I’m nearly finished building my Tripster with XT 48-36-26 and 11-36, using Ultegra 10 speed shifters and XT 9 speed rear mech. Similar setup works on my Salsa Vaya, good for touring.
Get home from work and find that Mr DH has been unable to contain himself and ordered a Tripster frame too. Soon to be advertising a 57cm Pro6….!
An additional benefit (I assume) with the V2 will be perfect disc brake alignment each time you swap out a set of wheels. Not an issue if you rarely swap, but being new to disk brakes I’m disappointed in how difficult it is to avoid rubbing / squeaks after a quick release. I’d thought switching from one set of rims with off-road tyres to a set with road tyres would be a few second job but it seems not to be. I understand having through axles solves this. Also flat mounts future proofs the frame it is becoming the new standard – looks better too. Will it be easy tracking down replacement parts for our V1 bikes in 15 years? Prob not, but I doubt impossible. But for all its benefits, I personally wasn’t prepared to pay more or wait.
Slackboy – looks an amazing ride – great pics. I hope I have the stamina to do that one day.
I’be just finished making my own front pannier rack using 10mm outer diameter titanium tubing and a pipe bender. It’s a copy of the Tubus Tara rack, apart from Ive made it a more snug fit.
I ended up replacing my fork with a fork from a Rose Pro Dx cyclo-cross bike…. (this is the only carbon fork I could find with integrated front pannier mounting holes). You could use P-clips if your fork doesn’t have the pannier mounting holes.
No, haven’t attempted Swain’s yet (saving that for the summer when I’m wearing less – it’s got a 14% gradient that I’m not ready to take on at the end of a work day carrying all my clobber). But you got the area spot on, I vary my route with the roads adjacent – Highgate West Hill and Highgate Hill. Apparently, 10% gradients. When the traffic backs up of an evening, if I’m unlucky enough to hit the red traffic lights, fully loaded weaving up between the cars, trying to clip back into the pedals squashed next to a bus, it’s not exactly a pretty sight – no doubt quite a few cars fearing for their precious paintwork. Anyway, I don’t have to hit the lowest gear, but often I find that I have.
@dave1986 how did you get hold of the rose fork? looks like what i’m after as i want rack mounts, i think the new tripster fork should have them eventually, but not sure on eta
Well if you see a lanky chap on a Tripster riding up and down Swain’s of an evening, that’d probably be me.
While I mostly just do loops up Swain’s and down West Hill if I’m training on the way home, I sometimes rep up West Hill, Highgate Hill, East Heath, or Frognal. Maybe put in a few kicks up Ally Pally to earn my supper.
Here are a few photos of my Tripster with my new home-made front pannier rack.
The fork is from a Rose Pro DX cyclocross bike. I did a lot of research to look for a carbon fork with disc brake mounts and pannier mounts. This is the ONLY fork available with that specification. I contacted Rose to ask if I could buy the fork, but they refused to sell it separately from the bike…. In the end I was very lucky to find one for sale on Ebay! The fork comes with the added bonus of having a 15mm thru axle for added stiffness (and slightly more difficult to pinch the wheel using a allen key thru axle). It also has internal cable routing for both the hydraulic brake cables and dynamo cables. The fork is also compatible with Shimano’s new flat-mount road specific disc brakes.
I made the pannier using a 2m length of 10mm outer diameter titanium tubing. I used a pipe bender to bend without causing the pipe to kink. I drilled holes for bolting to the fork. I bought some black plastic end-caps from Ebay to finish it off.
The front rack doubles-up as a stay for my mudguards, as well as a mounting point for my front dynamo light (Busch and Muller IQ-X). I decided to route the cables for the front and rear dynamo lights internally to the pannier racks… It makes it look much tidier but is very fiddly! The cabling for the Plug III (USB charger) is also routed internally to the fork.
The bike is now ready for my camping tour through France/Spain later this year! 🙂
Thanks guys.. Let me know if anyone wants to make their own and I’ll point you in the direction of a titanium pipe supplier and I have a pipe bender for sale too! It really wasn’t too hard to make.
Lovely job on the rack – and internal wiring Dave.
Thanks for comments on gearing to all, interesting peoples thoughts. I have a 50/34 compact with 9 speed 11-32 I think cassette is on my boardman hybrid commuter, but MTB is 10 speed 38/24 with 11-36 and you would want more top end I think on a tourer (and I really only venture big end of cassette on most brutal climbs).
Looks like v1 stock running low, guess we will find out if they bring more v1 in or v2 is coming…
I think the designer said that they were designed for a 70mm stem.
But mine has a 100mm stem and I found it a bit slow to turn originally, but got a little used to it and then when I moved to 4cc tyres thought it just right.
If I had a longer frame so I could have a 70mm stem I feel the offroad standover would be a bit tall.
Going back to fitting SKS mudguards, it looks like there is no fixing onto the seatstay bridge here. Is this correct? I can’t see how to attach it otherwise. gratis bilder
When i used sks mudguards i simply drilled a hole through the mudguard in the appropriate spot where it contacted the seat stay bridge and used a 4mm torx head brake disc bolt, fit a small rubber shim/washer on either sides of the mudguard (cut up old tube) otherwise you will find that the mudguard may develop a crack if you over tighten the bolt – and use suitable thread lock so you don’t have to over tighten.
Hi, Yes my bike (your screenshot) is drilled through as Somafunk described – just a neater look – though so far without the rubber/washer protection. That’s certainly a good addition that I’ll address when I next come to remove and refit.
As for stem, I have a 55.5 frame with 100mm (short reach bars). While on my road racer, I have a 56 frame with 90mm stem, long reach bars). Essentially, reach on both bikes similar. I would say the Tripster is perfectly comfortable and relaxed (as I like it) while my racer is a little too twitchy (but as it should be for racing). Make of that what you will.
F*in-ell eshoote you don’t half get around – been following you on twitter and i’m amazed (Envious really, bloody well done 😉 ) at the places you end up doing cool shit.
Thanks somafunk, been based in Scotland for a year now, it was time to earn some cash! Still been on couple of trips this year but being in one place for quite a while is giving me itchy feet 🙂
For mudguard fitting I used a M5 bolt from a spring toggle – only one I could find that was long enough!
I got the spring toggle from Screwfix, some rubber washers from a plumbing store to protect the carbon fork, and I had an assortment of compatible nuts and washers lying around.
Just wondering if anyone has fitted any 650b on their bike yet? I’ve just bought some Mavic Crossmax SLR to try. They are 10 speed hubs but i’m hoping the Edco Monoblock 11 speed cassette I’ve just orderd will work.