INCOMING !! New frame day… Bird Aether 7

Well, just to start off, if you don’t like how the thread went up to now, stop reading as it’s not changing. 🙂

Anyways.
Today was another ride on the Aether7. I was running the new higher pressure in the DPX2 of 215psi, with 1 large (Size3) volume spacer installed. I was also running the 2.35 Vigilante front tyre at 24psi.
The trails were around the rooty slightly muddy trails of Greenham Common, nothing massively techie in terms of jumping, but very much in line with the sort of riding my bike usually sees. Sure i have jumpy days, but my ‘normal’ stuff is more XC than DH. Hence really why i went for the shorter travel Bird rather than the AM 160.

Overall the bike felt great again today, whether that’s the pressures, the riders or the shock settings, maybe a bit of all 3, but didn’t have a single moment in terms of grip or turning, all good.

Shockwiz said “pressure good, remove a volume spacer, 1 click slower rebound), now arguably i should go to a smaller volume spacer, but i don’t have a size 2 or 1 for the DPX2, so i’ve removed it for now, I may purchase a size 1 for this coming Enduro race next weekend. But it may only be the difference between finishing last or 2nd last in my class, lol. I’m an overweight 50 (nearly) year old and the majority of this weekends racing is for the 13 year old, i’m just along for the ride, but i’m very much looking forward to racing enduro.

I think it’s much easier to ride a bike with consistent suspension settings than retune it for different rides. I can see that Shockwiz can be a useful tool but if it’s telling you to remove spacers on a ride where you haven’t got much air compared to other rides then I think you should ignore it.

Bear in mind that Shockwiz is not going to analyse how the suspension set up changes your dynamic geometry and if you keep changing the settings then it means you’re changing the balance, grip and handling of the bike. You will get more from the bike by being tuned in to how it behaves than from retuning the bike all the time (because MTBs are so light compared to their riders).

You’ll ride faster in a race knowing the shape and balance of the bike in the turns, not by changing your suspension settings again.

Rather than doing what Shockwiz says I’d try to build those correlations yourself so you understand and can feel what it’s saying. Like on the simplest level I know that not using full travel on the shock doesn’t matter if all my air time had smooth transitions, even if I was going large for me.

I am very much trying to ‘feel’ things myself and until I fitted the dpx2 I thought I was getting there, I was getting better at judging settings, but for whatever reason, this one has thrown me and I was way out with it. Well, in terms of pressure, the rebound I had right enough.

I agree on the settling on something completely.

I agree on the settling on something completely.

The problem with that is if you settle for the XC end of the scale it may get you into trouble when you do stuff at the other end of your range (e.g. bottoming out on a jump, travel packing down etc.).

I’d rather set things up towards the harder end of what I ride and deal with the negatives for the rest of it (which are likely to be less consequential).

I bet those settings will be da bomb at your Welsh enduro.

I bet those settings will be da bomb at your Welsh enduro.

If you think the terrain I’ll ride will matter that much, you think I’m very much a better rider than I do. Good settings will be fine, whether I’m at bpw, Swinley, xc or enduro racing. Even if dialled in by a pro I still won’t be troubling anything other than last place

So all this shockwiz fannying about is pointless then.
Pisstaking aside thinking that your bike is as good as it can be because an app tells you it is is a bit misguide.
Set it up so it feels good to you and ignore what the app is telling you.
You’ll learn what’s actually going on with your bike that way and it’ll probably help your riding too.
Maybe have a look how to set up via bracketing.
All the app is doing it measuring shock pressures.
It has no idea how the bike is actually sitting/balanced.
Then the important bit.
Stick with what you settle on and ride the **** thing. 😉
As an example on todays ride I was all over the shop on the first descent.
I didn’t blame the bike or change anything .
What I did was realise that I was just going too slow and on the brakes to much.
Had a word with myself on the next climb and guess what.
The bike felt great on all the rest of the descents we did.
No nobs were turned and the bike was fine.

Stick with what you settle on and ride the **** thing

I do, plenty. Afan last Sat, bpw on Sun, local Tues, Thurs and Fri, then Zwift Sat and out again today.

This might be helpful @weeksy, I’d ditch the Shoxwiz and start making adjustments by feel.

I don’t think any amount of zwift will help with bike handling and setup. 😉

Nice sheet, having it all in one place like that. It’d also be nice to have a column on what you’re trading off by making that adjustment, and/or how to tell if you’ve gone too far.

Hey Weeksy – based on the last shockwiz ride – if that was a non tech ride I’d leave the volume spacer in. Particularly if your next ride is going to be an enduro race in Wales and you’re running a lot of sag to start with. Otherwise you might be bottoming out when you hit bigger features going fast.

Good settings will be fine, whether I’m at bpw, Swinley, xc or enduro racing.

Funny, I’m a set it and forget it kinda guy. Except for BPW, where speeds are up, and my settings are tweaked – typically 10% more air pressure in shocks and tyres.

Funny, I’m a set it and forget it kinda guy. Except for BPW, where speeds are up, and my settings are tweaked – typically 10% more air pressure in shocks and tyres.

We’ll see how it all feels.. I have no idea how tech this course is on the weekend, i assume it’s not insane as it’s an Enduro rather than a DH race. We get time to practice the runs on the Sat, so we’ll check them out and if needed get a decent idea on what we need to change on both our bikes.

I have no idea how tech this course is on the weekend, i assume it’s not insane as it’s an Enduro rather than a DH race.

If it’s the Dyfi Haibike Mini Enduro – steep(ish) and natural I would think. Generally no unavoidable, unrollable features at this level.

Excellent video… Whilst i may still come last, there’s a chance i may not die based upon that 🙂

By eck that video doesn’t show quite how sketchy some bits are, you’re grabbing full on the brakes and sliding down hoping it makes a few of the turns. But mostly it’s fine.

It’s grassy that’s now powdery dust at times with a few flat and pedalling bits but mostly the timed sections are gravity.

I have absolutely no chance of staying with my lad, none at all. But sod it, I’ll do my best to survive. I’m actually impressed I didn’t crash once lol, I thought I was going to

2021-07-17_08-22-38[/url] by Steve Weeks[/url] – Flickr2BBcode LITE

After practice today we went for a beer and some very average food but with excellent company from Mrs and Mr dangerbrain, then back to B&B with epic views

2021-07-17_08-24-12[/url] by Steve Weeks[/url] – Flickr2BBcode LITE

2021-07-17_08-22-38[/url] by Steve Weeks[/url] – Flickr2BBcode LITE

Then we found a lovely place less than 2 mins walk from B&B

Sitting having an ale and it’s 20+ degrees

2021-07-18_09-42-39[/url] by Steve Weeks[/url] – Flickr2BBcode LITE

Game face on!

https://my.raceresult.com/174970/

Live timings

You both seem to be going well!

We’re not dead, I’ll take that as a win

Danger is 130 in the 30-39 class.

It’s definitely a hot one today. Currently leading vets & I’m done. Couple of laps & I feel like I’ve been in a slow cooker.

Be surprised if I win, as this is the first race I’ve done in nearly two years & i’ve not exactly been training or riding with it in mind 😆

Oh man, you should’ve said you were there

I didn’t realise anyone else would be there from here – actual riding/racing bikes & all that!

Ended up second, which given I’ve forgotten how to do racing, I’ll take. Definitely left a lot of time out there, but I’ll worry about that another time 🙂

Congratulations!

Snowdon seems to be 14.5% ?

Having ridden 14-17% climbs today, I can’t do that for 2 hours !

Ignore, I put in Snowdon thread

Steep and sketchy, yeah, maybe just a bit

2021-07-18_09-41-10[/url] by Steve Weeks[/url] – Flickr2BBcode LITE

Well there I was wondering how a thread about a new frame managed to stretch to 9 pages?! 😁

Keep on riding everyone, and be nice.

Steep and sketchy, yeah, maybe just a bit

I think that’s the most ridiculous camera tilt I’ve ever seen 🙂

I paid an extra £4 for them to make me look good

I paid an extra £4 for them to make me look good

It’s a professional photo !? !?

They could at least have surreptitiously replanted the marker pole at a 35 degree angle to make the photos look vaguely believable at a quick glance….

Though dealing with that tree could have been a challenge 🙂

Dunno mate, they’re all up on roots and rain, so I guess at least semi pro as we have to pay for them. In their defence I doubt I’m a great model, but they have plenty of time to frame me in shot I guess.

Also bought this one of the boy.

2021-07-19_01-34-33[/url] by Steve Weeks[/url] – Flickr2BBcode LITE

Then got persuaded to enter a southern enduro with him. I should know better at my age!

Event:
Southern Enduro Series #4 – Milland

Date:
2021-09-26

Good stuff. Great to hear about your riding escapades 🙂

The discussion about shocks etc leaves me cold but love hearing you talk about biking with the lad with enthusiasm and pride.

Happy days.

I was going to write a long report about the weekend but got sent to a data center today sadly.

I’m not sure either of us cared about the shocks on our bikes, him because he just rides it and me because I was just hanging on

Looks like he enjoyed it 👍

WEll i guess this deserves a bit of a write up, i’ve been a bit busy so not had too much time.

It was a long long drive, 4+ hours but we made it up there and got out in practice. The climb up was around 15% for much of it and wasn’t nice at all, but was do-able with a few walking bits for the boy, which in honesty i was glad about LOL. But at the top it turned into a lovely peak of fun.
2021-07-21_09-47-25 by Steve Weeks[/url], on Flickr

The trails were crazy steep at times, loose and powdery. Lots of grassy sections being torn up and lots of tree sections. A couple of bits where you’re hanging on and hoping for the best rather than actually riding the bike. Well, for me anyway. Every trail we went down the boy blew me away, which was completely expected of course. But we got down for the 3 runs and despite my worries on a couple of the drop sections within section 3, it actually went OK… None of us crashed and we all went down happy.

Met up with one of the lads for beers and food etc.
2021-07-17_08-22-38 by Steve Weeks[/url], on Flickr

Onto race day and we got there in plenty of time, transponders fitted for timing and up the hill we go… again… and again… It was showing 29deg and as you’d imagine it was PROPER toasty !!!!
2021-07-18_09-42-39 by Steve Weeks[/url], on Flickr

The format was ‘mash up’ so you can ride any segments in any order you want, you need to complete all 3 stages to register a time overall though.

We went 2-1-3 I rode OK and was happy enough with things on stage 2, but felt i could have gone quicker, too much time spent hanging on and on the brakes, trying to pick my way down lines i thought were half impossible. It was right on the borderline of my ability at times this stuff.

2021-07-18_09-41-10 by Steve Weeks[/url], on Flickr

Looking at the times i got stuffed by my lad again of course. He was roughly 20s ahead of me…. But hey, that’s OK.

2021-07-19_01-34-33 by Steve Weeks[/url], on Flickr

Onto stage 1 which has a techie drop line entry but was slightly more tame than stage 2 …. well, sometimes… Still steep and techie… but shorter. Considering the climbs, the end comes up sooner than you think. It also had a couple of pedally sections which i felt i could have gone harder on. As you’d expect i lost 20s to the small lad once again LOL.

Stage 3 is the biggy, it’s the stage used for the Fox and Hounds, where one of the Athertons chases a bunch of people down the hill who set of before them. Steep and tech again but with some flat/pedal bits both in woods and across the rocks/roots. This time i took some of the drop sections a bit harder than practice day and it paid off, i put in a half decent time overall, but 40s down on the boy.

My target though wasn’t my lad, it was 1. Don’t come last… 2. Beat the other Singletrack forum guy.

Sadly i was 4s ahead on Stage 1 of him, 6s ahead on stage 3, but on stage 2 i was 15s off his pace !!! Wow… Don’t know quite how that was.

We spent an hour getting cool in the car along with gallons and gallons of fluid and headed back out.

My lad was doing stage 3, i went for stage 2….

I took 5s off my time and beat the STW guy overall by 2.5s ! Yay me… 😀

My lad crashed and was 9s slower down stage 3.

the fatigue, heat and the day had taken it’s toll and we called it a day.

I ended up 32/36 and he was 20/38. Although the gap for me was a lot bigger to the leaders than for him. He was a little disappointed in his result i think, but he was in the 13-16 class and he only reached 13 the week before… So i thought considering that, he did bloody well.

I was in a group of 4-5 riders who on their day could probably beat eachother, but then the gap ahead to the next grouping is 1min… I don’t know yet how 1min could be made up… I’d need to improve a tonne.

We’re at Katy Curd training tomorrow, but i still think getting a minute off is somewhat optimistic !

Next race is Sept, it’s a fully uplifted downhill race, which will please the boy, although with a £70 entry fee, i’ve not entered this one.

We’ve then got an other Enduro a little later, which i have entered this time.

Both bikes performed perfectly over the weekend, although my lad did have a little brake fade on the last run, needing a quick bleed before tomorrows course.

Both bikes performed perfectly over the weekend

So what are you replacing the Aether 7 with?  Going 29er?

No, far from it. I’m thinking something a bit less LLS

It’s not that I’m not getting on with the Aether7, I do like it. Bit by the same account I think something with a shorter TT/reach and a bit less length would be somewhat easier on some of the riding I’m finding myself on lately. The last 2 days out have brought steep switchy tech, maybe I’m misguided but comparing my lads Sworks to mine in overall wheelbase mine is nearly 6″ longer. Sure his is a Medium and mine a large. But still, that’s a chunk of difference.

I’m not expecting it to transform my riding going to something shorter, but I think it’ll potentially make things a little easier?

All that said, I’m certainly not giving the Bird away and if it doesn’t sell I won’t be too upset. I may sit here tomorrow and think “don’t be daft” and pull it. I dunno yet.

Today on the coaching day, Katy turned my bars back quite a bit compared to where I had them. But it’s still a long bike and I just wonder if it’d be easier on a shorter wheelbase.