As above I’m looking for a really cheap hardtail frame with rear disc mounts. My current hardtail has a disc converter on it so I can run a disc on a non disc frame – but this won’t work with a bike trailer. Talking standard 9mm qr hub / 135mm.

Found a cheapie Chinese mass produced frame – but it appears to have a 44mm headtube. Can this be reduced down to run a 1 1/8th fork (retro bomber z1) with some kind of special headset?

Yes, just buy something like this-

http://www.wiggle.co.uk/brand-x-headset-44iiss-sealed/

there’s nowt special about the headset, it’s just a boggo zero stack effort.

Yep, zs44 headset / bottom cup if you want it to be invisible. Or, external cup with an adapter on the fork steerer (Hope) which the 1.5 crown race then goes on to. The latter option will have about 10mm more stack height

Or one of these-

http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/brand-x-headset-44iess-sealed/rp-prod130931

£10 for a headset, there’s no need to get all Hope spendy on a cheap frame! These use larger (tapered size) bearings in the bottom so if you ever swap to tapered forks you only need a new crown race.

Thanks for the replies – I asked for more detail on the headtube and it appears it’s 44mm top / 55mm bottom is this a standard tapered headtube?

If so, do the above products still apply or do I need something different. Hovering over the buy it now at the moment…..

Surely you just go second hand for this.

There are loads of 26inch bikes with no “purpose”

This should fit:
brand-x-headset-44-56iiss

Should work just fine, you will need a ZS tapered headset (ZS44/28.6 top, ZS55/40 bottom), then a reduction on the fork (either a crown race, or an adapter, depending on the manufacturer of the headset).

l.e. or the headset mentioned above 🙂
l.l.e: I see ZS55 (rather than the standard ZS56) specified on the Synchros website as a Scott-specific size, you will need to check the exact size of the headtube

Ok. Thanks for the advice. Tempted to order the frame and give it a whirl. The wife may kill me dead though for buying bike stuff I don’tneed. She’s not massively keen on the idea of our daughter going in a bike trailer anyway (but lets ignore that).

Josh vegas – you’d think that – but the Chinese frame is £70 delivered. All the 26er frames that I’ve found 2nd hand are going for at least that – or they are really tatty.