One in a million. Thanks Rob

@funkmasterp Thanks! That’s how it works with the Cotic CC though: If you own a Cotic, you’re in! Doesn’t matter where you bought it.

Thanks for the kind words everyone. Really glad to read those.

Should be a fun one. What are are you planning to spec? If you win the frame, we’d be happy to have you pay a balance for any bike build off the Cotic website. Just deduct £1199 from the bike pricing to give you the balance price on a complete.

Any questions, just ask!

@daffy With respect to Cotic, we have known for a long time that airfreight is much more damaging than road or ocean freight, so we have tried to minimise that in all parts of the supply chain. The Reynolds report acknowledges that the biggest impact na 853 tube has is being airfreighted to Taiwan to be made into a frame. We’ve done a lot of that in the past, but we’re learning and trying to be better. I suspect our Escapade UK 853 frames have considerably lower carbon impact that stated in the Reynolds report, because they have been built and finished within about a 2 hour driving radius of Cotic.

Currently the Cascade is the only Cotic frame using 853 made in Taiwan. The steel for the rear ends there is sourced in China, and they are ocean freighted back to us in the UK. We are trying to figure out if we can manage the cashflow of ocean freighting the 853 for those to make that better.

All our other 853 frames have the tubes shipped to either Five Land in Scotland, or via road to the Czech Republic. One of our drives to onshore more of our production is a lot to do with minimising material distances as far as possible, as well as gaining more control of our supply chain. As I said, we’re not perfect, but by making reducing our impact part of every Cotic decision, we will get better. I think that’s all we can do.

@tazzymtb That’s great to hear there are more titanium recycling things coming together. That said, it’s still a very high energy process compared to steel or aluminium, so it’s still in the negative category for me if considering new build frames.

@daffy The carbon impact is in those studies Kelvin posted, but they are purely focused on carbon emissions, and not the wider damage of virgin material extraction, crude oil use, landfill and other surrounding issues. Once you start taking those into account – although hard to quantify in any numerical way – it’s clear than carbon fibre is very dirty indeed, and although titanium is better on those other issues, it’s still not great overall.

@a11y – That is a beautiful montage of Cotic-ness. Thank you!

@honourablegeorge – Lovely job!

@stealthcat – Yours has definitely had a life!

@badlywiredog – Having zero influence over the kit we put on the bikes is quite troubling to me too, but I simply don’t have an answer for it. In the absence of that answer, I’m just doing my best with what I can influence.

@others – Thanks for recommending the Cascade. If the OP would like to drop us a line, I’m sure we could come up with some ideas. Maybe upsize and flat bar as Escapade? Or if we can help getting your Roadrat fixed up we’d love to do that.

For the OP, thank you for riding your Roadrat so much. That’s so good. I wish enough people wanted to buy those that we could have kept making them. Loved that bike. If it’s at all possible and economically viable, I hope you fix up and paint your Cotic. We’d love to help if we can. Our painter who’s doing the UK Escapade’s is ace. Drop us an email.

There’s a lot of comments on here taken out of context because the OP only posted an excerpt from my email. If you want to read the full thing, then its here: https://www.cotic.co.uk/news/2024/cotic-says-no-more-titanium

In there is a link to our Reduced Impact Statement, which is no longer a Sustainability Statement because I now believe stating that you can run any business sustainably is disingenuous. YMMV.

Yes, there are absolutely commercial and QC reasons we won’t do ti either. They came first no doubt. We fell out with the best builder in Taiwan who made the SodaMAX and Tonic – or rather they flounced off when we had the temerity to try and share some of our production across to another manufacturer – and the couple of samples from places I’m share build for people you’ve heard of which are utter garbage. We could make them in the UK and get around both those things, but when asked if we’d do a ti frame last week it did make me realise that the main reason we won’t do more is the environmental impact, not anything else.

Yes, moving material and products thousands of miles around the world is also bad. You might have noticed we’ve started making more of our frames closer to home recently. It’s not a low cost option, and it won’t be for every model line, but I believe it’s important.

If you don’t want to read the full thing, I think these paragraphs might at least give some context

“I know lots of my riding buddies who take the view that “it’s just one bike, what’s the harm?”, but it’s one of tens or hundreds of thousands of carbon or titanium bikes and parts that are made. If people didn’t buy them, brands wouldn’t make them. But by the same token, I think brands are being disingenuous to hide behind “it’s what people want”. Sometimes you have to do what you believe is right and take the lead.

We’re not perfect, and I know we have a carbon fork on the Escapade, but we’re trying to be better every time we make a decision. As we continue to learn and develop as a company, we will continue to work towards building the best bikes with the lowest impact.”

And if you think and lying or greenwashing or you just don’t give a shit, there’s a million and one other brands out there pedalling carbon tat you can go and buy. Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.

Thanks everyone, especially to @slackboy for posting the vid. I guess you’ve seen the reasons why. Any questions, drop me a line on cy@cotic.co.uk, or if you’re around on 28th december I’ll be opening up the showroom if you want to come and have a look and buy In Real Life ™.

Cheers

@pierreelie That looks great! I’m afraid the main differences are pretty spendy, as I have a full bike industry idiot drivetrain. Titanium eeWings cranks, XTR mech and shifter, Garbaruk cassette and hollow pin SRAM chain. There is over half a kilo there compared to SLX. That 14.5kg is quoted without pedals as that’s what most other brands people compare weights with are weighed like. I run MY22 Lyrik at 170mm which are about 300grams lighter than Zebs. Ti rail saddle, Galfer rotors, a few ti bolts here and there. Wheels are HUNT TrailWide which are a good weight for their toughness.

I also run mid-casing tyres too, not dual ply. The SG2 WTB Verdict front is about 300 grams lighter than the Tough casing version, and in the winter I usually run a Maxxis DHR2 rear in EXO Plus rather than DD.

@weeksy Looks like Minolink adjusts the BB up 6-7mm depending on model, so you’re looking at about halving those changes I mentioned above. Should probably work OK assuming your cranks aren’t too long.

We (Cotic) stock the Trail, Cross and Speed in 29 x2.4 and are happy to sell them separately if you want to drop us a line. 

Paul is a big fan of the Trail/Cross combo. I prefer meatier treads for wet conditions, but I am very partial to the Race and Speed tyres for stupid-grin-fast dry summer conditions. 

General rule of thumb for this is:

All angles approx 1 deg slacker

BB 12-13mm lower

Reach 12-13mm shorter

Stack approx 9mm taller

Cy’s reply puts a different slant on it, they are being more or less forced to move production from Taiwan, rather than choosing to do so.

We had already started the plan to onshore more of our production earlier in 2024 for all the reasons mentioned, even before things got trickier from Taiwan. All the current delays did was mean we had to move the timetable up. Fort had been doing production engineering for months on the Solaris before we made the decision to move this batch from Taiwan to CZ.

In fairness, although the price has gone up for existing pre-orders, the rise is less than the quoted price for new orders. Over the lifetime of the frame it isn’t a huge amount and if I am going to be a customer then I have a vested interest in seeing Cotic survive and prosper.

Thank you.

Thanks for the kind words everyone. It’s very much appreciated. 

@core @dan2406 Thanks fellas. Much appreciated.

Well that took a lot of getting through…..

Basically everything Kelvin said. And Brant (apart from the radio thing). We need to spread the risk of our production and move it out of Taiwan. We want to reduce our carbon footprint. Both of these things are more expensive. We have made a decision to keep us safe in the longer term.

And also the guy who mentioned inflation on our quoted Taiwan price. Solaris was launched nearly a year ago at £849. That was a jump from before, but based on nothing more than cost escalations. Based on what we see now from our vendors and the fact that the pound exchange is in the toilet, they probably would have needed to be at least £949 eventually. That’s all a moot point because actually getting them at any price from Taiwan has proved extremely difficult. Changing to Fort meant Actually Getting Frames, which as a brand who sells things is quite important. Even if that means selling fewer frames at a higher price. It’s a my brand, my business and a choice I made to protect me, my staff and our planet. If that “doesn’t benefit you as a rider”, sobeit, but you’ll excuse me for looking out for me and mine. So far, we only lost about 10% of our pre-orders with the announcement of the higher price. I thank all those people who are hanging with us from the bottom of my heart.

Finally, to all of you thinking this is about greed, **** off. Yes, it’s even handed Cy from Cotic telling you to go **** yourself. 2023 has been without doubt the hardest, most stressful year of my professional life. This is simply the price of the frame at our normal margins based on higher manufacturing costs. No ones scoring Porsches out of this. I’m offended you would think that’s the case.

I have a family and 7 people and their families here who rely on Cotic for their livelihoods I have taken on a lot to keep us together. Doing the same old thing doesn’t work anymore. So I did something different to keep us safe for the future. No thanks to the broader industry supply chain and politicians. Our customers are amazing, supportive, and part of the family. I hope to gain some more, but if not, I gave it my best shot.

Chapeau! Have fun dude.

@honourablegeorge We don’t sell without shocks unless you have a shock that we currently use. We have had trouble in the past with people putting in any old shock without the right setup and damaging themselves and the frames. We spec the Float X, so if you have one in 210×55 then that would be OK. No special tune required. 

@blackflag It’s doable. Particularly on the Gen1 as it has a slightly higher BB than Gen 2. Roughly speaking it will slacken all your angles by 1 deg, shorten reach by around 10mm and drop the BB 12mm, which makes it 39mm drop static. Just be careful of your pedals on rocks.

@fahzure Problem with doing that is the kinematic gets weird and we run into clearance issues with the seatstay against the seat tube. Droplink is quite sensitive to pivot positions.

@weeksy Thanks

@pedlad Thanks! Swingarm is aluminium, seatstays are steel, links are aluminium. Frame weight is 4.5kg give or take. Depends on shock and size. It’ll vary +-150 grams depending on that.

@weeksy It’ll wash out in the end and those prices on other brands with chinese made carbon won’t last forever. It’s annoying to be getting kicked in the nuts for getting it mostly right in terms of stock and not being greedy though.

@ayjaydoubleyou Problem with ‘medium’ sizing etc is that not all companies’ mediums are the same, so you get people getting weirdly emotionally attached to the fact “I ride a large” even if that’s not the right size for them on a Cotic. Especially if you’re recommending going to something smaller than they would normally ride. Humans are weird. C-sizing makes people look at the numbers and consider what they actually need.

@stevehine If you’re bits are in good nick, then every single part on your FlareMAX will transfer across. I know. A brand keeping consistence parts fitment over a period of years. Imagine that?!!! If any need replacement, we can sort you bits from our stock. Drop us an email and we’ll get you fixed up.

@highlandman I would say it would be pluuuuuuuuush! We can get Z1s if you want ’em. Drop us an email for a price.

If you can get a day off in the week, our Showroom in Chesterfield is open Wed-Fri 10-4 and you can demo a bike from the door. Coffee is good too. Come and see us.

<p style=”text-align: left;”>I think the BB thing is related to a lot of other received wisdom that goes out the window with longer bikes. When the bike is long it is intrinsically stable, so things you used to need like a low bb to pin a shorter, less stable bike with shorter front centre into a corner aren’t needed. And in fact, you get get a bit of ground clearance back and inject a bit of easier movement back into the long bike with a higher bb. It’s a little bit like rebound damping: We all used to run bikes with slow rebound because we needed to keep a short bike with little wheels from pitching around too much. You were stabilising the bike with the damping. Now the layout of the bike is intrinsically stable, you can run fat rebound for sensivity and grip without upsetting the bike. Double win.</p>
That said, our bb heights aren’t specifically the result of cornering ability. Mainly it’s because of where Cotic is based, we don’t have smooth fireroads to winch up, we have knobbly rocky climbs. If you are constantly clonking your cranks or pedals on our local loop, you are having a bad time! If a bike can’t pedal easily up the climb from the bench at Blacka Moor, the bb is too low!

 

@scottalej Hey, if you don’t like the looks, not a lot I can do about that, but literally the entire review explains the reason for using steel. The calmness, the grip, the feel. These are the performance reasons we use it. And sure, it’s not going to win any weight contests against carbon frames (although it’s closer than you’d think), it’s competitive with most aluminium enduro frames out there. My fancy build weight 14.5kg with no carbon parts.

Thanks for the lovely review Benji! And thanks for the nice comments and feedback.

Bar height – I’ve gone up a lot with my own bars in the last couple of years. Here’s my theory: On shorter bikes, you wanted lower bars to weight the front wheel, because the short reach meant when you stood up your backside ended up pushed rearwards because you didn’t have enough space on the bike for it not to. And that’s where your centre of mass is, just above your arse! So you used the lower bars to try and drag the weight forward.

On longer bikes you have room to stand up and stay more in the middle of the bike, and for me anyway, I found higher bars helped me stand taller in the middle of the bike rather than hunched over, which tended to make me hinge at my hips more and push my weight back. Despite having been riding long bikes for over 6 years, I have 20 years worth of bad habits still ingrained so I need all the help I can get, so taller bars help keep me more in the middle of the bike, with weight more evenly balanced between the wheels.

The major bonus of this is that higher bars allow me to get more lean angle on the bike when cornering, which is making my cornering better. When the bars are low, when you add lean angle to the bike to corner, the inner bar swings towards the floor and at some point you run out of extension on your inside arm. With higher bars, I can get more angle on the bike before I run out of reach, and can more comfortably weight the bars when cornering, so I actually generate more grip with higher bars, not less.

Yours Sincerely,

Someone Who Thinks Too Much About Bike Handling, B. Eng (hons)

The 10-51 1×12 new GRX uses the XT cassette and chain, so on a more drop bar mtb type bike you would just use an SLX, XT or XTR chainset and away you go.

The current aluminium frames the Frameworks guys are running have shown good durability, by using some very long gussets to reinforce the cracking areas. Cracking DH frames is very common. There is a lot of frame swapouts going on through the season.

All the versions of UDH are compatible with eachother. The direct mount transmission rear mechs are necessarily compatible with frames designed to earlier versions of UDH.

Transmission cassettes are 2.5mm wider chainline that any other cassette. With the direct mount rear mech, they have put the cassette effectively where the dropout cowl is on a regular frame, so that cassette will foul the dropout face plane of any other frame even if it uses a regular UDH hanger and other SRAM rear mech.

This completely replaces AXS. They also aren’t updating the mechanical drivetrains so if you don’t have UDH then it’s mechanical only. It’s completely not backwards compatible. Even the chainline of the cassette is different. It’s wider, which means it runs into your frame if you committed to UDH Revision E 2 years ago, and they didn’t properly disseminate the information for Revision G with the Transmission information in it. Not all UDH frames are equal……

@ndthornthon It’s true it’s pretty tight, but we have used the EC44 headsets for over a decade and I have not heard of it until this post. Obviously there are one or two others out there, but that’s out of 1000s we have sold, and that’s just us. I have been riding a bike with a 63.5 deg head angle since 2017 and never had anything like this. The team – when we had one – never broke headsets either. Lot’s of other things, but never headsets ;-)

I haven’t run anything 45c ish on the Cascade because that’s getting into Escapade territory, and on my personal Cascade I like the proper 2.4 tyres. I tried some WTB 36c slicks during development, but the combo of 51mm offset carbon fork (at the time), the 69 deg head angle and the very rounded, small tyres made for some ‘excfiting’ handling characteristics. The ‘flop’ effect was quite marked when cornering. It was better with the Cotic 44mm offset fork, but really, tyres that small don’t work. Baybutt has run Nanos on his Cascade and likes them, and I am actually getting some 45c Raddler’s to zip the bike up a bit for the upcoming North London Dirt ride I’m doing, but I haven’t tried them yet.

Having spoken to Jon at length about the Cascade, it’s definitely not what he’s looking for though.

Never heard of that before. Drop us an email and send details and we’ll see what we can do.

Nice!

Cascade is same weight as SolarisMAX because of all the bosses. It has to have the same thickness down tube as the MAX because of all the bosses (the new Solaris has a thinner tube which is where some of the weight is saved) and all the M5 screws that go in those bosses. There are 21 bosses on a Cascade. 21 M5 screws and bosses for them weigh quite a lot!

For those of you who have the SolarisMAX and love it 140, that’s ace. Glad you’re on board. However, for the vast majority of customers and builds, we’re building them with 120 forks, and we have a 140 bike in the range (which really works better with 140s because it retains it’s seat angle). So, that’s how we’re splitting it. It is much more in line with the bike we originally built, and we missed it. And the BB being lower works fine. We have a Climb Of Truth on my local loop, and if a bike won’t get up that without clonking it’s pedals all the time, then it’s too low. The new Solaris is just fine on that climb, with my 170 cranks and maaaahooosive flat pedals.

As for building the Cascade with flat bars, it’s totally doable, and will ride nice, if a little old school. You’ll need something like a 90mm stem to run flat bars size-for-size against one of the mountain bike frame range.

As for price, take the current SolarisMAX price, do the percentage difference between the dollar exchange rate in Jan 22 and now, and see where you get to…..