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Most Cotic owners will be transplanting parts across from their existing bikes and, for the most part, these won't be 650b / 27.5 sized. This may change over time as 650b bikes age, but it'll take some time.
There will be a smaller market for those who are willing to commit upfront to the expense of buying a new frame, fork and wheels (rims and tyres to build onto existing hubs at minimum) at the same time. But the high cost of this move is why...at a guess...many of Cotic's customers are still buying their 26ers.
In general, 26er parts won't disappear on the aftermarket for a long time as the demand will surely still be high. If your big game is OEM, then fair enough - but otherwise I'd still punt on developing 26er-compatible parts for a long time yet.
I, for one, am keeping money in my pocket that I'd otherwise have already spent on a new frame - due to the wheel size uncertainty. I don't want to be an early adopter of 27.5er sizing, but equally it doesn't feel like a great time to stump up for a new 26er or 29er.
Ergo, I'm in the middle of refurbishing my 2010 Cotic Soul with a frame re-paint, new forks and various other parts. It's still money spent in the MTB industry...but a fair bit less than it could have been.
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Why change perfection?
I just had a quick 40 minute lunchtime blast on my mk3 soul and it is such a fun bike and perfect for 90% of my local riding.
I can see why the complete bike companies might be pushing 650b but i think if you are in cy's position things are a little bit different. For a start i'd wager he's often selling frames to people who already have some or all of the bits to build a bike up, rather than buying all new.
Second, the whole long travel steel hardtail thing is much bigger in the UK than anywhere else and that's his main market.
Finally, he's small with small overheads and no massive team or worldwide marketing budget and almost certainly orders runs of fairly small numbers which means he could keep supplying 26" frames and potentially have a 650b model alongside if there were enough demand.
That said i notice that pace have a 650b frame on test in this months what mountain bike mag!
Personally i love the idea of a 5 inch rocket-lite. Once thats out the FS itch is gonna be unbearable i think........
Finally, he's small with small overheads
From Cotic demo days and AQR weekends, I seem to remember he's about 6'2" 😀
Blimey it took a whole hour before someone posted that! 🙂 🙂
This is what I love about Cotic threads...we all pitch in about what we think, feel and fear and the actual manufacturer (cheers Cy) helps us put our minds at ease, tells us as he sees it...rather than the mass marketing lot who do not appear to give one iota about customer insight...but base everything on supposed innovation and then shove it down our throat whether we want it or not.
Yep, and it ends with everyone posting pics of their soul's (again) 8)
Oh go on then...
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That's nice...where was that taken?
Overlooking Whitsand bay, in east Cornwall. Not many people know that part of the world. 🙂
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitsand_Bay
For the guy asking, a 26 x 2.35" Maxxis is 670mm diameter. I design around 688mm radius on 26" bikes (approx 2.5" tyres). Pacenti tyres come in around the 706 mark, but because fork manufacturers had no data to work with on their 650B forks because it all happened so fast, they drew something in between at a monster 717mm diameter. We now have to look at using this as the max because tyre manufacturers are ballooning their 650B tyres with some recent treads coming out at 713 and 715 (I'm looking at you Schwable).
To be fair, they are just the equivalent of the current high volume 26" tyres.
I've got some 2.3 HR2's in 650b flavour & they are 712mm. They are 'just' under 1 1/2" bigger than a 2.5" 26" Maxxis, and just under 2" bigger than a 2.35 26" (which were always small for their given size).
The latest Schwalbe Rock Razor & Magic Mary are massively wide though.
What happened there?!