Zilch Reinvents the Bike Pump Head for Best One-Handed Inflation

Because the invention of the pneumatic bicycle tire, riders have been pressured to air up their rides. At this level, there are a number of totally different bike pump head designs, however for Fernando Tages, the Founding father of Radian USA/Chainlift, there needed to be a greater method. It’s a traditional story, man will get uninterested in a difficulty he faces on daily basis, and decides to discover a technique to repair it.

Uninterested in fighting present pump heads and shedding air when eradicating the chuck from the valve, Fernando determined to place his 30+ years of product design and manufacturing to make use of and Radian USA got here up with Zilch. That’s, a reasonably attention-grabbing bike pump referred to as the Zilch.

It’s value stating that this isn’t Radian USA’s first rodeo. We wrote in regards to the model in 2020 with their Chainlift machine, which is a singular device to assist with bicycle upkeep. Now, with Zilch, Radian USA is poised to succeed in much more shoppers with a patented pump design that appears like a house run.

The principle purpose of Zilch is to make tire inflation simpler. Most pump heads both require you to pressure the valve by way of a rubber grommet or to make use of two fingers to function a locking mechanism on the chuck. Zilch makes use of a one-handed design that goes onto the valve with zero effort.

That’s as a result of till you lock the deal with in place, there’s nothing to the touch the valve. The Zilch head makes use of a patented auto-locking lever with a diametral seal design with two sides that squeeze onto the (presta) valve. Once you’ve inflated the tire, a squeeze of the lever unlocks it, and prevents any air from escaping from the valve. Once more, there’s nothing touching the valve at this level, so you may effortlessly take away the chuck from the valve–no extra struggling to take away the pump, solely have it launch and jerk your hand into the cassette tooth.

What about Schrader valves? Zilch works with Schrader valves, however you could use one of many included adapters. These adapters thread onto the Schrader valve and will be left in place with out air loss. The identical is true for Dunlop valves.

Packing a lifetime guarantee for the pump head, the Zilch head can also be absolutely user-rebuildable with replaceable elements.

Offered solely as a part of a whole ground pump or store inflators, the ground pump has some attention-grabbing options as properly. A fast docking characteristic for the pump head ensures that it stays in place on the pump deal with and able to seize at a second’s discover. The pump deal with additionally has an auto-centering characteristic to return it to the identical place so the pump head dock is all the time there. A big triangular base helps to forestall tipping, and if it does tip, rubber ends on the deal with ought to stop injury. The deal with additionally acts as storage for the included adapters for Schrader valves (2x) and a needle inflator.

At the moment holding three patents within the U.S. and with a number of patents pending internationally, the Zilch pump head has additionally been acknowledged with a 2025 Design and Innovation award.