love my tricross, cheap and cheerful, cost me £1k with rack+bags+guards.

in CXish mode:

l/w touring:

less l/w touring:

I wouldn't use front rack with the carbon forks again and i'm going to replace them as they are pretty awful anyway.

Aaww, Geoff you are too kind.

Looks like its sold and i'll miss it. I'd recommend it to everyone.

You can't go wrong with a Jake

Chris

Remember that disks aren't allowed in "top end" CX racing.

I don't suppose anybody that's likely to be a problem for would be asking for advice on here!

I really like the look for the Jake's despite the lack of disc mounts. Maybe it's not the end of the world?

Found a Jake the Snake for £899 which seems quite good value.

I looked at building an Uncle John but it worked out at £1350 for what I wanted 🙁

Not sure what size to go for though.

I'm just under 6'2" with a 33" inside leg and ride a 19.5" MTB and 60cm roady. (que the metric imperial gags).

I would have thought a 58cm would fit me well?

I think a test ride is called for…

Another Sutra owner here, I have done over 6500 miles on it and love it, they are heavy but feel really solid on the road and are dead stable loaded and unloaded which is good on the longer rides, especially towards the end when getting tired. The only changes I have made to mine are the chainset swapped out for an xt with 48t chainring (original is overgeared with 53t top ring!!), forks (craked the p2s!!) and swapped the bars out for some lovely salsa bell laps which are my favourite drop bars ever. Mine gets used most days throughout the year for a25mile round trip commute and longer tours. I did a tour round Ireland last week with blackhound from here, he was on his roadrat, they are much lighter but the dropouts are a pain when running gears and mudguards as the mech hanger is held in place with the qr so comes off when you take the wheel out. The sutra is currently in for a repaint as it was starting to get a bit tired, more photos when it is rebuilt.

Dawes Galaxy?

biased, but I do love them…. and sell a fair few of them too

another vote for the surly cross check.

When we singlespad from dorset to Aviemore, Si (aka crash, sausage) took his cross check and it was spot on, and he then cahnaged tyres and raced it in the world single speed champs, the following week it was a road fixie… its at least 5 bikes in one.

burley bob

Here's a pic of my Kona Major Jake (XL). It has a disc mount and rack mounts. The Kinesis DC19 fork is disc only and has rack mounts. Fitted with Ultegra SL running gear, Avid BB7 discs and XT hubbed wheels it weighs about 22lbs. I'm based in Milton Keynes if you want a test ride.

The saddle height needs adjusting in the pix

markenduro – The sutra is still in my top 3, cheers for your post.

charlie the bikemonger – Surly is in the top 3 too but I just don't think I can pull it off. What with no tats and about as much facial hair as a 13 year old school girl. Got a howies beamer though 🙂

ken_shields – thanks for the post and pics. I think one of the Kona Jake's is definently top of my list at the moment. I thought I had settled on a Jake the Snake but now that i have seen the major has disc mounts it's got me thinking. That and the fact I love white bikes 🙂

Thanks for the offer of a test ride. I have been trying to find a shop locally (East Anglia) that sells them so I can go and have a pootle around. I am fairly sure that I will need a 58cm but not sure about the top tube length and my reach…

Bob

My major is not standard paint so you won't get a white one off the shelf

Let me know if you want a test

Geometry
Size Head Seat Top Chain Head BB Stand
Angle Angle Tube stay Tube Height over
58cm 72.5" 73" 22.7" 17.1" 6.3" 11.2" 32.6"
60cm 72.5" 72.5" 23.2" 17.1" 7.1" 11.2" 33.3"
62cm 72.5" 72.5" 24" 17.1" 7.7" 11.2" 34"

I lied about the paint….there is a white one in the 2009 line up…not as nice as mine tho

It's worth remembering that a proper tourer (e.g. Dawes Galaxy) will be ok for light-offroading. So do you want a CX bike that will cope with touring, or vice versa?

ransos – good point.

I think for the riding i do and coming from an off road background I would lean towards a "CX bike that will cope with touring".

Fair enough BB – I've seen a few threads along the lines of "which CX bike for touring?" which begs the question, why not buy a touring bike?

But if you're mainly using it for off-road, then a CX bike is obviously the best choice. Unless you buy two bikes…

ransos – with 5 bikes and a tandem in the stables i think that would be asking for trouble.