andy-eunson profile

You can because there are holes in the insert around the outside periphery.

I’ve ordered a pair for my hardtail. I’ll post my findings once mounted and ridden.

At around 140 pounds this might be in my near future.

Excerpt from Sale Of Goods Act

Implied conditions as to quality or fitness

18 Subject to this and any other Act, there is no implied warranty or condition as to the quality or fitness for any particular purpose of goods supplied under a contract of sale or lease, except as follows:

(a) if the buyer or lessee, expressly or by implication, makes known to the seller or lessor the particular purpose for which the goods are required, so as to show that the buyer or lessee relies on the seller's or lessor's skill or judgment, and the goods are of a description that it is in the course of the seller's or lessor's business to supply, whether the seller or lessor is the manufacturer or not, there is an implied condition that the goods are reasonably fit for that purpose; except that in the case of a contract for the sale or lease of a specified article under its patent or other trade name, there is no implied condition as to its fitness for any particular purpose;

(b) if goods are bought by description from a seller or lessor who deals in goods of that description, whether the seller or lessor is the manufacturer or not, there is an implied condition that the goods are of merchantable quality; but if the buyer or lessee has examined the goods there is no implied condition as regards defects that the examination ought to have revealed;

(c) there is an implied condition that the goods will be durable for a reasonable period of time having regard to the use to which they would normally be put and to all the surrounding circumstances of the sale or lease;

(d) an implied warranty or condition as to quality or fitness for a particular purpose may be annexed by the usage of trade;

(e) an express warranty or condition does not negative a warranty or condition implied by this Act unless inconsistent with it.

So true. Paying for warranty is bull crap. We have a thing called the “Sale of Goods Act”. The product has to be suitable for its intended purposes. If the product fails, the party you got it from has to make it right. I was an insurance adjuster, now retired, and years ago I represented a boating store that had sold an outboard motor mount to an individual. Basically a stainless steel slot that attached to the boat where the motor slotted into. A weld failed and the motor fell off and was lost. We had to pay for the motor and new mount because the manufacturer was in the US and the plaintiff had only come after the shop. I think we attempted to have the manufacturer respond but they simply refused. An actual warranty probably changes that so that the store can transfer responsibility to the fork supplier. 

I’m no engineer but it would seem to me that the insertion depth needs to be increased to prevent the steer tube from coming loose and creaking. That EXT fork looks like it does that. I look at that big burly 38 and see a shallow insertion depth. Beef up the entire fork except for the insertion is asking for trouble.

I believe 35 came from road. Deda came up with a 35 bar and stem which Andre Greipel used. His nickname is the Gorilla. Road sprinter. Those guys will hit 2000 watts in a sprint so perhaps stiffer for them is better.

For my 140 ish pounds, 33 mm grips, 2.5-2.4 tires at low psi, soft forks are infinitely more important than bar “compliance”. Back in the day we had slim grips because Tomac said, 2.1 was a fat tire with tubes pumped too hard, rim brakes caused a death grip because they stunk. That my friends, in winter on the north shore is the definition of hand cramps and arm pump. Maybe if I was a lot heavier on a wider bar (740 for me) I’d notice it. Stiffness or compliance is the sum of all the components. I think to judge bar compliance one really needs machines to test and compare that.

I was riding hard in the early 90’s when the purple CNC machined rage was in full swing. A lot of that crap was just that, crap. Being a light rider at under 140 back then claims of stiffer this and that fell on deaf ears. I had a friend that worked at Norco then. He still does. He told us they sold Axiom stems for way more then normal because even though they paid around $5 to haVe them made and shipped, if they sold them wholesale for $7 and they were keystones for $14.99 no one would buy them. Too cheap. So they wholesaled for $25 and sold for $50 at the stores. Instantly a better stem. I think about that. To me there needs to be a tangible performance benefit. And I have been suckered in way more than once. Carbon brake rotors? Got some. Went through probably half a ton of rubber tires with bizarre looking tread patterns that still gripped like hockey pucks. Suntour XC PRO. Isn’t that pretty? Indexed well at one end of the cassette but not the other. Pick where you need to shift before the race. Although I did win a race once because I wasn’t able to shift to my 22. Forced me to attack in the middle ring. 

Colour matching is fun. Nothing wrong with that. But to do so at a high cost with no performance gain or lesser performance is dumb. Sometimes with stems it’s the cheaper heavier stem that performs better. I’ve had stems so skeletal that they don’t hold the headset in adjustment. Always come loose. Solved by using a cheaper stem with more surface area for grip. I’ve seen some fancy stems with sharp machined edges where they contact steer tubes and bars too. Bad idea. More so for carbon parts.

I’ve looked at stiffness claims as marketing bull crap for a long time. I mean the forces a given rider puts on a fork don’t change. You stiffen one part up the forces will concentrate somewhere else. At my weight, 142, X percent stiffer than something that doesn’t really flex is meaningless. Plus I thought we wanted compliance these days? 

At what point does one simply go dual crown? I suppose some will want a tighter turn radius But based on my experience with a Trek and Nock Block and years ago a VPFree and Boxxer u turn its a non issue.

Pretty sure they are.

Posted by: JBV

^^ i bet you're the life of the party kinda guy eh.

Don’t see anything wrong with his approach to be honest. It’s a valid question. I don’t think he’s necessarily correct though. I think better traction will always lead to less skidding. Less skidding equals less wear and tear on the trail. People slide corners when they have exceeded the limits of traction. Or they are doing those silly skidding turns in berms so as to throw dirt and make an easy trail look hard. Oh I know skiddy skiddy is stylish. Says who? The same people that say acid wash flared jeans are cool?

Posted by: syncro

Doesn’t improved grip and higher cornering speeds = more trail damage/erosion?

Speed for an old man like me is a relative thing. And more grip equals less sliding equals less trail damage.

Posted by: Kieran

I want a set for the DH bike. But at the moment the cost of shipping is putting me off. Did you get them locally?

I'd just put them in the rear if I was you. I've only dented a front rim a couple of times. The rear though is a different matter and I have a good 50 over you.

No. Ordered from the US. If it was only rim protector I’d just run a bit more air but I am interested in improved grip and cornering.

But do I put both on the hardtail or one in each rear wheel? I’m only 140 pounds and I rarely bottom the front at 15 psi front on 2.5 Assegai. 2.4 Dissectors on hardtail need about 4 psi more to not bottom out. Excited anyway.

Posted by: Endur-Bro

Posted by: Timer

What about rear-wheel-traction? Not being as far forward on the bike might be beneficial for that purpose. Considering the kind of power pro-racers can put down, keeping the rear wheel from spinning is probably important.

You’re underestimating how great the effect chainstay length has on climbing traction. 

YouTube Hill Climbing Dirt Bikes and look at how long the swingarms on those bikes are.

Yes. When 29ers first came out it was common that people noticed better climbing. I think the the primary reason for that was the longer chainstays required by the bigger wheel.

Posted by: Hepcat

Could it be as simple as wanting their XC seat angle to match their road bike seat angle? 

Elites that I've known anyway have done almost all of their training mileage on the road bike.

XC race bikes really are off on their own distinct evolutionary branch of MTB aren't they.

Could be.

Agreed that static angles are almost meaningless. The problem with a steep seat tube angle is that it can change your seated balance. As your feet move under your butt by either the seat being moved forward or the bb moving backwards, you may end up leaning on the bars more. To fix that you need to either raise the bar, which makes pedalling less efficient, or move the seat back and/or feet forward. To a certain extent the steep seat tube angle thing is a fad and marketing thing to try and sell new bikes. In XC racing the riders already have a more leaned over aggressive position and they don’t really set the bike up for comfort. Emily Batty seems to be an outlier in her set up. For us punters who ride longer travel bikes for the downs, we can get away with a less efficient platform for climbing and go more for comfort. The steep seat tube angle is more efficient in terms of maintaining traction on a climb but less efficient in terms of a pedalling platform.

Posted by: RAHrider

I've been building my own wheels for years. Not too hard & you tube has got to be a better teacher than I had.

My tips as follows.

1. Pro lock nipples. No spoke prep or grease needed on threads & they keep everything tight.

2. lace the wheel then go around and tighten the spokes a few turns each, until the threads are covered.

3. Make the wheel round. 

4. Make the wheel straight.

5. Adjust the dish.

6. Adjust the tension

7. Repeat 3-6

I looked into tension meters. they really aren't all that accurate, I know you need to the pretty close with carbon so might be worth your while to go over your work?

That’s pretty much it. But I use a Park tensiometer to get close to what the rim says I can go to in terms of tension and to get tension even. The rim is usually what dictates spoke tension. The mount a tire and crank up the pressure and recheck tension. It’ll probably drop a bit.

Go buy a lotto ticket brother. The gods are with you.

Posted by: FLATCH

Posted by: andy-eunson

Posted by: FLATCH

Posted by: andy-eunson

I was chatting with a local builder the other day. He had a fat tired ebike that he motorized himself. Throttled and massively powerful. Gives him quicker access for building. But boy did he ever go off on those that ride them with no reason other than to ride more. We had been talking about his trail and the fact that riders had been cutting in at the halfway point to avoid the fantastic aesthetic single climb because it was too hard.

Do people still think that growth of the sport by encouraging folks to get ebikes is good? Or growth at all?

I’m going to assume the riders cutting in half way are on regular bikes? Certainly for an emtb this fantastic climb wouldn’t be too hard. It also sounds like your builder friend is unfamiliar with the word hypocrisy.

I think in some cases a “braid” is just the natural evolution of a trail. Sometimes it could be a ride around and other times it is just a better line that was simply missed when the trail was cut.

The ebike is for getting to the build area with tools and for saving energy for the build. No hypocrisy at all.

But wouldn’t you think that using a throttled de restricted, not a class one, Ebike kind of sets a poor example? Builder or not.

With a chainsaw on his back? No.