The adventure has begun – RCYL on the igus:bike world tour

15th October 2024, half past nine a.m. in Germany. Time for a second breakfast? Maybe. But what’s a lot more important: you could order our bike – at last! And at the same time, the igus:bike worldtour was about to begin.

igus? Yes exactly, the company behind RCYL. You can find out more about igus and the beginnings of RCYL here, by the way. But why did igus come up with the idea of starting a tour across different countries and continents? Simply because igus turned 60 on that day in October! The tour was organised to celebrate this and to say a big thank you to customers worldwide for their trust in igus products. And what could convey the igus message better than a bicycle made of “motion plastics”, the igus claim? Almost completely made of plastic, recyclable, from recycled materials, lubrication-free, corrosion-free, innovative. The igus:bike actively draws attention to the importance of sustainable mobility. A nice side effect for the RCYL team: the bike is being put through its paces under various climatic conditions worldwide!

The starting signal was given in the new production hall, where the RCYL bike is also manufactured. The bike went on its first kilometre of the planned 6,000. It toured Germany for the first few weeks, with stops in major cities such as Cologne, Munich, Hamburg and Berlin.

It also made trips to smaller towns, however. They had one thing in common: they all included short visits to igus customers. People marvelled at applications with igus products, whether energy chains, plain bearings etc., customers were interviewed, people could try out the RCYL bike – and a short video of the customer visit and day tour was made, edited and uploaded to the igus:bike worldtour blog. Of course, the video was accompanied by a short account of the day and various photos.

Once a week, the trip included days for sightseeing, for example, to the Eibsee below the Zugspitze, the Allgäu and Lake Constance. The North Sea was also explored – well, at least a small part of it 😅

The tour wouldn’t be referred to as a world tour had it been limited to Germany. That’s why we set off from an icy 1°C with snow in Germany towards Asia! The next stop: Singapore. Ten o’clock in the morning, 33°C, 90% humidity! The styling is perfect, the bike’s on the road, one kilometre after another are scorching the tarmac.

Next stop: Vietnam!

Followed closely by Taiwan, where people are crazy about bikes.

And then we arrived in India.

By the way, here’s an overview of the countries that we’ve already travelled to and those that will follow. We’ll stay in Asia for a while, then we’ll continue in Europe. All in all, a real endurance test for our RCYL bike! Stay tuned – you’ll find updates on the igus blog and selected country highlights here in this blog.