Anybody do this? I mean, being a chunk then I wear things out quickly, and weight saving on a bike is not important really as I dont race or anything….

Does anyone ride a DH bike for freeriding but with a hammerschmidt system to enable more gear ratios?

Once upon a time there were no 'freeride' bikes, there were downhillers with the bikes they usually rode riding other things.

That is the most pointless reply to a thread I have ever seen.

won't a dh bike have the wrong geometry for that sort of riding?

You mean a DH race bike? On most the angles will make it impractical.

It's not because of the weight that riding my DH bike uphill is awkward – I've had heavier XC bikes before!

I use my chopper for all riding types but it gets hard with the gear selector stick on the climbs 🙁

That is the most pointless reply to a thread I have ever seen.

Why thank you.

I used to ride DH, I took the bike I used to ride DH on to other places and rode what was latter to become 'freeride'. It seemed to work alright, no black holes opened in the trail not did the four horsemen of apocalypse appear due to my bike being against the goodness of nature and thus one of the portents of the day of reckoning.

Freeride is a marketing term. Most DH bikes can do the job of a 'freeride' bike with a few lighter components and so too can some lighter, long travel trail bikes with a few stronger components. Indeed I once had a Cannondale Jekyll which I 'bulked up' with an assortment of stronger components (Marzocchi Z1 FR, tougher cranks, wheels etc) and quite happily thrashed the wheels off it on all manner of hairy trails.

On a serious note, I use my Giant Reign X1 for everything and I too havn't experienced anything bad happen to me like a ufo beaming me up or anything else like that!

If it feels right then just ride it 🙂

I think the issue here is, does the OP mean "DH race bike" or "some long travel bike". It's like saying all 4" bikes are XC race bikes. They're not, some are 4X bikes, some are dirt jump hardtails etc. I'd not want to DJ on a XC race bike, or vice-versa!

However, I would suggest if you can afford a hammerschmidt and decent DH bike, you could probably afford a DH bike and an XC/whatever bike. And then not have a jack-of-all-trades-master-of-none bike.

gangberg sorry but can you define being a chunk? Plenty of big heavy riders out there on non dh bikes…..

sootyandjim

I used to ride DH, I took the bike I used to ride DH on to other places and rode what was latter to become 'freeride'. It seemed to work alright, no black holes opened in the trail not did the four horsemen of apocalypse appear due to my bike being against the goodness of nature and thus one of the portents of the day of reckoning.

Freeride is a marketing term. Most DH bikes can do the job of a 'freeride' bike with a few lighter components and so too can some lighter, long travel trail bikes with a few stronger components. Indeed I once had a Cannondale Jekyll which I 'bulked up' with an assortment of stronger components (Marzocchi Z1 FR, tougher cranks, wheels etc) and quite happily thrashed the wheels off it on all manner of hairy trails.

Big whoop for you sir. Marketing term or not it has resulted in a whole new style of bike which is fun to ride and that is a good thing imo. Perhaps you would prefer if everyone only rode rigid xc bikes?

really you don't want to be using a v10 for freeriding. what do you mean by freeriding, are you hucking off 15ft plus drops or do you mean you winch your bike uphill and plough down it?

Can't think of many better freeride bikes on the market than this

The new Mongoose Pinn'r bikes look ideal for what your after. There's a feature on pinkbike.com about them.

i use my demo9 for freeride/shore and dhing

dont dh bikes do freeride? i used a g-spot on downhill and its freeride bike..visa versa…

Apparently not, you need a 'freeride' specific bike. Jedi – Make sure you stick a sign up at Herts Shore, its not my fault, its the rules. 😉

Surely just use a bike that you enjoy riding and works!

I ride DH on a hardtail as I get so much more from it.

lol@sooty 🙂

spent ages and a lot of money trying to find a perfect bike that could hack it on a DH course and be pedalled back up. problem is your always compromising somewhere. strength, geometry, tyre choice, even seat tube length

best thing i ever did was buy a proper DH bike for riding DH on and a five for everything else.

i hear you,
my demo9 weighs 49lb but needs to be very strong to suffer the rigours of riding herts 4 times a week.
it kills bikes

49lbs!

yep

Aye. The regional earthquake seismology centre has to forewarned before jedi goes up there now 🙂

Yep my demo 8 was 46 lbs I think……….

I do laugh at people thinking that DH and FR bikes are totally different, You can pretty much ride most FR bikes for DH and vice versa… they are not that different.

..You can pretty much ride most FR bikes for DH and vice versa… they are not that different…

Careful now. Everytime someone says freeride bikes aren't that different a little Josh Bender shaped angel dies.

CrAsH…tEsT..dUmMy

I do laugh at people thinking that DH and FR bikes are totally different, You can pretty much ride most FR bikes for DH and vice versa… they are not that different.

Laugh on mighty bike lord. Of course they are "not that different" they are designed to broadly similar things, just in a different way. In the grand scheme of things though there is probably more difference between an sx trail and a demo 9 than there is between the "xc" stumpjumper and the "all mountain" enduro. So what's your point?

For reasons best know to yourself I'd say you probably just want to laugh or be seen to be laughing at people who would use terms or labels to try and describe how they ride. God forbid anyone should ride anything other than an xc bike eh?

tails – Member
Can't think of many better freeride bikes on the market than this

So what's your point?

My point is why people think there is such a difference in them and spend ages quibbling over the use of a "DH" bike for "freeride" and vice versa, if you go over to some DH forums people spend ages arguing over someone using; for example a Sunday / V10 etc for freeriding.. Or as another example people quibbling over someone using an Enduro, SX, Nomad etc for DH… I find it amusing that people think a bike can only be used for the exact use the Marketing department say it can, ok I can understand with a trail bike being used on DH to a point but battling an argument over DH vs FR being used for the other discipline just makes me chuckle!

Laugh on mighty bike lord.

Im no lord I just don’t give in to marketing cr@p and understand that most DH or FR bikes will happily do DH and FR.. at the end of the day they are all designed to be ragged, jumped and hammered down a hill with little difference

rAsH…tEsT..dUmMy

My point is why people think there is such a difference in them and spend ages quibbling over the use of a "DH" bike for "freeride" and vice versa, if you go over to some DH forums people spend ages arguing over someone using; for example a Sunday / V10 etc for freeriding.. Or as another example people quibbling over someone using an Enduro, SX, Nomad etc for DH… I find it amusing that people think a bike can only be used for the exact use the Marketing department say it can, ok I can understand with a trail bike being used on DH to a point but battling an argument over DH vs FR being used for the other discipline just makes me chuckle!

Im no lord I just don’t give in to marketing cr@p and understand that most DH or FR bikes will happily do DH and FR.. at the end of the day they are all designed to be ragged, jumped and hammered down a hill with little difference

You do realise that the bikes are different though? I mean, you do realise that an Uzzi will ride differently to an M6 right? The fact that there is a cross over in function means that unless people are racing dh they probably will ponder over what bike is best for their needs. Surely it's no more or less ludicrous or amusing than people pondering on which 4inch trail bike or 4inch vs 6 inch "all mountain" etc etc?

I'm all for new niches, sub niches and marketing bullshit if it keeps giving us new bikes. Five years ago you would struggle to find a slack, burly bike with 4 – 6 inches of travel. Now because of "slopestyle", bikes of that ilk are all the rage. Turns out they are brilliant fun to ride. Who is loosing out here?

At the end of the day it's all about the rider and his abilities, one skillful riders dh/freeride bikes is another less skilled rider's xc bike. More variety is a good thing.

You do realise that the bikes are different though

Of course I do, I am refering to statements such as you would not want to ride a V10 for FR, a lot of Dh bikes are ridden for FR with a simple change of forks to single crown; that said I have seen a lot of people using DH bikes for Freeride with no changes and they are perfectly happy. All I am trying to say is most DH or FR bikes will do perfecly well for either. Do people really beleive statements such as "Race specific DH bike"… does that mean you cannot use it at a FR park 😉

CrAsH…tEsT..dUmMy

"Race specific DH bike"… does that mean you cannot use it at a FR park

Well obviously not. But here's the thing, I wouldn't want to ride a V10 for anything other than world cup dh tracks. There's no way I could justify it or use it properly anywhere else. I think I am just scraping through your outer layer of scorn and we are on the verge of having a debate but I must go out on my bike for some Freeriding on my All Mountain bike.

Yes. Have ridden a 224 (with a double on it) up 5-700m of vert and then raced the same bike in a DH race.

Or do you mean Freepushing?

There's no way I could justify it or use it properly anywhere else

that is a whole different topic, what one person can use and another are different, ok you cannot justify or use it does not mean others cannot!

I met a chap once on a £100 hack bike it was old, 2" travel, lined up for a big jump into a bomb hole, the bomb hole then goes into a step up! about 20 people watched in horror and worry, he launched off, pulled a perfect tail whip 10ft up, into the bomb hole, whipped up again and landed on the back wheel and rode off. Now that bike was an XC only machine and should have been in a museum, changed how I look at what people ride! now I do agree a bike needs to be in the right hands for its use, that is individual to everyone. I used to think i could only ride with 8" of travel, times have changed and so has my thoughts on that. What I am saying is ok you cannot justify a V10 other than at a DH world course, but there are lots of riders out there using them at bike parks. Let me leave it as this, I personally dont like short travel full sussers, that is because i dont get on with them, but others love them and will argue more travel is wasted, others say a trail bike cannot be used for FR or Light DH, others use exactly that and love it, everyone has their idea of what is right for the job but the right bike for a job is only what someone gets on with, and is happy with. In this case I was just trying to point DH & FR are close disciplines and both bikes cross over well as the bikes are not that different!

My 5 year old Nicolai is what I call "Freeride", in that it can be pedalled to the top of a mountain and then thrown down it like a true "Doonhall" machine.

It has an under-geared Rohloff for silly low twiddly gears for the ups, and 190mm of rear travel with 180mm up front. Silly slack head angle but steep at the seat for climbing – both ends are coil sprung and most of the kit is Diabolus with DH tyres. Weight is 44lbs which is a bitch on the ups… but it's a bike which is built for the other bit of the ride, hence for the Doonhalls it is superb.

I've not raced a DH on it but I've flown past many a fully kitted Stormtrooper when riding through their playgrounds on my more XC orientated rides (which happen to include the odd national DH track).

If I were to buy something similar again I would be looking at a Nicolai Helius AFR with a Hammershmiddlydiddly and a few pieces of lighter kit to get the weight down a tad – although I'm not sure the gearing would be as low as what I currently have???

If you've got the legs for the ups then it's a lot of fun to take the bike for the downs – most people seem to compromise this the other way round – it's a choice thing.

I tend not to have a choice since when I buy lighter kit I tend to break it and end up going back to the heavy stuff again. 🙄

What waffeling

too long, didnt read.

a hammer schmit has a very small "ring" size.
like a granny ring
therefore it can have undesired effects on the suspension.

wouldnt be any fun on a Giant, maestro is quite dependant on where the chain pulls (how far from the BB axel)

t'would stiffen the back end right up under pedaling.

Hammersmickle is 24/38T.

My Rohloff set up is equivalent to a 20T on the front with a 34 on the rear and is therefore much lower.

What a cop-out! Scrub the Hammersmackle off my wish list then… I'll stick with the Rohloffle option (which is my awesome Nicolai or the modern equivalent TFR) or go back to the age old solution of front and rear mechs.

If your bike is going to weigh near 40lbs you need super low gears if your not going to be walking up hills like a stormtrooper (and getting your dad to push your bike and carrying your helmet for you).

Check out the Nicolai forum on MTBR if you want to see heaps of big travel bikes with gears – there are some Alp dwellers on there that post some stunning pictures of why low gears and heaps of travel is not an oxymoron.

it'd be awesome if my dad would push my bike and carry my helmet.

Deleted on grounds of taste 😆

All I know is my Giant Reign X1 is the absolute s**t! it can go uphill downhill, flat, freeride, xc anything, it weighs 36lbs and is my top all rounder.

I used to have a Kona Dawg which was a great climber, but also took it to Morzine and flew past loads of people on DH bikes so it really proves nothing.
If it feels right then just ride it, whats right for you will never be right for others.
As long as I have a smile on my face and i'm not last then it must be the right bike for me 🙂