Quote Originally Posted by JamesWoodman View Post
"it's not marketing hype, it's scientifically proven". "Get a grip" is the response that should be given to anyone stating that!

All of this marketing hype got me rather wound up last night. I'd like to attribute it to the fact I'm jet lagged and over-tired like a toddler, but the phrase "50% stronger, 50% more elastic, 50% harder wearing" is particularly annoying me. 50% more than what?! You would assume the rubber used in previous versions of the shoe?

When I click to "See the science" on inov-8s website, I get a dummies guide to materials testing without actual referral to the ISO or ASTM tests used, any results, or any comparisons. However a media statement from Manchester University back in December states "Our unique formulation makes these outsoles 50% stronger, 50% more stretchy and 50% more resistant to wear than the corresponding industry standard rubber without graphene.” This "industry standard rubber" presumably isn't the rubber used in previous versions of the shoes! Interestingly Manchester Uni have also removed this crucial bit of information from their most recent media statement on 20th June, again leaving you wondering exactly what the new shoes are 50% greater than.

When I have a minute I'm gunna do some searching for the actual science (for my own interest if nothing else). Manchester Uni must be publishing stuff on this given its been partly funded through an EPSRC Impact Acceleration grant and Innovate UK (as in the government research agency not the shoe brand), that's of course unless inov-8 have managed to get some kind of non-disclosure agreement in place pending patents.

Whether it makes a good pair of shoes or not, the science is quite intriguing. In my material mechanical testing knowledge (albeit most of that in crushing rock, rather than trying to create something that will stick to rock), I'm curious as to how you mix something like graphene, which is reportedly the stiffest material known, (young's modulus of ~1 TPa) with something rubber-esque (young's modulus when behaving linearly elastically at small strains of ~0.1 GPa) to produce a material that is "more stretchy"? I'd have thought at the micro level with increasing strain you just get large amounts of shear occurring at the interface between the rubber and graphene particles.

I'm sure there is decades worth of interesting research in to applied rubber technology in the tyre manufacturing industry and other sporting industries such as rock climbing that could be applied to make a seriously grippy pair of running shoes, and that could probably all be done without producing a load of media hype full of buzz words, or committing daylight robbery.
You would say that though given you are obviously in the pocket of Big Stone. We know you discovered the secret ingredient to perfect rubber ages ago but you've been suppressing it because you want to keep crushing rocks.

I'm glad you cropped up here because I was going to ask you for your opinion if you made it through epic jet lag to Buttermere on Saturday. I'm glad your suspicions reflect mine, especially with respect to how a non-flexible 2D material is relevant to solving the problem. It seems odd, like using the latest developments in AI as a revolutionary sun screen. Either way, I would be curious to see where their other sole compounds compare to baseline they've tested against.

By the way, you don't even need a patent application for embargoing these IP things. It's a win-win because industry gains the authenticity of academic research groups and the research groups get perfect case studies for "impact" in the REF. I'd be surprised if any publications come out of it. It's likely a thesis will be unembargoed in a few years after the marketing hype has died down.

Matthew