Turning a DH bike into a freeride bike.

36 chainring, with a 11-34 casette work wonders. switch to single ply tires and light tubes and you have 3 pounds less.

the boxxer is quite light as it is, but you might drop about a pound, by going to a 160 talas, but that will run you at least $1000. if you get a lighter wheelset, ($500) you will loose another pound. but then you would have dropped $1500 into this bike, and you might better off just buying a used $1500 140mm bike.

I'm sure you can tweak it to make you happy.

You'd have to check the axle-to-crown specs on the forks to be certain (I'm too lazy to do it now) but I suspect that a Talas 180 would only just barely effect your geometry in the full-travel position. Dropping it would help a bit, but if your frame has a 1.5" head tube, consider using an Angleset to change the head tube angle, so you can keep all of your fork travel all the time.

For gearing, I run 34t up front and 11-36 (10-speed) cassette. Top-end is slightly limiting, but it gets low enough for everything I was riding my AM bike on, so I'm happy with the tradeoff.

I use a TALAS 180 for freeriding and love it. At full travel it's about the same height and nearly as capable as my 888 and when lowered it makes climbing much more comfortable. I think you have a coil Boxxer so it'll drop some weight too. Get the 34 11-36 gearing and a dropper post and you'll be trail riding that Aurum and loving it.

why don't you sell it and buy a bike thats more appropriate for what you want, with the correct geo.

blackohio said:

why don't you sell it and buy a bike thats more appropriate for what you want, with the correct geo.

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I have to agree. This will be more economical than having to do all the changing with the gears.

Ride it the way it is. Couple months you won't even notice the weight.