Bike wheel with fabric strips instead of wires?

A couple of days ago I saw a bike parked on Kinzie Street that appeared to have some kind of fabric/kevlar strips in the wheels in place of the usual wires. The bike looked expensive and store-bought, not any kind of homemade or DIY thing. I've never seen anything like it before and Google isn't turning anything up -- does anyone know what I saw?

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Permalink Reply by daWillinChi on April 27, 2012 at 11:58am

Could it be something like this:

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Permalink Reply by Far'arned Retrogrumpalunkus #63 on April 27, 2012 at 12:06pm

They have these things that work like zipties as a temporary solution to replace a broken spoke. So I don't doubt that someone has made a whole wheel out of something similar. Could save a few ounces? Who knows? High tech bike stuff is cool. Maybe someday it will become common.

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Permalink Reply by millenial removing Bernie tattoo on April 27, 2012 at 12:08pm

Spokes. They're called spokes.

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Permalink Reply by Duppie on April 27, 2012 at 12:20pm

What did they do to the fiber to make it mad?

Just Will said:

Could it be something like this:

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Permalink Reply by Aaron Wilson on April 27, 2012 at 12:25pm

That could be it, Will, but I thought I saw some kind of hook or attachment between the rim and the strip. Definitely not fiberfix, the "strips" were at least 1/2" wide.