Tinsy- just bought some Mavic 819's on Hope pro2 hubs, came in at 290 on CRC ('custom built'- I think this means they use a machine.) I weighed them at 1.04kg rear, 0.91 front. So there you go.

Dont matter what they use to build em, I had 2 indetical builds, 1 done by hand the other from CRC, both exactly the same as you would expect.. (just thought I would open a new debate)

I remember working it out on CAD how much wieght I could save by using Revolution spokes over DB ones… Weight saving does indeed get very anal.

I still gaurantee you the biggest gain you can get in speed is having the appropriate tyre on the bike for the conditions, as long as the rest of the setup is in the right ballpark.

Thanks for the offer njee but it wouldn't be long enough sadly.
I'm going to try out the foam grips. saving the best part of 200grams for £10 costs has to be worth a go…..but then again, I like my paddle grips. I don't know what to do.
New wheels seem to be quite a subject don't they?
I'm surprised fork upgarde only got one metion so far. No major upgrade worthwhile there?

Tinsy……so it's all down to your tyres why you had to walk home from your ride last weekend

Go for a thicker foam grip, Bontrager Xlite are very good and are only £9.

'm surprised fork upgarde only got one metion so far. No major upgrade worthwhile there?

Unless you 'need' new forks it's a big spend to save relatively little weight.

I doubt if changing your grips will make you quicker, you'd be better off spending the money on the wheels, less weight to get rolling,

Go for a thicker foam grip, Bontrager XX lite are very good and are only £9.

+1

Although it's the 'Race X Lite foam' you want, the Race XXX Lite foam is very thin, I'm not sure the latter are sold aftermarket in the UK though.

You'd drop a bit going for the fork, but a SID Race would blow your entire budget and save less than a pound.

I remember working it out on CAD how much wieght I could save by using Revolution spokes over DB ones

Revolutions are double butted, and you could've saved a fair bit of time and just looked on the DT Website 😉

HA HA toomanybikes, I actually made it home pedalling but only just, I do indeed put that down to XC'ing the bike I built for the alps, I think it is tubeless though, it just feels like the previous owner has used 300ml of sealant in the **** things.. but then I suppose some saint hubs and 719 rins aint going to be featherweight!!

Revolutions are double butted, and you could've saved a fair bit of time and just looked on the DT Website

Yup I meant over the Competition 1.8-2mm spokes, and you have to remember something on my CAD screen looks like work but the DT Swiss logo looks like play!! 🙂

Titanium rigid forks and single speed 😀

just remove the front wheel

Why not forego the grips all together and just use a thin bar tape. I've seen some Pro MTBers with this set up.

Saying that, if you are planning endurance races, the weird grips you have at the moment and like, will probably keep your speed higher than changing to something you are uncomfortable with.

seen some roadies without bar tape at all! its the next step!

take off the pedals and scoot along the floor?
take out the quick releases and dont do any hops?
make it SS?

or just leave it alone. why bother doing anything?

I've been putting my bike on a diet recently – foam grips saved 150g over lockons, downgrading rotors from 183/183 to 160/160 saved another 100g or so. Removed bottle cage bolts, windows from shifters, saddle bag clip etc…. another 50odd g.

Try an ibeam saddle/post pretty light combo for not much

Oh – I've knackered a 4.2 rim, but that was in Morzine through a particularly rough section on my nomad, not surprising really. In my experience they are pretty good, have yet to try stans.

"..why bother doing anything?"
Because I want to. It's as simple as that. I dare say when I get it down to 24lbs, I'll then try for 23lb.
Thanks for (most of) the replies.

your choice buddy. i just wonder why people fret about weight. the one thing that made me faster ever was more riding.

rode road to make me faster uphill. rode bmx track and DH to make me better technically.

not a penny spent on bicycle…

losing 2lb wont guarantee you are faster. weight does not guarantee speed.

Wheels and tyres are where I'd start. The Specialized Storm Controls aren't super heavy (I've a set on my Enduro) but something like Speed King Supersonics would save perhaps a pound. If the current wheels are 1900g then a 1500g wheelset is going to save the best part of another pound. Both those savings are in the places you'd notice it most as well.

My lightest bike has Speed King Supersonics and American Classic wheels and you'd need £400-500 to do the same I think.

I'm not convinced forks are the best place to lose weight – I got a set of SID Race for my bike but decided I preferred some heavier forks (Fox Float's) so stuck with them. The SID Race were fairly cheap 2nd hand though so something like that might be worth considering.

My Zion is down to 23lbs (weighed not calculated and with pedals fitted) now despite having minimal XTR (just the rear mech) and with alloy seatpost and bars.

Would recommend Schwalbe over Conti SS if you want to run tubeless, whilst the Supersonics will seal they're very porous. Schwalbe's go up much more nicely.

Would recommend Schwalbe over Conti SS if you want to run tubeless, whilst the Supersonics will seal they're very porous

I've not tried tubeless yet (no real need as there aren't many thorns in my area so I don't tend to puncture often) as it seems like extra hassle to solve a problem that I don't have. I had Racing Ralphs on the bike and while they were good in the dry the SS's are much better general purpose tyres as well as being lighter.

But Rons are the same claimed weight as Speed Kings (mine come out very slightly lighter), and grippier IMO. Still, that's a tyre debate, which isn't for this thread, but I wasn't too sure on Speed Kings.

Tubeless saves weight and gives better grip, reason enough to do it for me!

the one thing that made me faster ever was more riding.

Good for you, and if you upgraded the bike and did more riding, you'd likely be even faster. Seeing as there's racing involved, it makes sense to do what you can, and if that includes making the bike lighter, it's an obvious thing to do!

I'm riding less in fact tracknico. To be fair, I probably couldn't ride anymore than I was if I wanted to.
My riding focus and ergo stresses and adaptations are much more targeted toward a higher effort over a shortened but still sustained period rather thsn the multi day touring I was doing.
I have a good idea of what my potential was as of 8 years ago being the last time I was in the lab. Sadly, I wasn't ever going to win anything but I can make a fair show on most rides these days so I've not blown completely.
I just want to reduce weight on my mountain bike so it can be as light as I can get it and crucially financially afford to get it and also so that I am giving me the best chance I can to do as well as I can.
Thanks again all. Loads of stuff to go through and I need to start flogging stuff to raise some cash to lose some heft from it.

I guess it's all personal preference but better tyres would be at the top of my list, best weight saving and performance enhancing, pound for pound in my experience, upgrade.
For tubeless I would go for Racing ralph and maybe nobby nic up front (although would like to try a fast fred tubeless), for tubes conti race kings 2.2 supersonic, much better than speed kings, faster, gripper and don't puncture at the first sight of any thing lumpy.
I am lazy so don't bother changing tyres at all if I can help it but it's amazing what you can learn to ride (at speed) with semi slicks if you ride all year round with them. I change the front if the weathers really bad but haven't used a non semi slick on the rear for about 5 years and have never had any problems at all, and like the way the back kicks out a little sometimes. But that just me but worth a try.

if you find second hand xtr wheels (the new kind not the paired spoke ones) they are very light and i rate them very highly, i'm heavy-ish and ride hard and have never had a problem.

has anyone mentioned pedals?

single speed it, 2 pound lost and no money spent?

or bung on some carbon rigid forks and ztr/stans wheels and some of the other sensible ideas on here

I saved about 3lbs from my Anthem simply changing the wheelset and tyres and going tubeless with non-UST tyres.

SR Dirty Flea hubs with ZTR Olympic rims and DT Rev spokes
Schwalbe Dirty Dan 2.0 run tubeless with an olympic valve, yellow tape and stans tyre milk.

Less than 2500g for the lot and they've never let me down or had a flat.

Did anybody suggest oging singlespeed yet?

get a set of race wheels with 160mm ashima rotors. tubeless with schwalbe. run the heavier ones for training/routine riding.

when you wear out the rings go 2×9 (i thing i'll be trying this next i think)

oh, and try the grips for a tenner – what have you got to lose.

Why don't you lose 2lb that would be much cheaper ?,have a good dump before you ride

"Please refrain from the going to the toilet before you ride nonsense and at 12st 8lb myself, I'm happy as I chunky am thank you very much :-}"

It's up there in the original post. The very last sentence. I didn't ask how I could lose 2lb the cheapest way possible. I think I might also at some point made reference to my sports science qualification. I know a bit about physiology. Thanks anyway.

Thanks for all the useful advice and suggestions. The quest has begun.

Please take this the right way. A few years ago when I was racing on the road (badly!) actually racing saved me huge amounts of money as during races I realised that spending the money on the newest flashy wheels was not going to make the difference. Sat at the computer it is all too easy to read reviews and manufacturers descriptions and before you know it you have pressed play and put in your credit card details.

You have a sports science degree, use what you have learned. 2lbs makes a difference at the very top end for the rest of us (if you were top end you would not be asking) it makes no difference.

Yes this is a variation on the "have a poo statement" but simple maths does it. 2lbs is a far smaller percentage of your mass (what about a lighter multi tool?) and can be done easily by most. Proper intervals will make a huge difference as I found out just the once!! Sahme I couldnt bring myself to punish myself so much again.

As I said not criticism.

I love this place, I really do 🙂

Dont ask daft questions then!!

Oh dearie me. I'm going to leave it now. No offence intended. Thanks again all 🙂

the Race XXX Lite foam is very thin, I'm not sure the latter are sold aftermarket in the UK though.

They are – I've just bought some to replace my previous X-lite grips (actually went looking for the X-lite grips and found those)! Then again I like my grips thin, and they are profiled so that there's more thickness on the back where your weight rests – probably not so different there to X-lite – whilst thicker foam round the front doesn't really make any difference to comfort. Will report back on Sunday as they'll be christened at HONC if I get time to change my bars on Saturday! I'd probably still recommend the X-lite to others though – I was amazed how comfy they were – much nicer than the far heavier grips I'd had on before.

I doubt if changing your grips will make you quicker, you'd be better off spending the money on the wheels, less weight to get rolling,

As much as losing the same amount of weight anywhere else, including the wheels, the effect of rotating weight being pretty insignificant even compared to the small gains from losing weight in general.

Bloody hell! I've swapped the grips for FSA bar tape (double wrapped), the seatpost clamp for a KCNC ti bolt clamp and the Mavic wheel qr's for Superstar qr's and I've shed nearly half a pound already. That can't be right! I'm going to check it again.

Yep, just checked. 188 grams = 0.4lb.
generic seatpost qr 42grams – KCNC version 12 grams – 30 grams saved
Specailized Ergo grips 180 grams – FSA bar tape 60 grams = 120 grams saved
Mavic wheel qr's 120 grams – Superstar hollow axle wheel qr's 82 grams = 38 grams saved
I like this game :-}

WEIGH EVERYTHING. You can't effectively weightweenie unless you know the weight of the parts you're replacing.

"In your experience njee, in mine they don't puncture any more than normal tubes. "

I ran 100g Schwalbe XXlights before I converted to tubeless, they were just tubes, didn't puncture any differently to any other tube. I had one in the front for Fort William Still, my tubeless is lighter than 100g (most people's isn't, BMX tubes or Stans strips + sealant is almost always more than 100g)

I've got the XXX Lite grips on my Top Fuel, them seem really comfy, I must say though I don't really seem to mind any grips!

I went 1×9 withan nstop and Ti bash ring only cost £30 that saved 1lb

pace rc31 carbon forks (£200) will save you 2lbs

get a kmc x9sl chain somewhere was knocking them out for £25 the other day that'll save a bit too

get a pg990 cassette

got mine down to 19.04 lbs now!

FSA bar tape 60 grams

Some decent foam grips would be 20g, and less slippery in the wet.

Mavic 819's on Hope pro2 hubs

While I've a few 819 wheels, they are heavy, but strong so I use them as everyday wheels.

I wouldn't be selling anything to fund lighter parts, as its always handy to have spares.

Buy a couple of sets of scales (one to weigh the bike, and one to weigh parts), and go from there.

Over more standard stuff, and not stupidly expensive:
I-beam seats/posts – save 100-200g.
Hope Hoops running Stans rims – save 100-200g.
Lighter bars, either carbon or alloy – save 50g.
Ashima rotors – save 100g
XT cassette – save 50g
540 or XT pedals – save 50g
Ti bolts – save 100g

TBH though, whenever you are replacing something worn, look at the weights – and whenever you buy anything else, look at the weights.