Having just built my new one up this weekend and ridden it this afternoon, albeit only for a quick 10 mile off road hour blast:

I get it now.

That is all.

Thankyouplease.

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v4hr6QetxPg[/video]

strange as I tried one and really didn’t get the fan boy love at all 😕

You are cheating.

You must post pictures,
Promise to cut down the steerer first thing tomorrow.
Give an endless conclusive rave review about how comfy/springy/lively/zingy it is after your first 10 mile road ride.
Obviously you’ll then receive a mixed bag of complements/suggestions/abuse regarding your build and garden/shed/garage.
The thread may be nearing a close by the time cy chimes in with thanks for all the praise bestowed upon his wonderful frame by all the lovely STW folk after which a tangential discussion about your chain device/benefit to cost ratio of ti bolts/proper fork travel then signals imminent end to thread, never to be read again by anyone but you (once or twice a week for the remainder of bike ownership) or a few other sad folk like me once in a while.

Enjoy your new ride.

strange as I tried one and really didn’t get the fan boy love at al

So how does it differ from the Duster?

I can’t feel the love for the new one with the down pipe seat tube and funnel type headtube. I was going to buy one but the new mods just scared me off. Call me shallow basing my opinions on looks but I decided n a genesis latitude instead. I could square the extra cash for the last model soul as it looked right for a steel frame and I’d heard a lot of good feedback. I’m sure he new bits all work etc but it just takes it a step further than I need and the aesthetics are a bit much for a long term classic 853 steelie. Same with the orange p7.

Just my opinion based on not much…

R

I’ve got an older one coming this week and I can’t wait.

Gonna give a new paint job and ride it till it dies.

but you can still buy the classic soul can’t you, without the mods?

Yeah it offers it you at the bottom of the advert for the new one.

And it’s cheaper.

Right, now I’m at work, I’ve plenty of time to upload photos and generally do everything but work.

I might start by quantifying my opinion, my previous Charge Duster was built as such:

I loved it. Fast, flickable and fun.

However, I kept hearing all sorts of things about the Soul and it kept burning away at me – I wonder if it were really all that they were cracked up to be.

So I devised a plan. I ended up with this lot:

Ironically, the only difference between the Charge and the Cotic is about half a pound in weight and 20mm on the top tube. It’s identical pretty much everywhere else (dunno about the angles tho).

The On One was heavy, and built like a brick sh1t house – I’m sure it’s a great frame, especially on a budget, but it wasn’t for me.

So, this weekend I built this:

And thrashed it mercilessly around AC/LW to see what happened. What happened (in between dodging the Sunday dawdlers) was that I went blooming quickly. It moves around very nicely, it’s very zingy, lots of feel coming from the rear which meant that I knew when it was about to break away and all in all, just a bloomin lovely ride.

I’m toying with trying a 50mm or 60mm stem as opposed to the 70mm that is on there at the mo, but it’s everything they all say it is.

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7j2mzeyGZ8Y[/video]

Sure I have seen this thread before!

Neil, you really need get in the habit of fitting bar plugs!

What lenght are you running your forks at?
And have you upgraded you fork lowers? colour don’t match crown.. 😉
And if so worth the upgrade to 15mm?

MTB Rob:

– I couldn’t find the bar end plug for that side, it had succumbed to the Gods of Fridgesuck.
– The forks are F120’s, and perfect for it – new SKF seals and default fluid levels, and feeling lovely
– I was going to swap the uppers as well but the white uppers I have are OEM ones I think which are slightly different, so I had to go for grey upper, white lower, which I quite like 🙂
– Yes. Yes. and Yes. Do it, but only if you can it efficiently as it can get expensive quickly if your wheel can’t be converted and you can find the right fork lowers.

ah good old fridgesuck 👿

I got Hope pro2 so easy to convert to 15mm, I also have tied and soldered spokes which helps to stiffen it up a bit.

I am perplexed at the plethora of threads that insist on mentioning the soul in the title..
Eg what toothpaste for a Cotic soul owner or what pile cream for a Cotic soul owner

Why do you need to mention that you have a soul?

By the way I had one and it was ok but I actually preferred my voodoo wanga

By the way it’s arm and hammer and preparation h 😀

Though I would chime in and mention the Pipedream Sirius. The mk2 is equally as good as the Soul IMHO. Think we need a Singletrack steel framed trail bike test soon?!

… because

it’s everything they all say it is.

It may be boring. But true. And after reading umpteenth threads like this I bought one and never looked back.
A cliché? Well, if all clichés rode that well…

“Why do you need to mention that you have a soul?”

– So people uninterested in Souls don’t need to bother opening it?

psssst….

Prince Albert

/runs away

See, I have this itch. And it’s sort of a Cotic Soul type itch. These threads don’t help me, not one bit…

If you feel the itch and these threads make you more itchy: scratch the itch! Easy.

If you don’t feel the itch don’t buy it and ignore all Soul titled threads. Easy.

🙂

@bigrich: one picture can say more than 72,567 threads! 😉