Nitto Large Bar End Plug
New Product Introduction.
Whenever I talk about my bike fetish, I’m filled excitement, but I also have the fear that people won’t relate as much.
The topic of today is bar end plugs.
Do you guys like bar end plugs?
This specific component does not improve the performance of the bike and they are certainly not a bike part that requires rotation performance or durability like hubs, BBs, etc, but I love bar end plugs.
It’s like parsley on a nice steak, or like shredded seaweed on a nice sashimi bowl. My analogy may not be good, but bar end plugs are great parts that adds that one last steez if you choose the correct style plugs to the correct build.
There are many types of bar end plugs.
Wine cork on a Rivendell is always nice
Gilles Berthoud makes bar end plugs with leather, which they extremely good at. Bar ends should always be different depending on what type of build you are going for.
That said, Nitto makes the perfect aluminum bar end plugs. They are bolt on type and looks great on most bike builds.
The EC-01 for 23.8mm drop bar ends
The EC-02 for 22.2mm flat bar end
The outer diameter of the handlebar and the bar end plug matches perfectly. They are just beautiful.
As you can see, Nitto already had these flawless bar end plugs, but my fetish was unfortunately not yet satisfied. Therefore, I asked (or annoyed at this point) if Nitto could make the third bar end plug. A size that I always crave.
The one on the very left is the new NITTO FW-25″Large Bar End”.
If you saw this and thought of BMX, you are correct. I designed these based off from the plastic bar end plugs that would come with BMX grips.
However, I did not design these for BMX
I designed this so that people can choose the right bar end plugs for their bikes with “that sort of grips”, regardless of the type of bicycles.
Six colors are now available.
I LOVE using Oury grips on my personal bikes. I also love poking a hole in the Oury grips and shoving a big bar end plug in it. I just like how they look.
It’s something I can’t explain but love, so it’s a fetish, but I would like to take this opportunity to explain this feeling.
I didn’t really like putting the EC-02 bar ends on an MTB grip that has a large flange. It just doesn’t feel right to me. I started thinking that I can solve this if we had bigger bar end plugs.
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So I started using BMX bar ends with Our grips, just like this↑
Oury + big bar end plugs started to turn me on at this point.
I was unfortunately unable to find the 10/10 bar end plugs, but I think the ODI one was the closest.
Aluminum, bolt on and BMX grip size.
However, the ODI bar tapes had unfortunately gone discontinued. I bought most of the stocks that were left, but those stocks had come to an end.
It’s funny how most of my bikes have the Oury + big bar end plug set up.
Jackie, our staff who still rides BMX says that most parks are banning metal bar end plugs, which was interesting. That could be the main reason for ODI discontinuing those aluminum bar ends.
As I’m writing this, I found Issue’s track bike which had the ODI bar end plugs in question, so I’m going to use this as an example.
Here’s what the bar ends look like on a 22.2mm flat bar.
I just love the way it looks when squishing in the big bar ends to thick grips with a big flange.
Squish
So I thought it would be just perfect if Nitto had a bolt on bar end plug in this style with their beautiful finish.
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I love using these bar ends with Oury Grips, but they aren’t specifically for Ourys. I’m very stoked to see our customers and friends at the shop trying to find a good looking combination. The size of these Nitto Large Bar Ends are slightly different to the ODI bar ends. The reason for that is that I wanted to use these on ESI Racers Edge too.
I know some of y’all get a kick out of this look.
Here’s Digi’s baby bike Omnium.
He’s using them with ESI grips. I’m very happy that a well organized mechanic like Digi chose these bar ends.
Shamy cut the edges off the WTB Trail Grips and put them on. It looks great and I love that he didn’t choose Oury grips. Happy.
Wentz with the classic Oury combo. He’s probably influenced by Hunter, like myself. Happy.
Jackie usese them with BMX grips. Happy.
Santa got them as nip covers for the summer. Not happy.
There should be more good looking combinations out there. I would love to see what you guys come up with.
Buying them with your partner and trading one is also a fun way to enjoy these bar end plugs.
Thank you for reading.
-Tani