Late 90's early 00's Dirt bikes – show me yours….

After a bit of inspiration here…..

Just got me a yr 2000 Spooky and am after some inspiration for building her up.

I have some nice bombers with a CNC brace and a few period pieces but just wondered if anyone else on here still rode around on something similar?

I'll post up pics of what I have in a bit 😆

Was Spooky still around in 2000?

I had 1997 Metalhead in baby blue, with a mish-mash of parts that didn't really do the frame justice.

Judy DH forks, X-Lite stem, Azonic bars, LX cranks and hubs, Campag rims, etc.

Very nice frames for that era, but a bit pricey.

1998 trailstar – this ones my mates but i had an identical one (we built them at the same time) but mines was SS.

He hardly rode his – i snapped my frame at the headtube and the forks at the brace overshooting the triple at kinoull 🙁

Mike you have got me thinking now 😕 I'll email Mikey @Spooky

Pics:

Apart from a little decal damage the bike is mint 8)

That Spooky is lovely! I dreamed of owning one of those when I first got into MTBing proper.
Rusty had a DS1 with orange bombers at SSUK last year. Looked lovely.

Was Spooky still around in 2000?

Isn't Spooky still around today or do I need to read up on my mtb history? Or are we talking about that particular model?

Spooky are still going now but I think that they had a number of years "down time".

This frame, the Metalhead & the Motorhead were all produced in the late 90's really early 00's

Pics:

Bandwagon:

Metalhead

Motorhead

I think they all may have been hand made by Frank the welder 8)

frank then went on to various other projects including sinister – my mate had an r7 – it rode lovely

I've got a sunn bmix sat waiting till I have a bit more cash to finish it off. Can't decide if I should stick some old sus forks on it or keep the original 5pc rigid ones on it

Come on folks…..need more pics 😆

i've got a hardcore which i donated to my girlfriend. it has original (97) bombers (i.e. dual mount), original hope big un (the ginormous one) on the front with one of the original mavic disc-only DH rims. it's a 1×9 setup with xt cranks. the rear wheel was pinched by me but used to be a hope ti-glide with mavic 521/721

I had a trailstar frame just like that one Trail Rat, built with 03 DJs and 24” wheels, loved it, not sure why I got rid, it was the greatest bike ever!

Had one in red for a nit too with 26" and gears, 99-01 Trailstars were bob on!

i remember the hardcore frames – had rediculasly steep head angles – my mate ended up running his with JNR Ts to get a decent head angle out of it !

A mint/NOS Spooky is a very nice find, Mark.

I'd build it up with modern day parts rather than "period" parts. I think they were designed around 100mm travel, but you might want to put something longer on it to slacken it up a bit, cos that pic of the Metalhead shows what steep angles we rode 10 years ago!

Handn't even thought about head angles…..

My forks for this build have a whopping 65mm travel 8)

Why do you want slack headangles on a dirt jump bike?
They shouldn't be confused with the hardcore hardtail trail bikes that are so popular at the moment.
Steep headangles make for quick reacting bikes which is what you want on a DJ bike.

Cheers Mike.

Its not NOS and was apparently used as an XC bike up until recently. Can't for the life of me see how this was possible though 😯

Ran my Old trailstar with "period" Z3s at 80mm for a bit I think, then upped them to 100mm and the crown gave up, the 03 DJ3s I had after that are still running now on yet another bike, early 00's Marz ~100mm are great no need for more, nigh on indestructable, and easy to service…

There’s always the option of going for a rigid fork…

Build wise go for a mix of old and new, timeless classics where appropriate, with the odd bit of modernity where there is a true advantage, and it has to be SS for true dirt machine credibility..

You’ve inspired me, I want another Trailstar, sidekick or DS1/2…

back in the day we were using them for DJ through the week and DH at the weekends …. SCU dh – clockworks etc

thus headangle became important , doug could never work out why his bike was crap at dh till he noticed his headangle was near vertical ! fine for dh but the trailstar was much more versatile

……..some of them, around the time they went bust, didnt get heat treated

i had a metalhead, it snapped at the headtube, although i did hit a parked car

loving it to this day.

I suppose if you want to experiment with HA/fork length then the Psylo 85-120mm was your “period” Pike equivalent but it was a bit gash, otherwise your in the land of 100-130mm Bombers…

Terry – did you do the old SCU and Clockwork DH races? – didn't think you were that old.

A mate still has an original Metalhead from around '96.

did scu didnt do clockworks – the guys i rode with did clockworks – i was too poor 🙁

leggyblonde – Member
Why do you want slack headangles on a dirt jump bike?
They shouldn't be confused with the hardcore hardtail trail bikes that are so popular at the moment.
Steep headangles make for quick reacting bikes which is what you want on a DJ bike.

I can't see anywhere that the OP says he wants to build a "DJ" bike.

My understanding/interpretation of "dirt bike" means something he can do a bit of everything on, not necessarily just dirt jumping.