In that case I’ll stick with those Beavers on the 29″ wheels.

Jameso, any info/geometry chart about the new Ramin 2020? looks great!

Ramin geo for a Med –
450mm seat tube
470mm reach
650mm stack
805mm F-C
65 HTA static 130mm fork
75 STA
£725 and £925 specs, this is the £925 in ‘colour flip’ metallic blue-purple and gloss black rear

Flipping heck, that’s quite a revamp

What’s the chainstay length, may I ask?

Oops, I just bought a large to use for night rides, Be easy xc. It’s alot cheaper than the other bikes I’ve been looking at, and I can forgive the QR for this kinda bike. I’ll run it rigid, but what are people’s opinions about running with a 120mm fork from another bike, if i wanted to take it on harder bijepacking trips?

I think it came with 120mm forks on the Ramin 2 and 4, so should be ok in that respect.

I’ve got to say the new model looks fantastic from the image above. Is it still being marketed as an all rounder or is it more trail focussed?

For those interested in weight, according to my scales the XL frame is a bit over 1.9kg and the fork is a bit over 1.6kg.

Hoping my +20mm post mount adapters arrive today and then I can transplant everything from the Longitude this weekend. Though, awkwardly, I just tried a shorter stem on the Longitude and the steering feels a bit less wonky 🙂

XL frame is a bit over 1.9kg and the fork is a bit over 1.6kg.

Have a 1300g fork weight here but the XL’s steerer may account for some of that. Hope all’s OK on the build.

Well, the adapters have just plopped onto the doormat so if I can find time then I’m good to go 🙂

At some point I also need to get round to building up the Chromium frameset I’ve stashed in the loft, which (once I’ve managed to sell my Dolan) will become a singlespeed road/gravel bike with swappable 700×37 and 27.5×2.2 wheels… but I’m going to do a paintjob on that first. As a counter to the Ramin, the fork on that one is surprisingly light… 665g for an uncut aluminium fork that takes discs and 27.5×2.2 tyres seems pretty good, and 1765 for the XL frame is pretty competitive too. Picked that one up a while back for £130 so I’m not doing badly 🙂

Is it still being marketed as an all rounder or is it more trail focussed?

Marketed as a trail hardtail really. Though we don’t really market ourselves too well whatever we say about it : )
Matt B got really into BikeCAD after he started in the Pinnacle dept (dept.. there was 3 now 4 of us). He made the ‘Radmin’ layout and we got a couple made as an experiment, moving on the Ramin geo a fair bit since it’s always better to go too far then rein it in if needed than be too conservative with the geo making small changes. In the end the new Ramin is 95% of the Radmin numbers, the STA is only a tad more normal and the reach only slightly shorter. I’ll be honest- it’s a bit much for me and my local southern singletracker tastes, me being an old-school XCer. I used to ride jumps and drops OK but that was a while back now. That’s why it’s such a great bike, it’s had a wider influence in the design that it would have done from me alone and a few people here were nuts about it. So here they are, a couple of sub-£1000 trail rippers.

What’s the chainstay length, may I ask?

Oh yes, missed that. 440mm.

Marketed as a trail hardtail really. Though we don’t really market ourselves too well whatever we say about it : )
Matt B got really into BikeCAD after he started in the Pinnacle dept (dept.. there was 3 now 4 of us). He made the ‘Radmin’ layout and we got a couple made as an experiment, moving on the Ramin geo a fair bit since it’s always better to go too far then rein it in if needed than be too conservative with the geo making small changes. In the end the new Ramin is 95% of the Radmin numbers, the STA is only a tad more normal and the reach only slightly shorter. I’ll be honest- it’s a bit much for me and my local southern singletracker tastes, me being an old-school XCer. I used to ride jumps and drops OK but that was a while back now. That’s why it’s such a great bike, it’s had a wider influence in the design that it would have done from me alone and a few people here were nuts about it. So here they are, a couple of sub-£1000 trail rippers.

Thanks jameso. It does look the part, I get what you’re saying about it not being very XC though. I’m a ride from the front door type but am still tempted by hardtails with modern geometry, even though I’m doing ok with what I currently have. It would appear the marketing towards this style of bike is working on me.

@Jameso, any idea if there is a plan to offer the 2020 frame only option?

Oops just ordered one 🙂 forgot cashback though doh….

any idea if there is a plan to offer the 2020 frame only option?

Yes, due on stock any day now, but probably not at £100 ; )

I get what you’re saying about it not being very XC though. I’m a ride from the front door type but am still tempted by hardtails with modern geometry,

Thing is they still work fine for XC, you just get more out of some bits and a bit less in others. Or you go looking for more tricky stuff and go at the corners way harder just for the fun of it. It’s still a hardtail, they’re always going to be good for XC and it’s not a really burly overbuilt frame.

@jameso do you know the widest 29″ tyre the 2016 Ramin frame and fork will take?

^ Bigger 29er tyres have come out since that frame was put together, it was a B+ / 29 x 2.4 spec then. The CAD file says the chainstay has 78-80mm clearance at 350mm from the axle, down to 72-73mm at 360mm from the axle. A big but not 2.6-huge 29er tyre will have the edges/shoulder ~360mm out, so a tyre that’s 62mm there should have approx 5mm each side (6mm is the CEN clearance minimum for new MTBs). A Vigilante 2.6 has it’s shoulders at 366mm radius and is 69mm across at that point, so I don’t see that fitting.

Thanks for that, much appreciated 🙂

Thing is they still work fine for XC, you just get more out of some bits and a bit less in others. Or you go looking for more tricky stuff and go at the corners way harder just for the fun of it. It’s still a hardtail, they’re always going to be good for XC and it’s not a really burly overbuilt frame.

Cheers, they’re all valid points. I’ll pop in to Evans and have a look when they’re in stock.

Oh yes, missed that. 440mm.

Nice, looks like a really smart geometry.

Hope all’s OK on the build.

I had hoped that, too 🙂

I seem to be having some familiar issues… hmm

Yup… so… I’ve now triple checked this because I tend to assume the chances are I’ve done something wrong, but I’m pretty sure I haven’t (and it’s not like I haven’t done this stuff many times over many years on dozens of bikes with the exact same tools).

Hit the same problem as the 3+s: the internal surface of the head tube is not circular, it seems, because the cups won’t sit in it properly. The top cup is very slightly distorted but not enough to be an issue; but the bottom cup has significant issues with distortion. The (rubbish) picture below, with the frame upside-down, shows how the bearing sits when placed in (well, on) the cup. It will, admittedly, just about go in with a good firm press, but—well, it ain’t right.

I was pondering whether I might put up with it, and then thought I should probably try the seat tube, because on the 3+s that was a problematically loose fit. Slid a shiny new Cane Creek shim in, slid a post in, and hey presto, it’s loose. Tried adding a beer can shim (ironically the one I’d made for the EBB shell of the 3+) and that made for a somewhat better fit—still loose enough that the post would slide with no effort, but not waggling about.

Hey ho. Back she goes, then.

^ steel bearing cup so the bearing should sit OK in there, should make up for any minor distortion. Will have a look at that if it comes my way via the maze of the return process.
Seat post, the bikes were made around the same time and we’ve got them reaming them 0.05 closer now, but if the shim+post combo’s not a good fit there it’s more likely to be an issue on an XL too.

I had an issue with my seat post on the ramin plus but switched to a hope clamp and all was good

My headset cups and bearings are OK, just push in the cups fine.

Using a 31.6 I beam post seems OK as well, but I haven’t ridden it yet, so we will see after a ride.

steel bearing cup so the bearing should sit OK in there, should make up for any minor distortion.

Yeah, though there’s a bit that’s not quite seating properly, regardless of whether I use a press adapter that presses on the inner or outer part of the cup. I’m reasonably confident it’s not just my incompetence because (a) with the Ramin 3+ I got the guys in the shop to refit the cup and it still wasn’t right, with exactly the same issue, and (b) I’ve use this tool a lot, including with other 44mm internal-headset tubes, and only Ramins have had this issue (actually, no, I had a custom-built tandem frame about 15 years ago that had almost nothing straight on it). I might smack the cup back out and push it back in to see what gives.

I’ll take a caliper to the seat tube and shim and see what gives there, too. (and the seatpost, but I know that’s good from the previous saga, which I now remember involved two Longitude frames because the first one of those was over-reamed too)

I think I’m just not meant to have mountain bikes any more 🙂

The cheap Ramins have all gone now by the looks of the website, and I had a crazy notion of lobbing together a simple, rigid XC 29er…

Then I noticed the Lithium Alfine frameset for £100. It is a “hybrid” but says it’ll clear 29×2.2″ tyres and being the alfine model with EBB is SS-able so seems like an almost ideal basic XC MTB frame…
I’m far too tempted but need no more bikes right now, could someone buy them all up so I can’t please?

Right. Smacked the cup out and had a look, and thought I’d found the answer: some lumps on the inside of the head tube. Looks like some swarf had melted back onto it during machining, or something. Also one side has a curious step in it which, as far as I can tell, is within the region of the interference fit. Photos below (apologies for the upside-downishness); the step is shown in the second photo but you can also see part of it at about 9 o’clock in the first photo.

Gently sanded the lumps off (but not the step) and refitted the cup. Went in properly first time, which was an improvement. Thought I’d fixed it.

Sadly, no. Still ovalised (narrower side-to-side), and the bearing needs a really firm press to get in. Getting it out was less successful, the inner race came away and I had to prise the outer race out with a tool. I suspect the step (which is at one side of the tube) may be the culprit, but unlike the blobs it’s not easily fixed with sandpaper.

Measured the seat bits. According to my caliper the post and shim are true to within about 0.02mm, and the seat tube measures between 31.70 and 31.75 as you go round it. I’ve seen worse, but that’s the right amount to match a beer can shim.

James, I hope given previous experience you’ll forgive my lack of tenacity, I think I’ll just have to return it (albeit with a rather secondhand headset… but that’s happened before 😉).

James £925 spec appears to be £1000 on website, is it staying at £1000 or us it likely to be £925

Bez, the steps internally in the HT will be where it’s reamed to, depth limit, is that the part you mean? The ream is post weld and heat treat as they can distort a bit up to that point, the team should get it back to where a headset cup fits and the bearing goes in ok. The seat tube, it’s 0.05 over where it should be and a bit of movement in the process adds to that. Good clamp can do the job but ok to return if not happy with it. Apologies for the faff..

Karnali, not my area sorry. Looks like it’s been revised to £1000 now.

Ok, thanks the iroko 2 on offer is looking favourite at present for an all round ht