there’s a big thread on mtbr about tyres and rolling resistance, a german mag ran tests and tubeless setups had significantly less rolling resistance than tubed, they found the biggest factor in rolling resistance was the carcass construction not the tread or volume.
maybe having a tube in there affects the carcass in some way.

nah, they argue over whats best to put across trails, rope or barbed wire.

i’m not quite sure where all this 26ers are dieing out thing is coming from. outside of xc races and marathon events i reckon only about 1 in 50 bikes i see is a 29er and i’m yet to see a 650b bike or wheel outside of a magazine.

http://www.canyon.com/_en/mountainbikes/bike.html?b=3061#tab-reiter2

@ realman, i’m as likely to win the tour as sagen is, he won’t be within a hour of the leaders by the time they get to paris.

it’s froome or andy schleck i think.

i think the problems tend to occur when bikes are not in stock.

i was in the same position recently, wicked 160 ltd or strive al 8.0.
went for the strive in the end due to the number of horror stories about wait times for the YT bikes, seen some reports of people waiting 3-4 months after stated delivery date!
the BOS suspension turned me off a little too due to the fact there is no UK importer at the moment.
i’m don’t regret my decision at all, it arrived exactly when canyon said it would and is a very good bike, the linkage works very well i leave it in trail mode for most climbs i only use “climb” for extended fire road drags.

weird, i’ve just put some tubeless ready schwalbe’s onto a set of sun-ringle charger expert’s (pretty much a stans rim) and they literally fell onto the wheels and inflated and sealed with no issues at all.

with current shock technology, the difference in climbing characteristics is smaller than a lot of people believe to be the case.
a well designed 160 bike will climb just as well if not better than a poorly designed 100mm bike.

they’re great, no real difference in shifting performance but they really help to keep the chain on and stop chain slap, I’ve got a 2013 strive with one on and its silent down rough descents, all you can hear is the sound of the tyres.

an xc hardtail is one of the few cases where i would be inclined to go for the wagon wheeler, once you get past about 100mm of travel 29ers start to suck major balls.

you could always go up whites climb, across parsons foley then do the wall decent. if you feel fit go back up the wall climb and do the full W2 if your struggling bail out and follow the cycle path back to glyncorwg.

“skills coach” lol.

anything more substantial than a marsh guard just makes a bike look hideous, i’d rather get muddy.

@lank45, by the K2 bar by the looks of it lol.

i ordered the strive AL 8.0 and it got to me exactly when they said it would, as has been mentioned above though it was in stock.
I’ve only ridden it twice but early impressions are its a very capable bike, climbs just fine but i too ditched the heavy assed tyres for some lighter schwalbes, the OE tyres will be kept for uplift days.

my new toy.

http://www.pinkbike.com/photo/8994164/

the only thing wrong with elixirs is they need to be bled to perfection, most back shed mechanics and even some bike shops seem unable to do this though.

i always have a chuckle at people who go on about supposedly low bottom brackets and pedal strikes, learn to read the trail and time your pedal strokes.

good old trek, still looking for any excuse not to warranty their shoddy products.
back on topic, torque wrenches on bikes are generally pointless unless your hanging on a 4mm allen key with a 4ft bar your unlikely to over-torque things too much, they’re just a tool for muppets with no mechanical aptitude or sympathy.

for most of the riding in the Bristol/south wales region a 160mm travel bike is more than enough, there are plenty of riders doing well in the DH races on orange alpines and the like.

tyres on the other hand are a lottery, depends what the weather is doing for the particular few minutes your run is in :wink:

i was talking of the average person not karen carpenter.

oh and i agree, wheels and tyres are the only place i really take weight into consideration that’s why theres a set of pacentti tl28’s on tesla hubs waiting for when my strive turns up from germany :)

can’t wait to see the audi crowd wobbling around afan on these contraptions.

weight does make a difference but not as much as people (mags) make out, when they do tests and say they could feel the extra 3/4 of a lb that a bike had on the climbs is utter bullshit, seat tube angle is the thing I’ve found has the greatest effect on climbing.
1 kg is usually about 1% of the weight your pulling up a hill so it can’t make that much difference until your talking worldcup level xc etc.

really hope you get it back but laving a bike on a roof rack is asking for trouble, i’m lucky enough to drive a van could never go back to owning a car now they’re just not practical.

not quite, hydraulic brakes are massively superior its a quantify-able improvement.

SS are simply for weirdos or people from Norfolk. gears are simply common sense.

29ers belong on canal paths and beneath failed roadies that jump of and run down muddy hills.

650b. . .never tried them but i really can’t see the very very small increase in diameter making that much difference.

@mrmoofo trek did the 69er thing ages ago without all the marketing hullabaloo and they bombed big time, move on a few years add a few million in advertising and suddenly their the second coming . . .

all rose bikes are fugly, way too agricultural looking with some horrific colour schemes.

the “only using 26″ rims because they were available” story doesn’t wash with me, if gary fisher knew back in the 70’s that 29ers were some kind of all conquering god wheel why did it take 30 years for him to start making suitable frames?

@CaptainFlashheart

roadies regularly quote mileages for used bikes and parts, it is the type of mtb that a roadie would tend to own too.

i have a blur LTc now and love it, it’s just a tiny bit too small for me and starts to feel cramped on longer rides.

i have tried it, back in 2006 when i bought my first proper full susser i did 2 runs on the full skyline decent on the new commencal meta5 and the wobbly old dawes watoga i’d been riding, the times were very similar the only difference was on the meta i didn’t feel as if i’d just beaten with lead pipes.

thanks Northwind you’ve just kind of proved my point.

i’ve not tried the superstar hubs but on hopes its a 10 minute job to switch the front and rear hub adapters, the fronts simply need lifting out and swapping and the rear is just a case of tapping out the QR bits and bearing and then replacing it with the relevant spindle .

i wouldn’t bother with talas forks at all, once the playing with a new toy period is over you won’t use it, moving your weight slightly forward has the same if not more benefit while climbing than dropping forks.
oh and floats ride sooo much better too.

My £7000 worth of bikes are stored in my living room, problem solved.

could all you rigid/hardtail evangelists stop stroking your ego’s, if some rider goes flying past you on a full susser its because he’s a better rider than you, the same person would still go flying past you whether they were riding 10,8,6,4,hardtail,rigid or a Raleigh chopper.

i’d go with the reverb, the dross is just a prettied up gravity dropper with a daft lever, + the coating will probably wear off the post just like their forks if you don’t service it every 38 minutes.

the 105 sti’s aren’t really serviceable, give it a clean out and see what happens your probably going to need a new unit though .

if i remember correctly ONLY 2010 revelations with 20mm axles will clear 650b wheels tyres. theres a big thread about it in the 650b bit of the MTBR forum.

elixer brakes are pretty much bullet proof, most of the problems you hear of are from garden shed “mechanics” that can’t bleed them properly.

baah camera’s, if your gonna do a quad rotor do it properly.