Best known as the home of cycling for a few days in Monterey, California, Sea Otter has developed into a worldwide trade show with events held in Girona and Australia, where brands descend to show off their wares. And with Australia being as far-flung as it gets, there’s surely going to be some interesting and hairbrained bike tech coming from the land of dinner-plate-sized spiders and all of the snakes.
Curve Cycling Uprock 32 Prototype
Australian brand Curve’s show was strong this year, and it’s set to bring 32-inch wheels to its lineup, much like everyone else, seemingly. This brand is best known for creating sleek titanium frames for road, gravel, and mountain biking. But Curve is no stranger to experimenting, with its 00Kev combining titanium lugs and carbon tubes, but the brand looks to have gone all in on big wheels.
This version of its Uprock is a 32er, with the model prior rolling in 29-inch hoops. Although the wheel size has changed, we expect its intent to remain the same, as it’s the brand’s cross-country mountain bike that, on the 29-inch model, at least, runs 120mm of suspension travel at the front. If the old model is anything to go by, the new 32-inch prototype looks like it’ll come with sliding dropouts, allowing users to properly switch up their drivetrains, allowing for the installation of single-speed and even Rohloff systems.
FSA KFX i30 32” Carbon Wheelset
Surprisingly, 32-inch wheels are pretty hard to come by, but that looks primed to change as we move into 2027. And funnily enough, that Curve prototype is rolling on a set of wagon wheels from FSA. The brand’s KFX series is all about lightweight carbon goodness for cross-country riding, which gives us an excellent idea of what its KFX i30 32″ wheels are aimed at.
As the wheelset is slated to release in spring 2027, we don’t have too many details on FSA’s entry into 32-inch hoops, but its name suggests a 30mm internal width and that it’s built from carbon.
Paradigm Bikes also jumps on the 32-inch hype train
Starting as a BMX Steel Frame maker, Dane, the owner of Paradigm Bikes, has been dabbling with making mountain bikes. At the show, he showed two hardtail mountain bikes to ogle, with one being a full 32-inch-wheeled machine and the other being a 32-inch mega-mullet (32 front and 29 rear). Both feature sleek steel tubing, and the brand has gone for suspension forks from Wren, both donning upside-down constructions. We imagine that the bulk of this decision was made to achieve the clearance the 32-inch wheel needs.
The mega mullet bike then dons a set of tyres from CST, another tyre brand that’s set to offer big tyres for big wheels.
At the moment, we have no details on when the bike will be available, but the bikes look amazing with the special powder coat tone on the frame.
This Teewing Flux goes single-speed, because who needs gears on an e-MTB?
MSC Moto AU’s vibration-damping stem
As you might have guessed from its name, MSC Moto AU has roots nestled deep into the world of motocross, initially building steering dampers and anti-vibration bar mounts for motocross teams in Australia. However, as many motorsports companies have, the brand has turned its attention to mountain biking, bringing its anti-vibration technology to a mountain bike stem.
The idea behind this is to reduce arm fatigue, or arm pump, during enduro races by introducing four elastomers that are sandwiched between the steerer clamp and the bar clamp.
MCS Moto AU is also prototyping some cool-looking pedals that will be coming to market in a couple of months, according to Vaughan Cumming, the technical manager/product designer.
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