Do 26" race bikes use bottom bracket heights that are that low? Just curious.
What kind of 29"er would a Ridemonkey fan buy?
- Thread starter Cloxxki
- Start date
Funny.
Problem with Fox coming around to releasing a 5" fork is that it'll probably have their new 15mm axle. A new "standard" that really isn't a standard is just dumb. I've always thought that Fox was screwing the pooch by not having a 32 with 20mm axle. Oh well. RS will probably have a Pike 29er before too long. White Bros seems to be hit and miss. People that love them love them and then everyone else seems to think they suck. I also note that some of the folks (on eMpTy BeeR) seem to have an inside with the White folks and get special mods that us plebians can't get. Probably not true but that's my perception anyway.
I really like my Spot and I'll probably be really happy with it for a few years. I've been tossing around picking up a boring steel SS 29er. New trail we're building here would be perfect for it.
You can do that pretty inexpensively these days and you might not find it that "boring" either.
No doubt it will be fun...I guess I mean boring more like "everyone and their mom" has/had a steel SS 29er as their first 29er.
Gotcha.
Man that drawing makes my back and hip flexors hurt - holy "ass up/heads down"! Looks fast to me, just not particularly appealing for an all day ride.. I'll echo Mark here - why so low on the BB? Did you choose that number to help it rail corners, or is it to help keep your fit numbers the same and it worked out that way? I guess if it's a race only type of ride you shouldn't have much concern seeing as how so many XC courses are not too techy these days, to say the least.. Be sure to post some pics when you build it.
Honestly,
That bike (with the low-ass bb) is designed to excel on two or three courses that I've always loved. One is the Knobschorcher race at the Tsali trails in North Carolina. As a jr I was so close to winning that race so many times... You never slow down, you never get out of the big ring, and the race finishes with a 2 mile fire-road descent.
Bump and Grind in Birmingham is another course i had in mind, as was Sea Otter. I think it'd be a great bike for races like Cheaqumegon, IceMan, and Leadville as well, as long as I can fit a triple for Leadville. It would work pretty well at some of the early season New England races, like Farmington, and of course, would make one hell of a short-track bike too...
I wouldn't want to race it anywhere that has an appreciable amount of steep climbing, as I still think 26" wheels are going to win the battle there with their lower-overall weight, and I'd rather have higher volume tires and at least front suspension to descend at a place like Mt Snow.
I finished stock geometry numbers for all of our bikes months ago, but right now I'm designing team bikes. Except for me, everyone we are sponsoring next year is a Pro road racer. Except for the 6-8 races they'll do next year, they'll spend less than 30 days on their bikes. So working off a neutral position for them is important.
The low bb and the extreme offset on the fork will make the bike handle just like a 'cross bike, quick as hell to intiate a turn, but utterly planted, making the bars as low as possible by design makes it much easier to raise them to find the perfect weight distribution to keep the handling neutral.
If I can source a half-decent 7005 downtube with a race build the bike should be about 18 pounds. For all intents and purposes, it is a 'cross bike, with the proper adjustments made to optimize it for 2 hour semi-technical mtb races.
One of my primary (and favorite) XC bikes actually has an 11.3" bb with 26" wheels. It's about the bare-minimum height with 700mm diameter tires to keep the pedals off the ground through off-cambers, and the cornering traction is so good I intentionally run tires without much lateral grip to make the back end break free easier (because I like to pretend to be Sam Hill). An added benefit is that the bike climbs phenomenally out of the saddle, without having to go to a slacker seat angle to move more of my weight over the rear wheel.
High BB's and short stays are good for seated steep climbs, or super steep, tech and tight standing climbs, so they are great for trail bikes etc... For race bikes lower and longer actually gives you more traction on the gradients you are usually standing on.
Sure, there is more of chance to hit chainrings and cranks on rocks, but after 2 or three years of too much dh bike riding I got used to a bb that was effectively even lower, so it poses little trouble on a hardtail!
Somewhere around here I must have the drawings of what our possible "production" 29er will look like. That bike is higher, steeper, shorter and better for slower riding in every respect. But this thread is all about what we want! Good "trail" 29er hardtails are a commodity these days, with more and more every day, or so it seems. And that's great, for people who want 'em!
