Hi, I'm looking for some advice on a 'blat-around-town' bike. I was looking at getting a Cotic Roadrat, to run it with disk brakes, nice fat comfy tires and full mudguards. However, I want to run an alfine, and would like to build it up to a 26" mtb rim so that I could also use it on my mountain bike, which is a SS, if I ever want to have gears.

Has anyone tried a Roadrat with 26" wheels? I measured a 700c wheel with 42mm tires and the diameter was 70cm. My mtb with 26" wheel and 2.25" tires came to 67cm. Would there be clearance for 26" guards and say 2.0" tires?

Anyone?

Give Cy or Paul at Cotic a ring. I'm sure they'd discuss it with you and give you an opinion.

I was hoping maybe someone would have tried it already. Maybe not.

Hiya, I run mine with 26 inch wheels, very nippy round town, really fun to ride. Clearance wise it'll be fine with 2.0 tires, mine's got 1.3's on it and there's tonnes of room inside the 26inch mudguards. I'd love to have an alfine, but SS is great!

Hi Tiboy, thanks for that! Did you have any problems setting it up, as far as mudguard mounting points being in the wrong place for 26" wheels or anything like that?
Do you have any photos of your setup too?

Words from the Cotic website:

Huge tyre clearance. Why not? Big road or cyclo-cross tyres (up to 42c), or even 26" wheels with massive 1.8" slicks if you're using discs and want to go super comfy. How about 650B ? Popular with many tourers, and gaining popularity in the mountain bike world, these can be used with discs on the ROADRAT as well.

My guess is you can do pretty much what you like with it.

Nope, no problems at all, actually ended up setting it up twice, once on my wife's roadrat, who then decided she wanted bigger wheels as she's on a small frame, then on my roadrat. Worth getting specific 26" guards though, I was sold mine as 26" but think I was scammed as theya re way too big. ONly poorly fitted area is between the chainstays, it's very tight and hard to get to the bolt-hole. drop me an email and I'll send some pics if you like.

"ONly poorly fitted area is between the chainstays"

If you cut the body of a 'berol' felt tip you can use the plastic tube as a psacer with a longer bolt to bring the guard nearer the tyre. Just cu the right amount of tube off the pen to adjust the distance.

Nice tip wwaswas, will give that a go!

Tip duly noted for when I get mine…

Tiboy YGM