The Pinkbike review yesterday implied that you could get the frame and shock on their own but whether this is just a US thing I don’t know?….looks like a great bike to me too.

Mine was a raw lacquered one, it had some surface rust and looked all the better for it….the idea is to keep forks, wheels, drivetrain, cockpit etc mint but let the frame go to crap…..it’s part of the appeal!

Done it a few times. You’ll be fine, I can’t wait to go back and do the 4-5k new blue section they’ve got!

Booked to go there on the 17th of this month, I’ll be taking the Ragley HT as per usual…i’ll definitely be filming it on helmet cam as this has the potential to go spectacularly tits up!…haha….anyway, dual ply tyres are a necessity I presume?

Loving the wailing and gnashing of teeth my 70mm stem has caused the purists….f@$k,’em….the bike was fine when new two years ago with a 110mm stem but things change, I’m older, I’m not as flexible….and I refuse to use a ridiculous stack of spacers under the stem….so I just shortened the cockpit instead, much better, more miles on the bike and if I bend my elbows I can still get as low as I used to.

May post a pic when I get home just to really upset people!

The two most comfy HT frames I’ve owned have been Alu and steel, one was a 456-evo (steel) and the other was a Kona Caldera (Alu)…the common theme?….both had 27.2mm seat tubes with lots of seat post showing.

Obviously older steel frames that had lovely narrow 1&1/8 head tubes helped, as did pencil thin stays but for me the most important factor was the narrow seat tube….good luck finding one, everyone wants 30.9mm or 31.6mm seat tubes so they can run a dropper post.

The shapeshifter part of the design seems to fail, stick, give up etc….there are plenty of posts on here about it.

It would be bottom of my 160mm bikes list because of that alone.

Rotate the bars up slightly and fit a shorter stem, I’ve had similar problems to you and recently fitted a Deda 70mm stem as opposed to the 110mm one it came with and things are much better.

So have I got the wrong end of the stick here then, steel frames aren’t really any different

My original 456-evo had a 27.2mm seat post, a traditional 1 & 1/8 head tube, a 135mm back end and thin chain and seat stays….it has a compliance to it that is hard to describe, I suspect they could build a carbon one with the same characteristics if they wanted to, I have a carbon fishing rod that can be bent so the top comes round and touches the handle!….incredible material but in MTBing at the moment it’s being used as a ‘stiffest is best’ material.

My current Ragley (steel) has a 44mm head tube to take tapered forks, a 31.6mm seat tube for all dropper posts out there and much larger diameter stays, top tubes and down tubes than the 456 it replaced….they are like night and day.

If I was building a ‘hardcore hardtail’ now i’d probably get a Dartmoor Hornet and go for a lighter build than I’ve ever had on a HT….or accept the ride can be harsh and buy my dream machine PP Shan!

I had the original Evo-456, it was great, lovely narrow tubing giving a compliance I haven’t found in any other HT so far, I believe for the Evo-2 they put in a larger diameter seat tube to allow a wider range of dropper posts to be used…whether that has made things harsher or not I don’t know…I do know the seat stays look more delicate where they join the seat tube which may add compliance but I don’t know?….i skipped the Evo-2 to go straight to a 45650b.

My Ragley takes a 31.6 seatpost and will take your existing 26 inch wheels….steel too.

There’s loads on eBay, mine is the Piglet-2.

Dartmoor Hornet also fits your requirements in that it has a 31.6mm seat tube, takes both 26 and 27.5 wheels….it’s Alu though but I wouldn’t worry about that, the days of springy steel frames are long gone….people want 142 axle standards, big seat tubes for their dropper post, large 44mm head tubes for any standard steerer etc….and what you end up with is a steel frame as overbuilt and harsh as the equivalent Alu hardtail.

Minion….if you were somewhere softer I’d say Shorty but Antur is hard and rocky so I’d use a Super Tacky Minion front.

I’ve bought new from Ragley and On-One so around the £200-350 mark so far.

But having spent all year so far on a HT while I slooooowly gather bits for my Trance build its reminded me that I don’t actually need FS even on uplift days and local/grass roots DH racing.
I like the lack of maintenance and the abuse it takes in its stride, just buy a decent fork and you’re done.

So, I would happily now pay for something exotic like a PP Shan (£600) or go the custom route with Curtis (£1000)….mental to some perhaps but I think paying several thousand for a poorly set up FS that need tokens, bands, corset air sleeves etc after the initial purchase is bonkers and the manufacturers must be laughing all the way to the bank.

BB came with mine.

As others said, PSA of the year so far, fitted them last night and my Trance is going to flipping bombproof the way the build’s going so far!…now to wait until WorksComponents have another sale on, since seeing Chris Porter’s Geometron i quite fancy going slacker than the 66 degree HA the bike currently has…

….i’m thinking the standard rear 140mm DW/Maestro for decent pedalling with 160mm forks and a 64 degree HA!

I’m hoping it’ll convince me i dont need a DH bike and will save me several thousands of pounds?!

Great, they’re both bargains then….spoilt for choice these days aren’t we?!

I’m sure it’s a great bike and the spec is superb but I’ve heard too many horror stories about stuck ‘shapeshifter’ mechanisms to rule it out as a viable option for me.
I think I’d go with the shorter travel non shapeshifter bike (Spectral?) with the 140mm back end and just fit a longer fork.

I hope it opens in October, I have most of the month off and was planning a few uplift days somewhere, this seems as good a place as any!

letting people sleep in their vans at the race and bring their dogs with them

What’s wrong with that?!…sometimes I don’t want to splash out on a B&B or hotel and my van and a tent is the best solution….and I also love having my dogs with me, the other half goes off walking them while I ‘race’….it’s a lovely way to spend a weekend together weather permitting and we’ve found some lovely places like Eastridge/Shrewsbury that we otherwise wouldn’t have spent time in.

we were also disappointed with the fact that the Zees were no where near as powerful as expected compared to the XTs

This is a common theme with Shimano and they’re victims of their own success, the Deore-615s I had were immense, the Scott Voltage DH bike I demoed had Deore-615s on 203mm rotors front and rear, I scoffed initially and expressed my disappointment that the bike didn’t have Zees or Saints….right up to the point I nearly put myself over the bars when I grabbed a handful of brake….even Shimano’s basic stuff is so good you go up through the range expecting to be blown away by Zees and Saints and it’s almost a bit disappointing that they’re only marginally better than a well set up pair of Deores, SLXs, XTs etc….

The reality for all cycling is they are getting spanked over insurance cover (i.e. something of an exponential rise in premiums due to the number of hefty claims) and are therefore having to tighten up on procedures.

Symptomatic of people today who buy a mountain bike to ride at mach10 down an Enduro stage (of their own free will) and then run crying to mummy when it goes wrong for them….only in this case ‘mummy’ is a vulture-like no win/no fee solicitor who will try and take BC, the organisers and whoever else they can blame instead of the numpty riding the bike who ran out of talent.

There’s a hell of a lot of entitlement in mountain biking.

This has needed to be said for a while now….riders turn up at man made trail centres, contribute nothing it terms of payment to ride them…do all they can to avoid carpark charges and then ride smugly away on a bike costing several thousand pounds.

Maybe its because MTBing is an outdoor pursuit?…maybe its the health benefit?…maybe its the non polluting aspect of it?…either way it seems to give a lot of riders a holier than thou attitude and trying to get money from someone who wants to ride their bike is like getting blood from a stone.

The usual response is ‘I don’t ride trail centres’….fine, this doesn’t apply to you then….other times people say ‘if I had to pay I wouldn’t go there’…fine, p**s off and try and find some natural trails, you’ll be back in no time!

What I would happily contribute to is a campaign for open access laws in England and Wales much like Scotland, that would do wonders for getting people out and about and taking the strain off trail centres.

So presumably it’s the brand you trust? But they also make carbon bars.

Indeed, i dont think they’d ruin their carefully built reputation for tough bars by putting crap out there for MTBers….you only have to see how few crop up second hand on ebay to appreciate that owners buy them and keep hold of them….if i was going to try carbon bars it’d probably be theirs.

Another vote for the 661-comp here, its nice looking (no garish graphics), decent price point and does the job….too hot to pedal uphill in though.

Isn’t it funny how people argue so vehemently about carbon rims, but generally, the MTB community is falling over itself to get hold of the newest and greatest carbon vunder-bike frame, and doesn’t bat an eyelid about carbon forks or bars?

Nope nope and nope again….Renthal Alu bars on my bike (proven in the Motorcycle industry), Giant Alu frame (admittedly worrying light to pick up but i reckon it wont suffer a catastrophic failure)….it may bend, dent etc but should give me some warning….metal crank arms too, really really get nervous and twitchy about my ankles and carbon cranks just make me feel nauseous thinking about them letting go on a descent….maybe i’m old fashioned but i think if i’m chucking it down the side of a hill at 40-60kph i want total faith in the components and carbon isnt quite there for me yet….its still in the new/beta phase for MTBing in my opinion….i’d go out of my way to avoid a carbon frame, i did just that with the Trance i bought…could’ve got the ‘advanced’ version (carbon) instead chose the metal one….i just dont see the carbon one sitting in my shed in 5 years time ready to be ridden like i assume the metal one will be.

I’m even more of a luddite with HTs where i want the least amount of maintenance possible and that usually means steel!

Where did it happen OP? I thought Santa Cruz’s were only designed for use at Swinley Forest?

This was so good it needed repeating. 😆

As for the industry, I wouldn’t be surprised if Kona was the manufacturer to push their geometry closer to this (though not as extreme).

That would make me all warm and fuzzy inside, after they tore up the handbook on geometry under Barel’s stewardship in 2005 to bag a world title and with the current Process bikes doing so well I would love to see this….c’mon Kona make it happen!

I mentioned Ragley!…. Cant wait for them to start doing frames again, provided they’re fun hardcore HTs again then I’m looking for a replacement for my Piglet….. If they go all niche and saddle bag wearing, bike touring, fat bike beardy **** then I’m out and Dartmoor will get my money.

I went from a ridiculously well set up and good working Deore-615 brakeset to a pair of Saints….that have also been well bled and set up by my LBS with new pads and rotors.

Hand on heart there is no difference in stopping power, that may change on long Alpine descents but not in the UK, where the Saints have the edge is the initial bite and feel is softer giving the much hyped ‘modulation’ people talk about….I have a theory as to why this is and I think it’s to do with one pair of the four pistons in the calipers coming into contact with the rotors momentarily before the next pair giving a softer initial bite and the fabled modulation people seek.

Once you squeeze on the lever power builds quickly and I’ve no complaints, would I pay £100 an end for them?….no!
They were an eBay bargain where I got the lot for £100 due to cosmetic rub on the master cylinders etc….if it was my own money and I was buying new I’d get XT, new rotors and Uberbike’s Racematrix compound pads.

Ridden a few, didnt like it….purely psychological but in the back of mind i was thinking ‘please dont shatter, please dont shatter’ throughout….not conducive to an enjoyable test ride i’ll admit!

Also one thing bugging me is that to get these carbon rims strong enough for AM/Enduro/DH use they’re ending up weighing more than a decent Alu set….wasnt one of the advantages of carbon rims light weight?…if the bloody things have to be built up like tanks it kinds of negates any advantage for me.

Finally i’ve also heard they can provide a harsh ride meaning you fit them and then have to spend several rides buggering about with your suspension settings to soften things off based on your new harsh carbon rims….cant be bothered with that cheers.

I’m sure some love them but the faff, the lack of weight advantage over Alu, having to play with suspension settings to get them working right, the cost etc means i’m more than happy on metal rims cheers.

numpty double post

Now that its built and out there there does seem to be a very much “oh yeah, why didnt we think of that before?”….type of vibe floating around the bike.

The current fashion for short chainstays does make for short wheelbase bikes that supposedly handle well yet they position the rider perilously close to the rear axle which hinders climbing making the front wander and prone to lifting under power when pedalling….we see riders getting into all sorts of chin on bar positions to make their modern AM bike pedal uphill….nose of saddle wedged firmly in anus etc….

This bikes longer chainstays seem the obvious solution to getting the rider back in the middle of the bike and well positioned for everything….i like it, the fusion of a DH front end to a trail bike rear end is what i’ve been looking for for ages, shame i’ve just spunked thousands building up a FS trail bike recently.

It will be interesting to see if the big hitters follow suit or if this bike becomes a freak consigned to the annals of history….anyone wanting to try it on their own bike can do so with headset/angleset cups and a longer fork…as Chris Porter had done with his own Mondraker in the original Dirt interview, just fit a 2-3 degree slackset and if your bike is designed around a 140mm fork find a 160mm one, if the bike already has a 160mm fork then source a 180mm fork….fit the angleset and new longer fork and you should be nearly there….the slackset with original fork installed will drop the front of the bike steepening the the seat tube and dropping the bottom bracket (potentially impractically low)…but by sticking in the longer fork you remedy this by lifting the bottom bracket back up to a usable height, unfortunately you also put the seat tube back in its original position and part of the appeal of the Geometron was a steep seat tube with the slack head angle but its worth a try to see if you like it….if i had some spare cash and a recent-ish FS frame id give this a go.

Hope are frustrating, it’s not entirely their fault, it’s the fanboys too… When their stuff breaks, they fix it, yeah? But it’s not good customer service, selling something you know will break then fixing it when it does! At best it’s a last minute save. If superstar did this stuff, there’d be octopuses everywhere but people love Hope for it. This ground me down a bit, I spat the dummy when they decided to try and charge me RRP for the “upgrade” parts to fix their not-fit-for-purpose 12mm rear hub.

This for me too, they make some great stuff….the QR seat clamp on my HT is faultless and has endured many harsh British winters and still works when others have seized, snapped etc….the mix and match head set cups concept is so obvious and genius i’m surprised nobody thought of it sooner, i went from a straight steerer fork to a tapered one in a 44mm headtube….all i needed was the larger external bottom cup, Hope to the rescue and although i now have a mismatched headset with a Nukeproof top/inner and a Hope bottom/outer they work flawlessly together.

However, how often do we hear of cracked hubs, disintegrated pawls, bolloxed freehubs etc on their hubs on this forum….barely a month must pass by….and yet its conveniently swept under the carpet with a cheery “i contacted Hope and they’re sending me out a new one for free!”….as Northwind said, this is not a quality product but a last minute save by a company that has some decent customer service morals because lets face it their stuff isnt cheap!…if it was Superstar they’d be numerous threads on it….at least Superstar keep their prices cheap.

Anyway, back on thread. I like, have bought from and will happily by from again: Ribble, On-One, Superstar, Hope, Ragley, Nukeproof….i think thats about it, i tend to wander down to Trespass for outdoor/cycling clothing but i’m not sure if they’re British or not…ditto Karrimor for rucksacks, boots and such like…i think i got about 4 years out of my last set of Karrimor walking boots, not bad for £35 and they remained entirely waterproof the whole time….finally binned them when the sole came away and none of the useless cobblers in town would touch them!

At 18 psi it feels like I have a flat, I thought tubeless was about less weight, sealant to stop punctures, eliminating pinch flats etc….the craze for silly low pressures is just that, a craze…none of the racers spoken to in the WC pits or when Pinkbike do their EWS pit walk run pressures that low….it seems to be a comfort blanket for inept people who can’t ride properly without a squirmy tyre giving them a misplaced definition of ‘grip’

25 in the front, 28 in the back with or without tubes, let the tread of the tyre do the job it was designed to do without rolling about onto its sidewall.

Try running them with proper pressures, 18psi FFS and you wonder why it burped and deformed.

Just get back there and build another good 456….that’s all we want.

I’ve had a 456-evo full build from them which was great, including the bloke who was building it at the time phoning me up to run through a few things like tyre choice, stem length etc and to tell me it should be with me the next day (it was)…great service and a truly great bike.

Also ordered a 45650b frame only from there that I was able to build up myself, no ovalised headtubes etc

Would happily order again, if I didn’t already have a FS I’d be looking at a Codeine.

[/quote]It makes my previous bike a new style xl nomad look tiny and the nomad rides terribly if you were to ride it back to back. Most over hyped bike I’ve had if you ask me ( the nomad)

Careful now, several STW big hitters have invested several thousands of their hard earned on a Nomad and never tire of telling the forum how good they are….to hear that it’s not in fact the best bike in the world may make their heads explode.

I predict a sudden influx of Nomads onto the second hand market and a coincidental rise in orders for Chris Porter’s Geometron!

I tend to buy stuff that matches my riding ability, so SLX chainsets as opposed to carbon XO…likewise Deore, SLX or maybe XT brakes as opposed to XTR, Saint etc….it just feels ‘right’ for the kind of rider I am and the riding I do.

I would want the ground to open up if I turned up at BPW on my new boutique carbon Evil resplendent with ENVE wheels, carbon XX everything running gear…and then proceeded to get passed by everyman and his dog, no matter how good the kit may make me feel when I’m sat (mug of tea in hand) staring at it in my garage it would ultimately mean sod all if it didn’t make me a better rider….and we know simply putting an average rider on pro level kit does not give them pro level performance….training, technique…dare I say it skills courses and coaching make you a better rider not a £1000 set of wheels….but people like to justify their ludicrous purchases so inevitably we are subjected to the nonsensical ‘im 5% faster on Strava since fitting my new whatever’….it smacks of all the gear no idea.

When I’m finishing in the top 3rd of races I enter then I’ll start taking a long hard look at my kit and seeing if I really do need to start spending serious money looking for those final few seconds that separates the winners from everybody else in the top-30….but I’m not, I’m very much midpack so the midpriced, mass produced gear I buy suits me fine.

My attitude may be old fashioned but I think your kit should reflect your ability, if you’re a newby and don’t want all eyes in you then ride basic but decent stuff, if you’re a good rider and getting some reasonable race results buy a decent bike and adorn it with suitable upgrades…if you’re a highly skilled rider and winning local races, placing well in regional and national stuff and maybe carrying some sponsorship then ride flashy bikes, £1000 aftermarket wheelsets etc….I just find consumerism and ostentatious wealth a very American thing and ultimately distasteful.

Good PSA, these were genuinely bombproof and were cruelly culled by Shimano to make way for Zee components.

I’ve ordered a set, they say 9 speed but I know they run 10 speed no bother….nice close ratio 11-32 cassette on the back and that’s a lovely drivetrain….of course it’s not fashionably 1x but I couldn’t care less, the Shimano press fit BB went into my Trance last week….I’d been dithering over sticking to 2×10 or going 1×11 but this has just made my mind up for me!

Good video. It said Remy Metallier at the end of the video, if that’s him in there then that kind of steep, rooty, off camber riding will do him the world of good….he seems to spend most of his time at Whistler on smooth groomed trails…he has incredible skills no doubt but he got found out when he secured a wild card entry at the Mont Saint Anne WC and didn’t even make it through qualifying to the top 80 riders….some training on this kind of lairy tech stuff will stand him in good stead going forward.