Having recently missed a gorgeous 13in gary fisher with manitou air forks on ebay, I have a challenge. My 11yo (4ft8) nephew has just decided he loves mountain biking (and is damn near fearless). Kids bikes are enormously heavy. His current 24in bike with broken suspension weighs about 36lbs, 8lbs more than my alu giant trance, but as he has not gone through puberty his legs have no real muscle on them. Make it impossible for him to get up hills without a real struggle.

Weight and a working air fork are the biggest priorities. I was thinking a womens 13in 26″ wheel frame with a 50mm stem and maybe even a reversed layback seatpost. V brakes would be fine as he weighs nothing to stop, mech disks also.

Has anyone built anything like this up? Did you use a secondhand dirtjumping frame? Any good saved ebay searches? Anyone got a small frame I can buy from them?

Conti

I have a 13 inch kona shred frame with headset, its pretty light, and hasnt been used alot really. I also have some 120mm air forks.

http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/Models.aspx?ModelID=57826&utm_source=Google&utm_medium=Shopping&utm_name=UnitedKingdom

Would you be interested?

For my son I bult up one of the Merlin alu jump frames with some old duke forks, started of with 24″ wheels then went to 26″ when he was older, my daughter uses it now (she’s 13).
IMG_0573 by Stiggy2011, on Flickr]null

I built a extra small hardrock frame up with dual air revs travel reduced to 100mm, mavic 717’s on bulbs, hope mono minis. came out nice and light, would make a nice juvenile bike. there were some good small frames on CRC, I’d stay away from dirtjump frames, they’re a bit overbuilt for what you want.

I don’t know whether this http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1502600 has sold or not?

The idea is to get it as light as possible. That carver frame is gorgeous, but for £160 I could get a 13in hardrock off ebay and only need to get forks, brakes and a few carbon bits.

Iride, YGM

Some bastard just read this thread and bought the carver. Gits.

Hi,

I’m also looking for a similar size bike or frame.

Anyone else got anything similar?