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That looks a fantastc fun trail bike.
Red and orange though…
Santa Cruz, rode many models for 12 years, now, seems to be a one trick marketing pony, going down, V10, enduro, Nomad, going rad, Bronson, X country, Blur, so where’s the SC X Country team, Scott etc will muller this bike for fun, seems they produce too many itterations of a bike for the dollar only, the Syndicate that many.of us bought into is, in my opinion, no longer relevant, there are new kids in town beating what many thought a benchmark, work to do Santa Cruz.
Agreed @Tim black fork all day long
I noticed 27mm internal rims, I think it’s time for hope to rename their 23mm “Enduro” wheels ;0)
Doesn’t look like the bottle cage mounts inside the main frame are much use with that cable routing…
I think there is something wrong with the orientation of your dropper Post’ Head?
Awesome write up. I look forward to following the progress with the Blur’s build. Good luck with the race prep too!
Thanks for the great write up. Have you done the fork swap yet (with different offsets)?
Did you by any chance measure the stack and reach with the 120mm fork on? Adding those extra 20mm of front travel certainly change the head angle and seat tube angle, like you talked about. But the reach and stack should change as well. SC has the ‘straight up’ Blur listed as 460mm in size large and the Blur TR (110mm fork) listed at 455, so I’m guessing the reach on your rig is around 450. Can you confirm?
I’m also wondering if the reach ‘feels’ different with the bigger fork. I mean, yeah, technically it measures shorter, but the top tube is the same, so it may just be that your hands are in a slightly different place.
@edd – It does look like there’d be a clearance problem, but I’ve recently fitted a side-entry cage, and the cables simply bypass the bottle around the outside. So far no issues.
@guigui – Nope, that’s pretty normal for a Fox Transfer dropper when running a nose-heavy saddle position. The front bolt tightens a long way, to the point where it can almost bottom out. I’ve been experiencing it a bit more lately, and it’s something that I’d like to see Fox address to provide a greater range of adjustment from the clamp head.
@ccftri – Sure have mate! Been swapping the 44/51mm offset forks around over the past few weeks. A little more back-to-back testing to be done, but so far I’ve been pretty surprised how much of a difference I could feel. I’ll have a feature article and video coming on this soon.
As for stack/reach, I haven’t measured either of them, though you’re absolutely right that they’re both affected by fitting a longer travel fork. For trail riding, the extra height at the front of the bike has been a positive change, particularly with the slightly taller BB height and slacker front end. I think the general ‘feel’ of the cockpit can also be adjusted quite a lot with a different bar and/or stem, as well as raising or lowering the bar height via spacers on the steerer tube. In my case, I’ve been really happy with the 760/50mm combo that’s on there at the moment. I’ve got a couple of changes in mind for the bike, including a move towards a 740/60mm bar & stem soon to provide a more racy position.
Hope that helps!
ST Wil.
When is the offset review coming???
@heathwb – Not long now! Had a few delays, as I’ve been waiting on some input from a few different bike manufacturers with very different opinions, which I’ll be including in the feature. I’ve also been doing some additional offset testing with several other 130mm travel trail bikes, which has been pretty interesting.
Filming some video this week, so once I get all that edited, I’ll be publishing the full video feature on our YouTube channel; https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfKJcAFlJb2FrmWf0qHXP8Q
[ST Wil]
Any update on the offset testing???
@bigwheelsxc – Yes! There’ll be a two part feature on fork offset coming shortly, with the second part focussing on my experience with the Blur. Stay tuned on our YouTube and Facebook channels for the video too.
[ST Wil]
@singletrackwil Any update on offset?
@jshardwick41 – There is! I’ve already submitted the articles and video, so they should hopefully be getting proofed and published in the very near future. Both articles are pretty chunky – I’ve been doing quite a bit of cross-testing and research on the topic, so hopefully that comes across in the finished article and you enjoy the read 🙂
[ST Wil]
I bought the TR version with the CC frame and XX1 groupset and reserve wheels and then swopped out the 110mm fork internals for 120mm – used in anger at Lanzarote stage race and this year’s Cape Epic and I’ve got to say it’s been spot on – light enough to race on, climbs great and will take some abuse on the descents too. I agree that it doesn’t need the lock out – too many cables which is the only gripe I have with the bike plus the lock out limits grip choice somewhat. Can well recommend !!!
Hi Wil, thanks for the Blur build videos and great information included! Any chance you could show us how a setup would look with both the lockouts and dropper installed? I know from one of the videos that you chose not to install the lockouts such as those in the complete bikes at least in part to not clutter up the cockpit, so I’m wondering if it’s even functionally practical to expect to be able to operate both? I’m interested in installing a dropper, but not sure I want to lose the lockout functionality. Thank you!