for me.
I have spent time in sales, and there is a method called leading questions that funnel a person to a limited numbers of answers, which funnels the answers to a limited amount of outcomes. I can see how that would play out in engineering if you have to start out in CAD you have already funnelled/limited a engineer into a certain limited number of answers to a problem, I can see how original solutions that exist outside the NC programming box could be overlooked and never considered, thus stiffling innovation.
@@slartybartfarst9737
Oh man the yank is so annoying, doesn't get the British built in the shed outlook at all....
He's a typical American, not a thinker.
😂😂 stay classy fellas
The outlook in the US is very different, as garage tinker types almost always create garbage that never looks quite done and rarely works, so when people see garage products that look finished and as good or better to what they see as sales people, government workers, basic construction workers, educators, and retail class consumers, they don't know what to think as nobody they know really has any of these skills, so they assume it is made from the gods and bought at walmart. The people who do know don't interact with the rest because the average person always acts like this interviewer, a one-upper who is totally off-base, thinks he's gonna give a master like this advice, as if you could get to to Allen's level without knowing about cnc, surprised he didn't try to inform him about 3d printing.
@@fishyfool No. He is a typical ignorant A__ hole. There are plenty of them, all over the world. He had very little idea of what he was talking about, or the accomplishments of who he was trying to interview. There are plenty of us "yanks", who are thinkers, respectful and creative. We just don't go around interviewing geniuses, and you don't see or hear much from us.
I hope I'm not reaching, I just feel that this interviewer did not know who he is interviewing and probably didn't bother to research at all.
Correct.
Wait... so it has 6 parts total all of which are dirt cheap, the only one that might wear out is a 20 pence seal so it will last effectively forever, it's indestructible in any survivable landing, it outperforms the market leading high tech solution, you adjust it by changing the weight of the oil you fill it with & its performance is stable from one year to the next, & it's old tech that probably isn't patentable, just being applied in a way nobody previously tried.
I'm sure the $1000 boutique mountain bike shock industry will get right on that as a replacement for all their current & future products...
The current shock manufacturers won't be doing this any time soon. No patents, so they can't just go and sell it for $2000 like they normally would, because it's not worth $2000 and we all know that. Also, those brands probably rely on spare parts sales and servicing to some degree. They'd much rather market something complicated and overly adjustable with a high price tag, because the average joe will be sold on all those anodized knobs and switches.
Also, good luck trying to create a product hierarchy for such a simple design. It's not about starting with a base model and improving it. It's about starting with a flagship model and making it worse, which actually takes a lot of effort.
@@Metal-Possum Err... yes... exactly. But it would be quite funny if you turned up to a few Mountain Bike World Championship Downhill events with a bike using properly sorted versions of these suspenders & gave it to a couple of the Athertons to race, & they spanked everybody on them... you'd probably be asked to leave :-)
@@Metal-Possumyou nailed it , pretty much what was going to say
They wont copy him because theres no profit in a bike that lasts. What a horrible business idea. No one would ever upgrade if bikes were built like millyard
@@Metal-Possum Exactly, the patents protect the manufacturers investment. They care about nothing else. The whole patent system is the biggest stifling hindrance on the progress of technology.
I love Allen Millyard. Proper expert geek craftsman doing it for fun. ❤️
Interviewer,
"so Allen, what's on the lathe at the moment"?
Allan,
"The future"!!!
It leaked because you used a Landrover part for the shaft :P
Bad jokes aside, really amazing work. Best wishes for the future, and please find a way to bring this to us “normal people “
Amazing!!!! I am afraid to change the oil in my fork and this guy is making his own suspension....
Just love the way Allen stays so humble when being pushed on the possibility of taking the shocks to production. Just goes to show that all the boffins at RockShox etc can't compete with a true engineering genius.
Surely this a perfect project for a company like Hope! They’ve got most of the equipment needed to bang these out! Let’s see something new in suspension.
I’d love to see Allen chat with Chris Porter about this stuff. Between those 2 something amazing could happen.
I think Chris Porter is too busy putting EXT into production.
The fit and forget design philosophy Hope are mostly aiming for in their parts would be a great fit with making this. I'm not at all convinced the damping will match top end shocks because if it did that's all that would have ever been used, but for non-pro level riders, having something that works more than well enough and won't spend most of it's life oozing oil and wasting their time and money on designed in maintenance issues would be an easy sell for me and many others. A lot of the reason the vast majority of my riding is on a hardtail is because of the relative lack of maintenance compared to full suspension, and I've still ended up binning forks because fixing the damping systems or fork bushings when they shit themselves is more a waste of more time and money than just buying another fork.
@@peglor like Allen said just because everyone else is doing something one way doesn't mean that there is not a better way.... That shock has damping performance equal or better than the very best Fox or Rock Shocks ect ect
@@nigelsmith7366 How do you know? Have you ridden it or seen independently measured data? The internet is full of similar stories of magical new tech that will change the world, but never amounts to anything, usually due to some fundamental flaw that's obvious to anyone building similar equipment.
This shock at least has the benefit over most of these devices of actually existing, but very little else is known about it - there's every chance for example that it either doesn't work very well without a lot of minding, has been patented by a shock company already that can't make it work as well as their existing products or if it does work well, it may infringe on industry patents the bike industry can't afford or isn't interested in licencing.
Millyard is very unlikely to run into any problem with this with one-off builds, but it will be a major problem for anything that will be mass produced and sold.
@@peglor 🤣 you have no idea what you are talking about
After watching a vid featuring AM and his work I spend the rest of the day just shaking my head in disbelieve
Can not think of anyone else I’d like to hear from than those two.
What a total legend the millyyard is puts bike manufacturers to shame
Allen is the best! True visionary genius!
Great Father and Son team! Allen is a genius! He builds what he wants!
“Allen, have you ever thought of letting a computer do all the work for you and to take all the joy of creativity out of it?”
Love this guy, super interesting.
Can't wait for Allen's next motorcycle project.
Ive never seen some one so disinterested in something that is so interesting.. Allen and Stephen are great guys doing something a little different compared to the big boys and creating some great bike tech, out of a small garden shed..
Was the interviewer just given the mic at the last minute because the real one didn’t turn up?
Can you imagine what would have happened if you’d got Mike Burrows (RIP) and Allen Millyard together on a project? The mind boggles at what they could have done, but they never met. Such a shame.
Love that they’re using transition sentinel bikes (which I am also riding). Proper seal of approval.
"Singeltrack Magazine"? Should be called "Singelmind Magazine". It's all about money...
Man, you'r interviuing a softspoken genious who's making miracles in he's shed out of pure love of creating.
As he said, he's selling just to make the next project possible.
First time i seen Allen's naked alloy framed downhill bike i loved the beast, and i like the red one.
I love it, all freehand turning, parts robbed from the scrapyard.
So, the obvious question is, can we crowd-source some expertise to draw up plans for hobbyists? If he's up for it, surely we can help.
British shed-dwelling mechanical genius interviewed by aging American enduro bro. These guys are from different planets. What a painful interview.
Not sure if " playing around " was quite the right term , Alan is an original thinker and inventor .
He freely admits that he hasn't invented anything here - in the interview he says that the whole concept is pre-1950s technology and there's no intellectual property to protect. Not that it would stop a large corporation getting patents on it anyway because nobody could afford to fight them in court.
For years, for example, anyone who wanted to sell a 4 bar linkage suspension bike in the US had to pay Specialized royalties because Horst Leitner of AMP Research (Who was another bike innovator in the 80s and 90s) managed to patent it and Specialized bought the patent.
To see some of his work, look for pictures of the AMP B2 and then check what year it's from and what else was around at the time if you have any doubts on his work being ahead if its time. The Rocky Mountain San Andreas is the only bike from around then that qualifies as even more innovative - monocoque frame, upside down fork, bolt through axles and hydraulic disks when almost every other bike was on cantis.
I suspect the same patent got laughed out of the European patent offices because one of the rules for something to be patentable is that it 'should not be obvious to someone already working in the industry', so it should have failed at the first hurdle, but I suspect because it was for bicycles it barely got looked at before being rubber stamped since the MTB industry was worth very little back then. It was however a good chunk of the reason short link 4 bar suspension systems (Which were not included in the patent) were developed initially.
Engineering history should be a much bigger part of the research process into new products though. So many 'new' problems have been solved already. I've done it myself where I use some obscure thing I know from some weird corner of the engineering world to solve a present problem. An entertaining internet rabbit hole to go down is to look up the workarounds for converting reciprocating motion to rotation as the crank was patented during the industrial revolution, so for years while the patent was active, steam engine makers had to use something else.
yep a genius well done allen and greetings from norfolk
@singletrack magazine, please don't use this "journalist" again. He's awful!
Please someone back the production of their designs
It's like hearing Mozart saying: it's not hard, you just think of some music and write it down
Reminds me of my dad. They'd come up with highly innovative ideas, and then be like "Ah that's nothing special it's just X Y and Z and a part from a whatever car".
Some people can build, some people can market, few can market what they can build!
interesting approach, EXT have gone for super low internal pressures to reduce stiction and they ride great too.
He's a legend isn't he
I wish the interviewer gave his impression on the ride.
I absolutely love how he shoves aside the imbecilic imperial system without batting an eye.
Bad choice of words there, i prefer working in decimal imperial sizes on the lathe as you can feel 1 thou of an inch. Which is the tolerance allen can machine to. (Ok 1/2 thou on a good day with correct temps lol) if you need better you grind it... And that is comming from someone brought up in the metric system, taught by my old rolls royce engineer.
This is the same shock system that has been used on commercial aircraft for the past 80 years with out any real challenges.
This guy is the biggest, baddest, most amazing specimen, yet hes soft spoken mild mannered and youd never guess hes putting miracles together in his gay-rage (garage britishly pronounced)
Please check Allen’s channel, he deserves a knighthood.
This interviewer has no idea who he is in the presence of..... absolutely zero idea.
Snide Amercan interviewer, got the impression he couldn't believe something made by a bloke in a shed was cutting edge!
Is the cameraman drunk?
2:33 You can hear him stand on a beer can
Dont think the corporate bike world either wants to or can understand Allen Millyard.
Love real British Engineers. I just wish they would put this into production. Would love to see how these products perform on some on the dyno machines EXT has. Love my storia and looking forward to my ERA fork, but really curious about this tech.
His designs transcend time. Does the interviewer have any idea on who and what he is interviewing or is he just intentionally keeping it extremely simple?
Yeah... Alan’s more or less a genius.
And the charm is that everything’s handmade and often with eye meassure even,
Hilarious that the other guy really doesn’t understand the whole concept. 😂
But nice to ser him in an interview though
Is the interviewer aware of the bikes he built for his son that are still way ahead of their time.
Took about 6 minutes for this guy to start realising Allen’s a genius. You can literally see the penny drop.
Some guys are soo cool
Sounds like a sharp dude 😎
Allen!!!! Please make the shock open source!!!!!!!
Makes you think how much the big brands are 'developing' new technologies mainly just for the marketing appeal and sales. Hype.
I get the impression the interviewer is talking down to Allen its just how hes talking to him. Ive noticed a lot of Americans will talk down to British guys. I see it and its obvious he doesn't respect Allens ideas etc allens a master he could really be a thorn in the side of fork manufacturers who rip us off all the time
I would love to get a frame built by this genius of mtbs.
Have a look at his channel.
Allen seems like a no Bs type of guy 🖒
The guy was really interested in the Z1 I think,
Interviewer was awful but both you guys are amazingly interesting, what a dad!
Fucking rude as hell interviewer ,a genius like millyard deserves more than a bloody yank coming over here n talking like it's just a joke cause he's a British man in a old shed making sure for his since. Point is HIS STUFF REALLY WORKS FIRST TIME NO BULLSHIT ADVERTISING IT JUST WORKS. WELL DONE MILLYARD FAMILY. KELLI UP GREAT IDEAS. BRITAIN IS WELL PROUD OF YOUR EFFORTS,!!!!
I see one major problem; it leaked becouse Alan isnt an expert in seals. This is one of the major component in suspension. The sticknes of the seal fight with movement of the shaft. Make it oil tight and seal will prevent smaller absorbtion and responsivness. Same hapens to dirtbikes. It's not all about damping ability. It's a war against friction.
These ideas or solutions are well known by all the top mb manufacturers. There’s a shitty thing called planned obsolescence in which all sensible solutions which require little replacement parts or repair are set aside for options that do! It absolutely sucks as we’re all being ripped off but that is the way of the world as it is. Unless we change it somehow!
It took me 3 hours to make the shock ......wow
The interviewer is a total clueless. So awkward!!
Allens voice in this interview reminds me little bit of old windows narrator.
This interviewer is ill prepared and slapdash. He has no clue what Allen is about and just how smart he is. Disgraceful.
Road crash interview! Legend v Well you choose?
Wizard. This interview could be hours long i bet. Sorry *days
I only got through 5 minutes & it felt like a week with this dickhead interviewer
Mate, do your research and bow down before the engineering god. 😎
Somebody make these…
Allen uses CAD. Cardboard Aided Design but generally he just cut it off the bat.
The interviewer is out of his depth talking to Allen 😂
God the guy doing the interview is so boring he has Allan and Stephen millyard there and doesn't seem interested i would be so excited to chat to them about this bike its nothing short off incredible they handled this terrible interview so well
If this shock is so good why aren't fox and other big companies not making it?
Because they can't patent it. The entire mountainbike industry is just about making a profit from people who don't know any better. If they wanted suspension to work better they'd be making forks open bath the way Marzocchi were doing it 20 years ago (works well enough on motorbikes, which is where Marzocchi came from). Has anyone yet made anything that works better than Marzocchi Shivers? Nope, didn't think so.
Man this interviewer is brain dead - allen millyard living legend
"People eat a burger, put on a pound in weight and then spend 50 pounds on titanium bolts to save weight". Nails the pointlessness of weight obsession.
The interviewer has no idea about pushing the envelope. If it’s not conventional it’s wrong. Yeah right. He should talk to Norman Hossack another amazing British engineer. He’s different again.
his shock is from the past. Has no future.
Yet it works better and lasts longer than anything the so-called 'professionals' are producing these days?
Do your research before interviewing people who are your betters. You should have been addressing him as "Me Lord"
The old "yo bro!" Yank was certainly out of his depth with this one.
Could do with getting an iterviewer that's actually interested in the subject.
If only this wasnt shot on an iPhone. Has the "I'm drunk" waves. Typical apple products. Maybe milyard should fix an apple device cause he fixes and improves everything else so bloody well !!
He’s American ,they just don’t get the British can do attitude . So wait for a over priced shocker to come out of Fox as the new great thing .
"have you tried cnc" --- Get the **** out of here!
The American guy just dont know who hes interviewing and why .. Hope he checks out Allens youtube after and kicks himself 😂
Interviewer has no clue!
Man you guys couldn't have done a second of research before hand? This is embarrassing
Poor bloke being forced out of bed to interview a non materialistic non American...
Just read the other comments - I think there is a universal view. Singletrack take note and get rid of this interviewer.
Weird isn’t it. It’s the most liked video 98% approval we’ve published for a while.
Singletrack Magazine I don’t think the interviewer did that badly, but the likes aren’t for the interviewer, I am 100% certain!
Singletrack Magazine Your reply to *ALL* the comments and feedback here is “yeah, whatever”? I see the clueless attitude runs deeper than just the interviewer. 😑 Maybe, just maybe think how extraordinarily interesting Allen is to somehow still give you your precious popularity stat with such a dire setup. Literally, the interview is not about you.