There's a number of frames that have the capability of having two or more personalities, intentionally or not. A few examples off the top of my head are the Starlings as you've mentioned, Rocky's outgoing Instinct/Altitude combo in carbon (also Rocky's out-out going Instinct), the Deviate Claymore (unintentional but works). The problem, for me at least, is that I want to change so much between the two that it's halfway to a bike rebuild and at that stage, I'll just get a second frame because what's my time worth (plus more bikes). For example, when I first threw may Claymore together with all the wrong stuff, I was running it at 160mm front, 160ish rear rather than the intended 170/165. The bike was actually really good, certainly light enough to fall into all-mountain camp, and pedalled quite well to boot. It's now 180mm front, ~178 rear (I just can't do what manufacturer want me to, can I?), still pedals quite well but is better on the smashy-smashy end of things. But anyway, when I got the Claymore, I had just cracked a previous 160/160 frame, which in turn had all my parts from when I ran one of my instincts in BC Edition mode. With the same setups on each of those bikes (including tires) they all pedaled roughly the same, mild ergonomic differences aside. And the BC Edition Instinct climbed roughly the same as the non-BC edition instinct in slack mode with the same wheel/tire combo.
Take this Optic, for example. I'm not going to put on my 1350g wheelset and light tires, nor am I going to put on my we are one super-strife wheelset and DD/DH casing tires either (because it's not my bike). But both would change the characteristics of the bike, and based on messing about with my Instinct and Claymore, make a bigger difference than long-stroking the shock and putting a 150mm fork on the front. So for me, it's changing shock, fork, and tires to actually get notably different experiences, and at that point? Give me another frame.
I do get the familiarity argument. I couldn't swap between my XL 2022 Range and XL Aurum HSP easily. Too dramatic a fit change. But my Instinct, Aurum, and Claymore all have wheelbases, reaches, bar width, and cockpit setups on the same planet (not to mention similar if not identical brakes), and I can jump on any of them and be happy by the second turn. Maybe the trick is to own two murmers, eh Marty? Hah!
Heathen, Pass his thoughts on re: the extra travel and mullet. I'd be hesitant to give up the 29er rear on the climb trails we have out here regardless of any extra fun from the smaller rear wheel (unless he's running the mullet link with a 29er rear wheel still and just being a weirdo). ]
Kenny, re: the Float X (based on this thread and that other one), I don't entirely agree that the shock works best on flow and not well enough on tech, but I think you're onto something with that spacer. I'm not exactly sure what it is but I just don't think the shocks work as well as they're supposed to if they aren't running whatever the full amount of travel available in the shock is, i.e. with only the 8mm screws and plate installed. When 5mm of spacers are in there, I can't seem to access the last 10+mm of stroke - doesn't entirely make sense to me, but looking down at the shocks reveals this experience to be universal to all the bikes I've tried the spacers on - which is all of them because I enjoy messing about. I've read some thoughts about how some of these air shocks that use the same IFP depth and negative spring volume at all stroke lengths (within the platform; i.e. 50mm 52.5mm, and 55mm, not between different eye to eyes) really do work best at their full stroke. I haven't given that much analysis beyond that but again, perhaps there's something there (and it aligns with my anecdotal real world experience; confirmation bias hooray).
Last edited by: Jotegir on Oct. 29, 2024, 1:49 p.m., edited 1 time in total.
