My son had a medium Stiffee a couple of years ago which I built with spare parts. Now he’s 18 he’s asked for another bike. Since the medium Stiffee was great fun but too small for me I’ve scored a large Stiffee frame in the expectation that this time we’ll both ride it.
However I’m around 70kg fully loaded, whereas he’s about 115kg at the last weigh-in, and an inch or two taller. Fortunately he doesn’t seem to have quite clocked this….
He doesn’t ride hard, although I might, and the bike should get his weight down but when I got the calculator out I realised I’d need heavier kit than I’m used to.
An SLX groupset takes care of the drivetrain – probably switch chain for Sram and shifters for Sram X0 gripshift.
My XC FS bike has Mavic XM819 UST wheels – the heavier-duty bike has DT Swiss 5.1 tubeless wheels (they were a bit of a pain to seal with DT’s kit but allow wider tyres). I prefer tubeless so I’ll probably transfer the 819s and get myself some new lightweight wheels. Maybe Stans ZTR Crest for my XC bike.
I might take the coil Pikes from my Ventana X5 and fit a stiffer spring – or get an air shock for the Stiffee so we can switch easily.
Lastly disk brakes – The Stiffee’s going to need bigger rotors than my usual 160s, but what size? CRC have a good offer on the Formula Oro K18s with 160mm rotors – but those rotors are surely too small? Actionsports.de have an offer on a pair of Formula Megas with 200mm rotors for Eur 189, or see what people are selling here – Maguras, Formulas or Shimano?
I’ll get secondhand kit to cut the cost. So suggestions please – what air shocks, brakes and rotors will get the best out of the Stiffee?
