[Closed] New Ragleys; done yet?

10-4 sounds more my kinda thing.

Defo interested in the G6. Just hoping that BB is nice and low.

10-4 looks good to me too.

Yeah i think these look spot-on although my knowledge of Ragley's generally is limited.
But I do like the idea of more travel up front vs lesser at the rear, ideal for my type of riding and wants from this type of bike.

I wonder if those stupid cartoon graphics come off easily?

his lawn's in jolly good nick.

They look brilliant. I just hope the 10-4 comes with short(ish) chainstays and a low bb. If so it could be a perfect bike for uk trails.

Before i started riding a susser and saw these mentioned with a fair bit more travel on the front than the rear, i thought "wow, that might actually work out quite nice", coming from a "hardcore" hardtail.

On a hardtail, you use the forks to work the bumps.

Now, i've been riding a susser for a little bit now, the way i and i know many others work a full susser is to really work the rear suspension, rather than being weight biased over the forks on a hardtail.

The COG is heavily dependant on the bb location, which is closest to the rear wheel, when the rear suspension is there, that is what you're biased to working. Now on a susser all the forks do is stop my front wheel from being eaten by holes, all the real suspension action is being dealt with by the rear wheel.

I hope my ramblings make sense. I guess what i'm trying to say is that you work a hardtail differently to a susser, by reducing the rear travel, you're making it ride more like a hardtail, when really you want a full suspension bike to work like a full suspension bike, not a hardtail.

Also the 140/100 version, what is that rear suspension actually going to do? You will have to run it hard to cope with the same hits as the 140mm fork, getting rid of all small bump compliance, so all it's doing is saving you on big hits. But does that extra safety on big hits warrant the extra weight/cost/maintenance the 100mm of extra travel has over hardtails?

Then you have the geometry complications as the front wheel is moving more and more readily than the rear, the HA will get steep and squirrely easily.

I really don't agree with applying a hardcore hardtail design process to a full suspension bike.

How many bikes have you designed and sold?

I struggle with long sentences

but i had 160mm forks on my 120mm hemlock and it was bloody ace.

i'm very tempted by the big-10-4.

dean - do you ride flats or clips? I bet it's flats. Clipped in riders don't work the back as much as those on flats on the whole. Just down to style of riding on the pedals. Just switched to flats in the last few weeks and I definitely lean back way more than I used to on clips.

Looks like the front end of a 2008 Stumpy bolted to the back end of a Blur.

Wozza - Member
Looks like the front end of a 2008 Stumpy bolted to the back end of a Blur.

@dean

IMO in the majority of the uk a bike with 140-160mm travel out back is too much. Something like 110-130 is the sweet spot. Feels more like a hardtail, but without the sting in the tail.

Lots of people like their all mountain full sussers, but I have found that unless I take mine to a downhill track I can't really get the most out of it.

A slack head angled, short travel frame with a low bb is perfect for 90% of the riding I do. If I want to ride anything more aggressive I will take the big bike and will get the uplift or push back up.

Nah, looks like an old Giant Trance with longer forks.

A bit.

I rather like them. The front reminds me of the old, old Enduro with a Giant-esque back end.

Would be interested in demoing one.

Provided the production machines are properly built of course.

In a way, I agree with kudos. I ride a 140mm rear travel bike with 160mm forks. I could get away with less travel but I like the angles. The options for a short travel bike are pretty rubbish IMO as I don't want a steep racey bike and the only other choices seemed to be Orange ST4 or the commencal super 4. Didn't want either. It would be good to see more 120r/140f travel bikes with slack angles that can take a beating.
I have recently had to persuade a beginner friend away from a Enduro EVO beast. He just like the look of it and thought more travel = better. The LBS were very keen to sell him one, too. 😐

(imho) it's the geometry of long travel bikes that we like, not the travel.

i'd like:

ragley geometry
built like a tank
100mm front and back

please

🙂

How many bikes have you designed and sold?

Bit of a blinkered view. I don't have any opinion on the subject of long travel front / short travel bikes, but "designer always designs great stuff" is not always going to be true is it?

While we are at it, one of these here 'ragley geometry bikes' with 120mm front and 100 rear would be pretty handy too....

While we are at it, one of these here 'ragley geometry bikes' with 120mm front and 100 rear would be pretty handy too....

If anyone is actually designing/developing the ragley range now.

deanfbm - Member

Also the 140/100 version, what is that rear suspension actually going to do? You will have to run it hard to cope with the same hits as the 140mm fork, getting rid of all small bump compliance, so all it's doing is saving you on big hits. But does that extra safety on big hits warrant the extra weight/cost/maintenance the 100mm of extra travel has over hardtails?

It doesn't have to work like that. My own bike is a 120mm rear, 160mm front... It's a superb combination. It doens't lack small bump compliance, as the suspension is designed around short travel- if you were to take a 140mm travel bike and try and make it only use 100mm of its travel then yes, you'd probably end up with something quite unpleasant but if it's done right then the suspension will react correctly.

Remember, the whole mechanism of the front and rear suspension is totally different, so there's nothing magical about matched travel.

The benefits aren't what you think either... Yes it climbs and pedals very well, for obvious reasons. But it also translates into really excellent trail manners, it doesn't soak up jumps and lips in the same way as a longer travel bike generally does. The bottom bracket position's a bit more stable as well. It's not just a "hardtail with a bit of give", in fact it doesn't ride anything like a hardtail, it just rides like a very good full suss but with a mix of the benefits of short and long travel.

It's probably not as fast as a 160/160 bike on the bigger descents, mind... But then these aren't race bikes. What it is, is very very fun.

I think this is pretty neat - I love riding my hardtail and generally prefer it to a full suss, but I also like to go to the alps every summer. If I took my Surge, I'd get super beaten up within the first couple of days, thereby affecting the rest of my holiday. Whereas this looks like a bike that you can ride like a hardtail, but will take a lot of the sting out of all the braking bumps.

any indication as to when these will hit the shops and a possible frame pricepoint?

Whats the £ ?

I rode a Blur 4x for years, 140 front, 115 rear - ridina Soul not, that's built with mostly the parts from the 4x - there's a real similarity in the ride of the two bikes, in my head.

Northwind - You can't have your cake and eat it as it were. The weight on a bike is going to be rear end biased, the rear shock has to deal with more energy than the forks.

You can play with leverage ratios all you want, but for the rear suspension has to always deal with the same amount of net energy put into it from an equivalent impact.

If we consider the scenerio as energy dispersed per unit length of shock shaft displacement.

Normally shorter travel=shorter shock stroke. So a shorter travel bike normally has to disperse more net energy per unit length than a typical longer travel bike. To disperse this net energy, either the spring stiffness needs to be increased and/or damping coefficient increased, this results in a harsher ride.

So how can a shorter travel bike (assuming shock stroke is shorter than the longer travel counterpart) be designed to feel supple and bottomless, manipulation of leverage ratios. High leverage ratio feels "supple", they input more energy per unit displacemt, low leverage ratio feels "harsh", they input less energy per unit displacement.

What i'm trying to say is a shorter travel bike, assuming it has a shorter shock stroke, no matter how much the suspension design is manipulated, has to have a greater region of low leverage, hence a greater region of harsh feeling suspension than a longer travel bike.

For myself to suppose properly, shock stroke and leverage ratio curve would have to be known.

So everyone's ramblings, including mine aren't really valid until we know for certain the specifics of the suspension design.

I agree that there does need to be shorter travel bikes with more stable geometry.

I just think expecting 100mm of travel to deal with the same impacts as the 140mm travel up front in a manner that doesn't feel harsh at any point is quite unreasonable and much.

deanfbm - Member

Northwind - You can't have your cake and eat it as it were. The weight on a bike is going to be rear end biased, the rear shock has to deal with more energy than the forks.

That must be why so many people ride bikes with rigid forks and rear suspension?

Seriously, you don't need to wallow in supposition, mismatched travel bikes aren't a new idea and there's plenty of us that can speak from experience with them.

Can't find any details for the shock stroke in these but you seem to be assuming it'll be short based on the fact that "Normally shorter travel=shorter shock stroke". But these aren't normal short travel bikes. The Ragleys certainly don't look to have short shocks, and the Hemlock takes its 120mm from a 200x57, and the ST4 uses a 190 x 50 for its 110mm.

All your arguments would be equally good arguments in favour of bikes having more rear travel than front, but that's not a popular option.

Surely suspension design has everything to do with it?
My 140mm rear travel works with a shock with 50mm stroke.
I've ridden bikes of different designs (same travel) of which one has felt like it has significantly more travel than the other (no specifics I don't want to be flamed!).
Also for what it's worth, I ride my forks as much as possible to get as much grip as I can.
Also, to be fair to Northwind he did say;

It's probably not as fast as a 160/160 bike on the bigger descents

i once built a 100mm rear travel frame out of a dmr sidekick, slapped a set of pikes on the front (140mm) , and raced it in the mega avalanche.

it was 'mismatched'.

it looked rubbish.

it was ace.

i'll dig a photo out tomorrow, but remember, i did say it looked rubbish.

all the real suspension action is being dealt with by the rear wheel.

You learn something every day 😯

The G6 looks a giggle.

10-4 29er .....on the want list

The arse end of my bike is imperial measurements, the front is metric. Does that count as mismatched travel?

The G6 does look like just what I want, mind you, regardless of numbers. If they spec it in hands I'll probably buy one at some point.

it is all about the quality of the travel..............some 100mm designs feel and work better than some 150mm designs.... turnerflux dw with a 130mm fork very very capable, my old turner xce hl with 130 mm fork and coil rear pretty indestructable....giant trance with pikes or in my case pace 150s a hoot.

quality suspension is better than oodles of travel!

I like the look of them alot. Any ideas on frame weight and price?

I'm guessing but maybe it will be priced along the same lines as the nukeproof frames - £800

Now on a susser all the forks do is stop my front wheel from being eaten by holes, all the real suspension action is being dealt with by the rear wheel.

Thanks for brightening my evening. Ace troll.

So this 100mm rear / 120+mm front, more relaxed head angle has been around a few years:
[img] [/img]

More slack-angled bikes with shorter travel is a good thing imo - quite interested in the 10-4.

Not convinced by some of the pseudo-science talk above tbh.

I ran a 140 front, 100 rear trance for a while. best bike i've ridden for trail riding. bloody fantastic. These ragleys have got the right idea. love the idea of them

My motolite works quite well in the 100mm rear travel setting and a 140mm fork up front. 10-4 looks good to me.

*waits for ahwiles rubbish photo*

You took an old steel frame and welded some suspension bits on? I'd like to see that - seriously, I'm a bit of a fettling geek. Hopefully it'll put Cynic-Al's efforts to shame.

I probably wouldn't buy blind, but I'm fairly sure that 18bikes will get a demo frame up and running asap.
I'd love to try one.

1st assembly:
[img][url= http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6210/6102916096_0bf4d8ac5c.jp g" target="_blank">http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6210/6102916096_0bf4d8ac5c.jp g"/> [/img][/url]

1st build:
[img][url= http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6207/6102369925_31ef913935.jp g" target="_blank">http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6207/6102369925_31ef913935.jp g"/> [/img][/url]

after the mega:
[img][url= http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6064/6102916296_a5679931cb.jp g" target="_blank">http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6064/6102916296_a5679931cb.jp g"/> [/img][/url]

100mm rear travel, felt ace.

i built it as a 'this will never work' prototype, as a step towards building my own Dh frame, so i was as surprised as anyone when it came together into a rideable bike...

i then spent a couple of years designing/building a 180mm rear travel version.

only to slowly realise that i don't like loads of travel... and the shorter version felt much nicer.

so i'm back on the drawing board: 100mm 29er, with geometry [s]pinched from[/s] inspired by my Ragley. (to be made from steel, obviously)