I had my heart set on the new Marin Pine Mountain or a Cotic Solaris 650 but I can feel this bike calling me……

Any owners on here? Forum search revealed little.

Does anybody know if it will take a 27.5 plus tyre if I decided to do that one day?

Or what size a 6ft2 chap with longish legs would need?

I think it looks like a great fun bike. The only thing I can see wrong is it looks heavy as……

Can’t imagine why you’d consider this monstrosity over a lovely new Solaris

Or either of them over the pine mountain

I don’t know why but to me it is a beautiful thing…. I can’t explain it.

Mind you I said that to my friends when questioned about my girlfriend, and she was very heavily framed but I didn’t notice while riding.

ANYway, I bet you the frame isn’t much heavier than the Marin.

You really don’t see much about these, and Surly reduced the price very heavily at one point. I think they’ve bombed, 26+ isn’t a thing they’ll gently die away when they’ve sold their stock.

As an educated guess, you won’t get 27.5+ in there in especially “+” size, because they were designed to take either 27.5 or 26+ (50mm rim, 2.7″ tyre, in 26″ flavour).

Personally, I think I’d be getting a Krampus if I wanted a Surly trail bike. But the Solaris is a whole lot less peculiar…

🙂

On Facebook, there are quite a series of groups dedicated to different Surly models – Krampus, ICT and Big Dummy are very active. There doesn’t seem to be an Instigator one at all.

On Flickr, there are perhaps 3-4 being photographed – most of the tagged shots are of the older models.

Almost nothing on Tumblr.

Couple on Instagram, one with a petrol engine.

Not that this proves it’s a bad bike or you shouldn’t want one, just that the overwhelming majority of Surly’s loyal fans looked at it and decided they could pass. Which is fairly unusual!

🙂

I really liked th original. In orange. Would’ve bought one, but bought an ace dmr off here….

Thing of beauty.

I just built up a Surly Instigator as 27.5. I like the frame a lot. Nice 4130 CroMo with neat welds. It has modular dropouts to allow horizontal slotted for SS, 142×12 thruaxle (direct mount for Shimano rear mech) or 135×10. The frame rides beutifully with short chai stays, slack-ish head angle and long-ish front end. It’s as heavy as you’d expect from a steel frame but not a beast. It rides light if that makes sense. Of course it will not be as light at aluminum or carbon, but that’s the trade off with a steel frame. The bike is spec’d from Surly as 26+. It will fit 27.5 but not 27.5+. If you want to go 27.5+, go with a 29-er frame. Solaris would fit 27.5+ as it is a 29-er. It has a different geo than Instigator with a longer chain stay. Marin Pine Mtn also has a longer CS but not as long as Solaris. If you’re looking for 27.5+/29 with short CS and slack head angle, look at something like Canfiled Yelli Screamy or Nimble 9 (aluminum vs steel).

I could be persuaded to part with this XL Yelli Screamy frame and forks, or even the whole build for the right ££££’s – I’m 6’2″

Surlies are great bikes. I have two built up (a Cross Check & KM OPs) + a 26″ LHT frame waiting for bits. Really well made but are a tad heavy if you’re concerned about that sort of thing.

really wanted one. Thought about the price. Bought a Honzo. Never looked back.