Saw it in mountain mania and like it!

http://www.vitalmtb.com/product/guide/Frames,7/Foes/Shaver-Trail,10267

Have you seen the weight? I wouldn’t ride one if you paid me.

Have you seen the weight? I wouldn’t ride one if you paid me.

ide ride it if you paid me. no really its a nice frame how much is it? i think the weight is not an issue unless you want it to be an ex bike but with its nearly 6 inch travel? i see it more a am/ mini fr

They’re £2099. Weight a none issue too? I’d need one in large, that would come in at 7 lb 12 oz, FT! I don’t know if that’s including the shock or not. You could get a frame just as capable, with a coil shock fitted, that weighs less.

You’re right you could get a Mojo HD but I like Foes, I’ve got an FXR with a curnutt coil shock Ti spring and it handles really well at speed, feels odd at slow speed like the shock has stiction but it’s seems to be a quirky Curnutt thing.

Another one for the crap bike names thread.

So what’s a good bike then?

A Foes without a Curnutt?!?! 😕

What is the world coming too?

OH and FWIW, Foes have always erred on the side of heavy/burly/overbuilt, but then you don’t see too many broken ones, and you do see (or did see) a lot of Foes bikes getting a hell of a lot of abuse from riders that know how to dish it out.

What I’m trying to say is that for a 140ish travel frame it’s appealing to a different market compared with the 5 and a bit pound Carbon frames around…

OP – If you’re meaning something with the same travel and available as frame only…I have an HD funnily enough. I would always choose a carbon frame now, at least when spending a couple of grand. If I’d been after a 160mm bike, I’d have got a Nomad C (my HD is set at 140)
I met a bloke last week with a Liteville 301, that seemed a hell of a bike and after reading up on it, it seems others agree.
Nicolai’s are good and plenty of models to get exactly what you want. They’re in another price bracket though. I would only pay that for aluminium if it was something I was keeping for years. I say that with every bike I get but seem to change every two years.

You’re right you could get a Mojo HD

No no, he said a frame just as capable. The Mojo HD doesn’t fit that brief 😆

7lbs 12 ozs for a 145mm frame even with a shock makes it shockingly overweight. That’s 3.5kg with shock, or the same weight as a Nicolai Helius AM that can offer up to 170mm and you don’t see too many of them broken either.

Maybe if they made the tubes straight, they wouldn’t have to make them so bloody heavy!

Maybe if they made the tubes straight, they wouldn’t have to make them so bloody heavy!

I thought that was the main point of hydro-forming, to put extra material where it’s needed but keeping the tubes thinner where it’s not.

I thought that was the main point of hydro-forming, to put extra material where it’s needed but keeping the tubes thinner where it’s not.

Well based on conversations with an engineer in the bike industry, it seems that the point of hydroforming is to make shapes you wouldn’t otherwise be able to make. No one has yet come up with a problem that that solves but the industry likes to say that it’s for things like standover clearance or fork clearance when really it’s mostly about aesthetics and a little bit about packaging.

But also note that there are two issues here; one is the process of making different shaped tubes the other is making tubes that are antyhing other than straight. I’m not sure at what point a tube stops being optimal in strength terms if it has bulges in it, although I still can’t see why we need the bulges in the first place; there are plenty of great bikes that don’t use any kind of shaping, like the Cotic Rocket or any Nicolai you care to memtion.

Butting a tube, which is what you’re describing, is something the tubing industry has been doing for years and it certainly doesn’t need hydroforming to do that. Double and even triple butted tubes have been used in bike construction since I don’t know when; Reynolds was doing it with their 531 steel in the 50s I think. I even wonder if you can butt a hydroformed tube; can you?

Besides, the basic engineering premise is that the strongest tube between two points is a straight one, so the minute you make it anything other than straight, you have to make it heavier than it otherwise would be.

To quote one design engineer in relation to the UK’s most popular 140mm bike, i.e. the one he designed: “when we made that top tube kinked, we had to make that tube twice as heavy to make it just as strong and the only reason we had to make it kinked is because that’s what the marketing department told us the customer was demanding”.

Well if you want strength; buy carbon. easy.

Cheers d45yth – your comments about my bike made me smile!! 😀

That Foes looks ‘The Boy’ in Black!

I wouldn’t buy a bike with no curves, they look old. I like image as well as ride quality in my bikes.

To quote one design engineer in relation to the UK’s most popular 140mm bike, i.e. the one he designed: “when we made that top tube kinked, we had to make that tube twice as heavy to make it just as strong and the only reason we had to make it kinked is because that’s what the marketing department told us the customer was demanding”.

Nice to hear the truth! Who/which bike please?

Surely it’s because foes use monocoque pieces of thick alloy.
Have a soft spot for a xc foes but £1100 says no flippin chance.

Nice to hear the truth! Who/which bike please?

I’m not going to say but it shouldn’t be too hard to work out.

I like image as well as ride quality in my bikes

It is more important than most of us are willing to admit to. Personally I like the aesthetics of more traditional design. I think the Cotic Rocket looks fantastic for example. But I like the aesthetics if Nicolai even more.

I realise that suggests I have zero aesthetic appreciation 😀

Nice to hear the truth! Who/which bike please?

Orange 5 at a guess.

Nice to hear the truth! Who/which bike please?

Orange 5 at a guess.

this, and hardly a secret, it’s quite a widely reported quote. Keith Bontrager said the same thing about riser bars 15yrs ago; weaker and heavier than a straight bar and stem with the corresponding “right” rise, but the market demanded risers so they started making em.

Show us yer Foes then!

here’s my one:

That’s a beast Marcus! I approve 😀