All these colours look great

I’ll have the green one please 🙂

ahead of the curve…

Newcomers Airdrop Air Drop ‘Sick’ Edit

The geometry looks better than transition IMO.

Not quite up there aesthetically, but external cabling is a winner for me.

Nice looking bike,but personally the small is too long for me at 5’7″ .So the height range for this is 5′ to 6’4″ but the difference in reach between size range is only 33.5mm and stack 18.4mm ,how does that work ?.

gravesendgrunt- don’t knock the geometry until you’ve tried it. I’m 5’8”-9” and the medium looks spot on for my preference. I’m riding a medium T129 that has a longer TT than the Edit and I’d prefer it longer still to be honest.

chakaping – Member
The geometry looks better than transition IMO.

Not quite up there aesthetically, but external cabling is a winner for me.

Up to a point – I think Reverb Stealth routing is a big miss, if they don’t have it – not having that big loop of cable when the saddle down is a proper benefit – internal cables for anything else I can do without, but Reverb Stealth I’m sold on.

I’m not sure Airdop have enough to set them apart in terms of value – YT are cheaper and better spec, while a lot of the bigger manufacturers are not far aay price wise too.

Gravesend – I’m only 5ft 8in and my newest bike has 10mm longer reach than the medium. It’s been a revelation tbh.

I do have short legs, but I’m totally sold on long front ends now.

I think that website is a great way to start creating a new brand. Given that there isn’t even a production product on sale yet there is a wealth of content on there to wet the whistle of an interested consumer.

If they’re not selling the orange one though, I’m out.

Just for my own curiosity, is the Bird Aeris a Horst type design too? There is a pivot close too (and below) the rear axle.

is the Bird Aeris a Horst type design too?

yes

gravesendgrunt- don’t knock the geometry until you’ve tried it. I’m 5’8”-9” and the medium looks spot on for my preference. I’m riding a medium T129 that has a longer TT than the Edit and I’d prefer it longer still to be honest.

I kind of have tried it I ‘sized up’ when buying my current bike of which the reach is 422mm (the recommended reach for my height was 400mm) and found it a little too long for weighting the bars during cornering so I added a stem that was 10mm shorter than the stock 50mm and that improved things a fair bit for me,bike became more maneuverable and fun .

Current bike: 422 + 40 stem = 462
Airdrop geo: 435 + 30 stem = 465

3mm in it, bring the seat 3mm further forward effectively steepening the seat tube getting better climbing to boot.

Obviously the long geo isnt for everyone but you could run it if you wanted

I’m not sure Airdop have enough to set them apart in terms of value – YT are cheaper and better spec, while a lot of the bigger manufacturers are not far aay price wise too.

Whilst true, I don’t think that’ll put people off. There’s more to a bike than just having the latest and greatest spec. Pretty much every review of the Capra says it’s too short. That combined with no demo bikes in the UK makes it a bit of a none starter for most.

Ditto you could look at Giant, Spesh, Trek, etc and say one was £200 less than the other, but that’s not going to stop people buying them, otherwise we’d all be driving round in Daewoo Matiz telling everyone how much cheaper than a Focus it is.

Rolling chassis is a brilliant concept, most people who’ve been riding a while have sheds full of spares that they’d swap onto a new bike anyway, so cut out the middle man and save the cost of the OEM finishing kit and drivechain. On-One are similar with their in house stuff, stick £10 bars, stems and seatposts, saddles etc on all their bikes and people can either upgrade them at the checkout or bin them for no real loss when they get home.

Current bike: 422 + 40 stem = 462
Airdrop geo: 435 + 30 stem = 465

3mm in it, bring the seat 3mm further forward effectively steepening the seat tube getting better climbing to boot.

Obviously the long geo isnt for everyone but you could run it if you wanted

Are you confusing reach and top tube length there?

Why have none of these new UK companies made their bikes single pivot?

Would’ve thought it’d be a good selling point; designed in the UK; built for UK conditions etc.

Just like Orange, except nicer and cheaper.

I’m sure there’d be a market for it; afterall, look at how many Orange’s you see about.

brant – Are you confusing reach and top tube length there?

Speed-reading at lunch

davidtaylforth – Why have none of these new UK companies made their bikes single pivot?

Orange sell partly because they have reached a desirable product status, much like VW in the car world, they are nice but pretty much the same as all the rest but you get to join a secret none existent club upon purchase and for that they can charge xx more.

Hardly anyone does single pivot these days and as far as I am aware none of them market them as for UK conditions, its something only Orange fans do.

Whyte, Cotic, Airdrop, Bird, On One… All UK designed, all put riding characteristics above some mythical bearing eating conditions.

Cotic and On-One are singlepivot.

They are linkage driven single pivot, Orange is “true” single pivot.

The bit about single pivot being UK conditions safe seems to stem from you only needing to change 2 bearings, linkage driven has more than 2 does it not?

Hardly anyone does single pivot these days

But why?!?!??! I’d have thought single pivot bikes would be better now than they ever were since shock technology must have moved on from the Fox Van R halcyon days!

Cotic and On-One are singlepivot.

I can count lots of pivots…… 😉

Id like a custom one with a Red back end fading to yellow at the front,
I shall call it the ‘Pear Drop’

I’d have thought single pivot bikes would be better now than they ever were since shock technology must have moved on from the Fox Van R halcyon days!

They probably are but then all the other designs would have got better in parallel if they are all using the same but better shocks

They probably are but then all the other designs would have got better in parallel if they are all using the same but better shocks

True; guess there’s more potential if you’ve got the location of four pivots to play with, rather than just one.

I’m with DTF on this, I don’t mind single pivots, I’d happily ride a new version of the Heckler but it’s way too short, and is now almost as expensive as a 5 frame. And……….

It depends on the pivots. Lot’s of small PITA blind bearings, proprietary bolts and spacers like specialized – GTFOOH. A handful of big easy to replace bearings, re-useable spacers, standard sized bolts (and stainless, with nylock nuts at that) – not a problem, Ok it’s £30 more when they wear out each winter, but it’s not an all day job to change them.

Far nicer looking than a bird.

legend – Member

Might just be the graphics, but something about that frame shouts “catalogue” to me

brant – Member

I worked with Ed, who’s behind Airdrop for a few years at a previous job. I know he had quite a lot of input and feedback from some of the Sheffield based riders who’ve thrown a lot of companies prototypes about.
Really impressed with what he’s achieved and put out, in a tough market. He’d not be doing it if he wasn’t sure he could make a difference, and I hope he achieves what he’s aiming to do.

It’s not “catalogue”.

Not even a little bit? Or a modified one?

It does look like the bottom left one but then it also looks like a Transition and no one is calling them catalogue

There’s maybe a slight similarity in the chainstay yoke and the rocker, but not much else?

10 years ago I was riding a Carrera from Halfords that shared tubes with assorted Specialized and Merida bikes.

Doesn’t the Bird share some tubes with a frame that Kona don’t sell any more?

Aren’t all carbon frames all catalogue frames re-badged?

Does it matter?

Not to me, I was just wondering, and it’s a perfectly reasonable question. Why are you so defensive?

Why so accusational? If you’re going to accuse it of being a catalog bike, at least find a catalog with a picture of the bike in it.

You must be a very sensitive soul if you find that accusational.

I’m simply querying whether it might be a slightly modified catalogue frame, having seen the suggestion made elsewhere with a link to that catalogue, since that question came up earlier on in the discussion about this frame.

I’m simply querying whether it might be a slightly modified catalogue frame, having seen the suggestion made elsewhere with a link to that catalogue, since that question came up earlier on in the discussion about this frame.

If they are being made by that factory its entirely possible they liased with the factory on the best way to produce their design within a given budget,and the factory proposed using some parts/tube shapes they already produced that were close to what air-drop wanted.

It could equally all be brand new designs/parts/tubes all to airdrop spec.

Of course it doesnt matter which route is taken, as long as the bike is as advertised and the air-drop guys are happy with it (sound like they are and many others are too).

I see, thanks.

You must be a very sensitive soul if you find that accusational.

I think it’s an under appreciated engineer thing.

Me: Wow, look at this cool bridge
GF: Looks like any other bridge
Me: No look at the way they’ve solved XYZ problem
GF: Still looks like a bridge
Me: *sulks*

Fair enough then. It was just a question, from an insensitive layman

Me? Defensive? Just seems odd to reopen a thread with a picture of a bike that looks like a lot of bikes re questioning someone who knows the designer, like you’re trying to score points… It’s been a long day.

It cheeses me off when people put time and money into doing something and all people can do is pick at it.

As a former bridge designer, yes, yes and thrice yes to the above.

As I said above, it was just a question, not a dig, not a criticism. I saw the image of the Alu-Mate catalogue earlier today in a discussion about the Airdrop frame, remembered that the question had come up in this thread, so it seemed relevant.

Doesn’t the Bird share some tubes with a frame that Kona don’t sell any more?

Yes and no. The seat stay is used by Kona, but its a current model AFAIK. The top tube and down tube are from a certain manufacturer that used to HQed at Bronson Street and again still current AFAIK, and The forward shock mount bolt probably features on a dozen different bikes from different places.

I guess the difference is you have catalogue tubing, and parts, and catalogue frames. The tubing literally has a catalogue, just like say Reynolds. Its not like you need to go opening molds all the time and make something brand new just for the sake of it. Our tubes are from open molds, made in China. We set the butting thicknesses etc. but the extrenal shape of the tube is the same from our frame to others that use it. In a few cases we have specific molds made to suit our needs if nothing else works. This might be hydroformed or manual formed.

If you pay enough attention you’ll spot plenty of the same tubes on small batch production bikes, and even on bigger manufacturers. Its just not making sense to solve a problem that doesnt exist if there’s a good tube already in production. Its probably not a cost issue either. Opening a mold for a tube costs about the same as you’d pay RRP for a mid range frame (Single) – its just a risk and delay that unless it needs to happen doesn’t really get you anything.

Where I guess frames trip over to ‘Catalogue’ is where they are a design from a factory, tweaked and modified or otherwise. Again thats not to say there’s anything wrong with that specifically. If you look at early generations of a current model from a certain European brand thats been very much in the press over the last few years, or maybe something current out of discounters closer to home, you’ll find something very similar in the catalogues of the Taiwanese manufacturers, and they aren’t knock offs of the Euro brands.

As for us – we design everything here in the UK from the ground up in terms of the overall bike. Bikes start life as stick drawings with pivots and lines for tubes only. Dan my clever boffin partner has built the equivalent of Linkage into Solidworks so we can move stuff around in the models (2d or 3d) and see in real time how that effects things like anti-squat, leverage curves etc. We then use open mold tubes and some parts to save on the lead time and cost of making everything custom when it comes to stitching the pivots together with some tubes, but the bikes are entirely designed by us in Solidworks.

Sometimes too you find the factory influences the similarity in the bikes too. Among many reasons why they will have input, assembly processes mean that they want to input into your design to ensure they can assemble the frame efficiently and without risk of damage or mis-assembly. This means they draw on expertise from other bikes they work with and influence your design too. Sometimes its good, sometimes its not so. As an example, one of the factories we’re working with also make bikes popular with Abominable Snowmen. When they wanted to change a certain part of the design to something similar to what the snowmen like, we had to tell them to stick to the plan as we wanted it another way for our own good reasons, and they couldn’t see what the issue was. That I guess is the flaw in rejigging catalogue frames – sometimes mistakes get repeated as often as good stuff if you don’t put your foot down or understand fully why you’d want to do it one way over another.