Why Is CRC selling old Bombers, and what’s next?

by 59

Proving that 26 ain’t dead – or that it just keep on coming back, as shed finds are brought back to life – the Singletrack Forum was all of a flurry as a batch of brand new unused Marzocchi forks hit the Chain Reaction Cycles listings.

Marzocchi Bomber Z5

£349.99 gets you this orange retro wonder:

‘Boasting a hard-wearing alloy construction, 100mm travel and a retro look, the Marzocchi Bomber Z5 Fork is an ideal choice for finishing your vintage bike build or breathing new life back into your retro mountain bike’

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Marzocchi Bomber Z4

£349.99 gets you this slightly more understaded black 80mm Z4:

Marzocchi Bomber Z3

Or, £179.99 gives you the choice of two colours which may only have coordinated with a bike back in 2000, plus the choice of a whopping 70mm or 80mm of travel:

We’re trying to find out quite why these have hit the shelves now, but there are a few theories kicking around. One is that in the great shipping container shortage of 2020, someone found a forgotten container lurking in the corner of a dockyard somewhere. Another is that the CRC/Wiggle reorganising has unearthed some lost stock. Perhaps these aren’t originals, but are actually new copies, whipped up to meet the great shed bike restoration demand?

Whatever the truth (and we’ll let you know if we find out), they’re not likely to hang around long, so if you’ve got a bike that just needs these forks to bring is back to life, act now.

If there has been a shipping container or warehouse find, what else might there be? What would you hope to uncover? Marzocchi Monster T or Shiver fork? Anything by Pace? How about a whole PRST1? Or something more practical, like the mech hanger or brake mount for that bike you have in the shed that just won’t roll without it?

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Hannah Dobson

Managing Editor

I came to Singletrack having decided there must be more to life than meetings. I like all bikes, but especially unusual ones. More than bikes, I like what bikes do. I think that they link people and places; that cycling creates a connection between us and our environment; bikes create communities; deliver freedom; bring joy; and improve fitness. They're environmentally friendly and create friendly environments. I try to write about all these things in the hope that others might discover the joy of bikes too.

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Viewing 40 posts - 1 through 40 (of 59 total)
  • CRC selling old Z3/4/5 forks
  • big_n_daft
    Free Member

    People rescuing bikes from the shed, forks often in poor condition, lots of demand, that container suddenly leaps in value

    finbar
    Free Member

    I was riding a pair of those Z3s on my XC bike up until about 3 years ago and they are a surprisingly great fork.

    hatter
    Full Member

    Wow, retro goldmine!

    I imagine they’ll have been discovered as they wind down CRC’s Northern Ireland operations in order to move everything to Wiggle HQ, bet there’s been all sorts of treasures coming to light.

    kayla1
    Free Member

    Dibs on any 55 Ti RC3s they find!

    chakaping
    Free Member

    Dibs on any 55 Ti RC3s they find!

    How I’d love to try one of those in 29er form on my current bike.

    andrewreay
    Full Member

    Hardly the vintage price!

    But sorely tempted as finding anything decent for a straight steerer 26″ is pretty much impossible.

    chakaping
    Free Member

    How much were they BITD?

    I thought they seemed quite reasonably priced in the current climate and considering the exclusivity.

    mashr
    Full Member

    I see a lot of confused faces in the near future for folk that get the QR20 Z5’s

    If they are all old stock I also see a lot of unhappy faces when the 15 year old seals fail immediately

    snotrag
    Full Member

    I was gonna say – QR20 is going to really confuse some people who might not be familiar with all the ‘standards’ back in the day.

    Ditto I.S. disc mounts!

    andrewreay
    Full Member

    My mistake – I’d been looking at the Z3 and Z5 which are £349.99, which is pretty spendy. Probably about £50 more than they were BITD. But then a decent bike ‘only’ cost £800 then I suppose.

    But I’d not noticed the Z4 is only £179.99 – and has disc brake mounts in green, so have just bought one!

    bigyan
    Free Member

    If they are all old stock I also see a lot of unhappy faces when the 15 year old seals fail immediately

    Could be some interesting warranty questions. Imagine if somebody takes one to SilverFish as Marzocchi UK.

    I presume CRC will just replace or refund if warranty issues?

    That said, there are 20 year old bombers still working on original oil, so these ones might be fine for another 20 years.

    But I’d not noticed the Z4 is only £179.99

    That was a fast price drop! Was £299.99 earlier. Let us know what its like when it arrives.

    finbar
    Free Member

    If they are all old stock I also see a lot of unhappy faces when the 15 year old seals fail immediately

    Open oil bath on the Z3s (not sure about the others) – seals will last forever *if* they haven’t dried out and cracked at the top already….

    greyspoke
    Free Member

    Ah yes QR20. Anything but “quick” and the dangly bits sometimes wound off in transit.

    mashr
    Full Member

    seals will last forever *if* they haven’t dried out and cracked at the top already….

    Thats the problem, the oil has been sitting on one place for years rather that being cycled around and keep the seals wet

    cookeaa
    Full Member

    Wow, retro goldmine!

    Apart from the asking prices…

    I reckon the seals will be OK TBH but they’ll need fresh oil immediately which makes the prices a bit comical really…

    mashr
    Full Member

    I parked my old DH bike with 888s on it for a year due to injury. Blew both sides first ride out afterwards (told myself to put the bike upside down for a while first to try and help – forgot), would love to say it was due to my extreme riding but they truth would say otherwise 🙁

    wildfires3
    Full Member

    Just what I need to replace my X-Vert R’s! If I had the cash.

    P-Jay
    Free Member

    Surely they’re reproductions? Or has someone found a pile in a warehouse in Italy?

    mashr
    Full Member

    Or could be that there were parts lying around somewhere that have been cobbled together. They will probably be more expensive to manufacture than modern designs (lowers being several different parts for example) and I’d be surprised if they tooling for the forging/castings had survived that long without going in the skip. Would be interesting to know the story

    chakaping
    Free Member

    Would be interesting to know the story

    re. another thread on here at the moment – this is the kind of investigative MTB journalism I could get behind.

    andrewreay
    Full Member

    Quick update,

    Just had the Z4’s I ordered delivered.

    I’d say OEM packaging 😉 i.e. brown box and placed in a clear polythene bag. The stamps on them suggest parts manufactured in Summer 1999! Backed up by the stickers which are ‘2000’.

    PXL-20210723-133019504

    The seals feel fairly ‘firm’ but are not noticeably brittle. There’s oil inside, just not sure how much yet. Will do a bit of a disassembly later. What’s there is running up the stanchions clean.

    Came with a 2 year Marzocchi warranty card, which you have to post off and register, so I’m sorely tempted :0

    andrewreay
    Full Member

    Couple more pics:
    Old Bombers

    Warranty card!

    Old Bombers

    Old Bombers

    Old Bombers

    the-muffin-man
    Full Member

    It’d be a laugh if the disk brake mounts where the old 48mm spacing ones that Bombers used to have! 🙂

    kelvin
    Full Member

    They still look great, don’t they.

    andrewreay
    Full Member

    It’d be a laugh if the disk brake mounts where the old 48mm spacing ones that Bombers used to have! 🙂

    Not THAT old…

    thols2
    Full Member

    It’d be a laugh if the disk brake mounts where the old 48mm spacing ones that Bombers used to have!

    Was my first thought too. We just need CRC to turn up some other old stock with weird ass proprietary mounts that look almost like normal. Didn’t Hayes have a different sized post mount back in the early days? I have a feeling that I have some old HFXs in my junk box that don’t fit the normal post mount. Worked fine with the correct ISO adapter IIRC.

    andrewreay
    Full Member

    It is intriguing as to where they came from, and why! Sitting in a box for 22 years.

    The warranty and instructions are entirely analogue, with not a mention of any website or email address.

    A completely different era.

    wzzzz
    Free Member

    Ha! Probably turned up at the back of a warehouse when Fox bought Marzocchi and punted onto CRC

    On aliexpress theres a load of new oem elastomer rock shox indys with threaded steerers for £60

    grahamt1980
    Full Member

    Might have to get a set for my sts.

    Still got a pair of 55 rc3 ti in the garage, i wish they would do a 27.5″ version of them or the r2c2

    chakaping
    Free Member

    Still got a pair of 55 rc3 ti in the garage, i wish they would do a 27.5″ version of them

    Have you offered a 27.5 wheel in?

    I seem to recall some people were doing it.

    mrdestructo
    Full Member

    I had Z3 Air 100s on my XC bike. Dull, lifeless, no rose-tinted glasses here.

    But if the pandemic has really limited frame options.. . ..

    Kinesis Maxlight 26

    BigJohn
    Full Member

    Who owns them?

    voodoo-rich
    Full Member

    Lovely forks… I replaced a very light SID SL with a Z2 about 20 years back… realised quite how flexy the SIDs had been shortly after!

    richmtb
    Full Member

    I had a set of MX Pro ETAs BITD.

    Great little fork. They almost had a conversation with you as you road across rough terrain

    boco
    Full Member

    Sorry, if you found a PRST1, keep it hidden or burn it!

    dyna-ti
    Full Member

    Shame they’ve not a Z1 or Z2, just the lower end fork and I dont ever remember them costing £350 😕 I think the Z2 was £250 initially, it was on par with a pace price wise and I paid £199 for my Z2 in 1999.
    They must be trying to price them for the retro crowd and hoping to make a bit.

    Andy-R
    Full Member

    Premier Icon
    kayla1
    Full Member

    Dibs on any 55 Ti RC3s they find!

    I’ve got one lying around doing nothing….

    docgeoffyjones
    Full Member

    A pack of frozen sausages and a hammer is still a much cheaper way to settle your neighbourly disputes.

    ktache
    Free Member

    My late 90 Z2s are still going strong, managed to pick up some seals (just in case) about 2-3 years back.
    “O” rings have started to rot though, Silverfish had a couple in stock, but by the time the “o” ring picks came back in stock, which would have somewhat justified the p+p some one had had them. Luckily I went to my local hardware shop and accessed their box of metric “O” rings and found one to fit, was one on the bottom nuts. Might be difficult if one of the “O” rings at the top of the forks goes.
    Kind of wished I had sought a replacement fork after about 5 or so years, after that finding anything with only 3 inches of travel with a straight steerer was impossible.

    plus-one
    Full Member

    Wonder how many they have ? I’d ha e the z4 with one piece arch they were decent.

    Maybe buying a set and sit on them and cash in later ?

Viewing 40 posts - 1 through 40 (of 59 total)

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