While visiting the Gates Carbon Drive System booth at the 2010 Outdoor Demo in Boulder City, NV, there was one bike the jumped out as being completely unique from all of the other manufacturers using the belt drive system. That manufacturer was Boo Bicycles from Ft. Collins, Colorado. The feature that really made this bike stand out was the use of bamboo as the main tubes and stays of the frame. Bamboo is one of those materials that has picked up steam as a building material in the mainstream recently due to its beauty and more importantly its sustainability as a building material.
Unlike traditional lumber, bamboo can be harvested for use as a building material in a few years as opposed to a few decades. For centuries, Eastern cultures have used bamboo for everything including building shelters, weapons, food and textiles. Boo is certainly not the first manufacturer to use bamboo in a bicycle frame, but they are one of the few to use the material in every single frame they produce. Continue reading Hands-on: Boo! Freighting Good Ride With Bamboo