Weeksy08 the ongoing racing trials and tribulations of a crazy teen

but he then decided it was either the Assegai (again) or the pressures, so went back to the usual 18F 20R.

It’s because you’ve got his front tyre on back to front 😆

The shimano clutches are serviceable, it wants a clean and regrease.

It’s because you’ve got his front tyre on back to front

I fell for that one a few weeks ago and had to check…. i’m sure it’s on right

(walks into garage to check) 😀

I fell for that one a few weeks ago and had to check…. i’m sure it’s on right

joking aside – its hard to be certain, but it does look like it could be on backwards in that photo of him and you a few posts back

Sound weekend result for him 👍

If you are going to swap to SRAM it may be worth considering going up to 12 speed Eagle at the same time.
The bigger ring may help climbing if he decides to compete In Enduro.
There are still good deals around on used stuff

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/SRAM-EAGLE-12-speed-GX-NX-conversion-set-/325120436832?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&_trksid=p2349624.m46890.l49286&mkrid=710-127635-2958-0

That’s a cracking idea… but i’m properly financially challenged this week due to the surprise of the Santa Cruz. I’d really thought we could get him happy with the Whyte, but maybe that was crazy thinking from me, it simply didn’t and i don’t think ever could/would happen in hindsight. Either way, I wasn’t planning on such an outlay this weekend that’s for sure.

I do have £800 coming back from the T-130 which sold in less than 10 minutes on Ebay this morning…. but i think we need a sugar daddy/sponsor 😀 😀

Mrs Weeksy keeps offering me money, but i see the riding/biking thing as being my responsibility so say no.

joking aside – its hard to be certain, but it does look like it could be on backwards in that photo of him and you a few posts back

oh “$%^%$%& Q$^”^%&$%

it IS on the wrong rotation !!!! jeezzzzzzzz

Maxxis tyres always have the tyre name and maxxis on the drive side, just maxxis on the non drive side.

Edit too slow

You could recoup most of the cost by selling mech, shifter, chain and cassette on and getting 12 speed on it now rather than later. It would be a no brainer in our house.

That’s what I’m hopefully going to do with the Reverb AXS

i don’t like you any more 😀

He will if he gets 12 speed 😉

oh “$%^%$%& Q$^”^%&$%

it IS on the wrong rotation !!!! jeezzzzzzzz

ha ha.

Your son needs a better mechanic!

Front tyre on backwards probably rides awfully – I bet he’d be a load quicker with it on the right way round.

ha ha.

Your son needs a better mechanic!

Well i must admit i’m either feeling quite guilty or reading too much into it… but both at Rheola and 417 he moaned about not quite feeling the front end grip he wanted, we’d have gone back to the Shorty yesterday but didn’t have it with us as we had the new spare wheels with DHF/DHR combo fitted, i did offer to swap to the DHF wheel at one stage but i think we both just thought “it’s quite loose, so just get on with it”

I don’t know exactly how i managed to do that wrong, i’m usually very good at checking them when fitting.

but both at Rheola and 417 he moaned about not quite feeling the front end grip he wanted,

You live and learn…. at least now he will know what it feels like to have the front tyre on the wrong way round , will all help in him getting to know how various changes affect bike feel.

I reckon there was probably a couple of seconds lost because of that tyre being on backwards- maybe more.

i’m not sure i wanna know the answer as he was only 3.1s off the podium hhahahaaha. But i can’t go back in time and he’ll race there again for sure later in the year.

Given you’re spending loads of money on bikes for him and doing all the maintenance I wouldn’t beat yourself up about it. It’s easily done to make a simple mistake sometimes on bike stuff – we’ve all done it.

On the xt stuff I’d just tweek the rear mech – either loosen the clutch tension off slightly – if that doesn’t do the trick then the pivot needs dismantling / cleaning / regreasing.

I have one bike with XT 12 speed and one with GX 12 speed. They’re slightly different but within a few clicks it really doesn’t make a difference to your ride. And gx 11 speed isn’t exactly the same as gx 7 speed DH anyway.

I’d save the money for something else.

Remember Eagle cassette will require a new freehub if upgrading from Shimano 11speed.

The eBay link above to GX has a new NX cassette so it should fit without the need of a new freehub

Right now i’m not sure there’s anything about the thing he likes…

He doesn’t like
gears, shifting, brakes, suspension, handling. Errrrrm not sure that leaves a hell of a lot.

I did ask him to be honest ….. but FFS i thought he’d be raving about how brilliant this was.

That suspension set up day has turned into a double edged sword hasn’t it.

He’s gone from not being able to feel any setup changes (or at least not being able to articulate them) to being as picky as Minnaar in the course of less than a month.

Right now i’m not sure there’s anything about the thing he likes…

I’m a bit lost – which bike are you/he referring to above?

gears, shifting, brakes, suspension, handling.

so to break this down to things we can help you with on the internet:

gears – looks like a fairly small cassette on there, is he wanting a winch gear. Assume it is set up and in line, including the b-tension being in the right place things to look for are:
-the top jockey wheel being worn or sloppy
-all bolts from mech to hanger to frame and the rear axle done up tight (I’ve fallen foul of this before)
If he wants the 12spd, do what tracey said and do it now.

shifting – cant see what it is, has he switched brands? theres definintly a shimano feel and a sram feel, and some people have strong opinions.
If not, just try shifting it around on the bars until it matches the shifteron the DH bike. having to cock your wrist at a funny angle will make any shifting feel crap.
New cable inner if it feels stiff at all or is delayed on the upshift (to smaller cogs).
“out of date” shifters can be had new-old-stock for not a lot of money.

Brakes – bleed as first port of call.
I know he’s light but if he’s jumped off a 200mm rotor DH bike they may feel a bit underwhelming initially.
I’d upsize rotors if needed rather than change/replace brakes.

Suspension you are hopefully experts at now, that previous gen vpp was quite sensitive to sag I think.

Handling – the stem looks on the longer side for the style of bike, plus the riser bars seem to be rotated forward a bit. Either roll them back, change stem or possibly both.
Sort suspension first, as front to rear balance will have some effect.

The lad took it down Cheeseroller (a trail at 417) and really liked it. I was up at the top at the time waiting for my race, but when i got down i chatted to him and the guy and we made some suspension changes and sent him down again on it….
Once again he was happy.

He doesn’t like
gears, shifting, brakes, suspension, handling. Errrrrm not sure that leaves a hell of a lot.

Isn’t this just what 13 year old lads do?
What did he say when you asked him what he liked about it before you bought it?

If those criticisms are about the bronson, then surely its just needs setting up for him – given he liked it when he rode it at the weekend, or did he just like the colour?

I’ve got a friend who says the same whenever he gets a new bike – I dont like it, its not like the old bike. Its true its not like the old bike because its a totally different bike , what he means is that its not been set up in the way he likes a bike to be set up – but he cant articulate how he likes his bike set up. Gear shifter position, handle bar roll, grips, pedals, brake lever position, lever reach etc etc. Its like jumping onto someone elses snowboard without setting the bindings up in the position you like them, but with a far greater number of variables.

poor suspension setup (I mean poor setup as in not suitable for the rider ) can make a good bike feel utterly awful – the problem is there not a magic ‘good’ set of settings that you can just lookup on the internet and apply to the bike & person in question, the rider needs to be able to give some feedback as to what they think is wrong for you to make the right changes , or you need to know what good feels like for that person in order to be able to get the suspension vaguely in the right ball park.

Assumption with all of the above is that all the bits on the bike are actually working fine, and not faulty/worn out etc . eg if you cant tell the difference between a knackered fork,shock,brakes and one that is merely not set up optimally, then its the blind leading the blind.

Looking at the photo, and my experience from the bikes we have.

Are the bars too wide compared to what he is used to and is the stem longer. The seat post looks to be fully slammed in. Is it allowing him to get enough clearance. I seem to remember that the Whyte and this are larger frames compared to the medium he has had. It will feel bigger and less responsive than he was used to but should feel better the more he uses it.

I don’t ride the two large bikes we have got for the same reasons above apart from the stem. I can jump on any of the mediums we have and they all feel right apart from a bit of suspension tuning but at 5′ 9″ the large ones just don’t feel right

Right now i’m not sure there’s anything about the thing he likes…

He doesn’t like
gears, shifting, brakes, suspension, handling. Errrrrm not sure that leaves a hell of a lot.

I did ask him to be honest ….. but FFS i thought he’d be raving about how brilliant this was.

He didn’t like the t130 – he tested a bike that you’ve bought at quite a lot of expense and liked it. He needs to suck it up now if he’s changed his mind just in my opinion. He’s had 2 pretty nice bikes bought for him and he’s very lucky.

I’d just play about with suspension pressures, service the rear mech, bleed the brakes and check if it needs new pads and general setup stuff. I think you have a box of spare stems / bars etc to swap in and out that won’t cost you anything.

That year of Bronson is quite outdated geometry – SC were quite slow to get up to date. Even my mate’s SC 5010 CC v3 needed the large (for someone 5’8) to get a sensible reach.

Can someone check my summary here? Feel like I’ve missed something;

T130 – blind buy by Weeksy, boy hates it
GT – blind buy by Weeksy, boy likes it?
Bronson – chosen by boy, boy now hates it?

just out of interest, you arent considering adopting are you? I’m not that fussy about bike setup…

That year of Bronson is quite outdated geometry – SC were quite slow to get up to date. Even my mate’s SC 5010 CC v3 needed the large (for someone 5’8) to get a sensible reach.

Not mega LLS but neither was the Spec Enduro that he had.  I had that model (Alu) Bronson, 5’10 and large was fine (wouldn’t have wanted smaller though).  Mine had a pretty basic RS shock and rode fine so maybe a bit of playing with the shock.

Gears can be fettled to work well.  The stem and bar don’t look ideal but assume you’re playing with options here.

Brakes look like Magura. If he doesn’t like them for not much outlay I’d get a set of Code Rs for the GT and swap the guides from that onto the SC. You’ll probably recoup most of the cost selling the Maguras.

Thanks all for the ideas… without derailling the thread too much as this is more about the riding than the bike as such, the Bronson has been returned and we no longer own it.

Reccomend me a Trail/Enduro bike.

So we’re currently in the process of looking for a replacement.

Not sure if this has been covered before and it’s lightly covered in a few of the posts above. Have you considered that you are making a bit of a monster. Maybe switch to treating it like he’s a sponsored rider, you’ve signed the deal now, you may not like the bike any more but it’s the one you are being paid to ride this season so get on with it. I know that is the opposite of the marginal gains you generally seek but… The boy is getting close to having more bikes in this thread than I have had in my 45 years.
Aka I’m jealous too but aren’t quite at the point of pleading like jam-bo 🤣

Not sure if this has been covered before and it’s lightly covered in a few of the posts above. Have you considered that you are making a bit of a monster

Of course i’ve considered it yeah. But despite how things come over at times on the forum/posts he’s honestly SO far away from being the screaming spoilt brat that he may be percieved as in my posts. He’s a really nice kid and never honestly done or said a bad thing wrong (or been caught anyway 🙂 )

I absolutely agree we can and maybe are falling into that trap, but i think that’s at least as much my fault as it is his fault. “Be honest and tell me….” so he does… i then go nuts and change things etc… Which is probably at times a massive over-reaction from me… but i can’t help that, i’m just me and trying to do my best.

Using the sponsored rider analogy is pretty close though to where i’m feeling right now, i just want to get him on a bike and happy. Even just a bit happy 😀

Not a dig at you Steve, but this thread always reminds me of this series which is extremely funny, episode 2 in particular always has me in tears of laughter.

Get him a Remedy 🙂
After growing out of my old bike (which he never really loved), my boy demo’ed a Remedy at BPW, loved it – we found a carbon Remedy on Pinkbike, sold my old bike to fund it. Went and bought it. He still loves it about 5 inches height and 4 stone weight later! It’s in his Uni lock up so gawd know what state it’s in. (He brought the front brake home cos it wasn’t working properly and the lever pivot was absolutely full of dried mud) 😀

Do keep up – Remedy has already been discounted 😉

TBH i think he’d LOVE a Remedy… but after riding his mates one he wasn’t exactly blown away, which is a bit of a shame if you ask me and was more than likely as much down to setup/suspension as his mate likes his bikes quite differently set up to my lad.

after riding his mates one he wasn’t exactly blown away

Whereas… the Bronson 😀
I know what you mean about when they’re good kids – you just want to do the best for em. Good luck finding something (or just make him ride the GT for everything) 🙂

Reports are, it’s really good. Apart from brakes which are on cheap organic pads and can be easy sorted.

But he seems happy. Didn’t get to ride it too much as he spent the afternoon with Coach on DH bike.

That looks proper jumpy / lairy.

Surprised the codes are on cheap organic pads – they normally come with Sram sintered ones that are really good (if a bit expensive). I normally replace with Sram sintered again or Uberbike Race Matrix. The Race Matrix are good for 3 seasons but I think in proper slop they’re a bit lacking / get overwhelmed and I’d take proper sintered pads every day of the week.

Don’t forget the bike wasn’t new. But they’re blue pads which I suspect are Noah and Theo organic.

I’ve ordered new ones.