The Vinyl Vessel: Norbs’ Specialized Demo

Words Kaz Yamamura

Photos Kaz Yamamura

Date Oct 11, 2015

Norbs. The 5-letter word strikes fear into hearts. Children cower and wives hide in the basement while the men arm themselves to the teeth. The renegade cop has gone off the deep end…

Kidding. Kyle Norbraten is the super likable freerider originally from Prince George, now calling the Sunshine Coast his home. Always laughing, and giving his bikes the custom treatment via vinyl.

27.5″ is the new 26″. Well not really. Kyle has pimped out his S-Works Demo with some vinyl, a process that takes days from start to finish.

A RockShox Boxxer World Cup with 1 token up front takes care of half of the suspension duties. Kyle runs his fork at 110psi, with 1 click of compression and 5 clicks of rebound.

Time for an intermission. Norbs flipping the step-down from The Sickest Edit Ever.

The flowy trails around his Roberts Creek home allow him to interpret the trails in different ways every time he rides them.

Adding some spice to the littlest stunts.

A RockShox Vivid Air RC2 pumped to 230psi takes care of the latter half of the suspension duties. 1 click of compression, 3 clicks of rebound and the ending stroke rebound slowed down all the way.

Specialized isn’t yoking around. An asymmetrical frame allows any shock to be fitted to the S-Works Demo, without the need of a proprietary yoke.

SRAM Guide RS brakes with a 180mm rotor out back and a 200mm rotor up front.

Specialized Roval DH Wheels mate with Specialized Butcher tires-2.3″ wide. Norbs runs 30psi in the front and 32psi in the rear.

165mm long SRAM XO cranks with Specialized Boomslang pedals for the drivetrain. Norbs opts to run just a lower guide.

Chromag Director stem and Chromag Fubar 780mm bars for the cockpit. The star-shaped top cap is for weight savings, of course.

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The vinyl process usually takes days from start to finish. Visualizing the new design and colours, to laying on the vinyl with the most minimal amount of seams possible, to adding more or taking away to the right balance and look in for the bike. There’s a lot more to design and colour than one may think – it needs to balance out so the bike looks as good as possibly can.