Irish Eyes are Smiling

Here we have yet another Bandersnatch, built to the hilt in all the right places. This bike belongs to one of our own, "E-Dog". It's his very first 29er.






I am proud to say that the Dog gave up a big flat screen TV for this bike. Good choice!







The Bandersnatch is the best bikes out there for the money. Nothing rides like one, maybe with the exception of a geared Jabberwocky.


Speaking of....
Something wicked this way comes....

Empty House

I am home alone. While some may rejoice at the prospect, it does come with a penalty. It is awfully BORING. In my "free" time I have taken to watering the garden. I'm pretty well house trained, so I do my own clean up, laundry and other chores on time, so I'm not living in the reckless abandon of bachelor life.
I still wake up at 6. Sure there are dogs to walk, and cats to help be on the right side of the door, but otherwise, it's quite dull.

It doesn't help that it's 98° with a million % humidity right now. No riding.

Lots of working.

I even turned on the relatively ineffective AC in the shop. One corner gets ice cold, then a ceiling fan moves the hot air into the cold air. The result is a slightly less uncomfortable temperature to work in.

I got to miss the Big Wheeled Ballyhoo, an event I quasi inspired with my Meat-up. I was really hoping to be able to go, but it was a long shot, and I fell short. The shop can be all consuming. It can be tough being the onliest guy at Bike 29.

We did put together this sweet RIP for a local customer this last week.


I've been building wheels like crazy (great!)
My baseball team got swept (ehh...)
My dog even ran away on Monday after an unfortunate gastronomical event (horrifying!!)
I don't have 4th, 5th or even 6th bowls of Cheerios to get for my boy (sad)

It's quiet.
Too quiet.
All that will change soon.
I have a Bandersnatch to build for a new convert. A RIP for another.
And before too long, my family will return, and life will resume it's ridiculous pace.


I'd like to givea big shout out to Guitar Ted, and Tim Grahl @ Twentynineinches for all their fantastic effort with the Ballyhoo. While I think that they are bike visionaries of sorts, more importantly, I think they are really cool guys I have only ever dealt with on email and blog. I'm most sad about not being able to play bikes with them in Decorah, put faces to names, names to rides and rides to stories after.

There is always Interbike...

RIP - Roll In Plenty!

My long awaited shipment of Niner RIP9s are beginning to trickle in.
I am beginning to fill back orders, and will even have a pretty decent stock after those have shipped. Very exciting times indeed.

In fact, things have been chugging right along at the shop. We are starting to look the way I always envisioned. Small tweaks to the layout, and more importantly, a way to get all the frames I have in stock out of their boxes and in the eye of the customer. It's pretty tough given the sheer amount of stuff you need to cram into a working bike shop. Even though my 1200 sq/ft space is not that small, it is very easy to clutter it up. So I've decided to make use of my 1200 sq/ft ceiling!
I had a pile of hooks left over from when I rearranged the shop. I'm amazed it took me so long to figure this out. I think they look great hanging there, and the frames are easily removed for oohing and ahhing.

Synopsis of Color

One of my most recent projects has been a Vassago Bandesnatch partial build. While it left the building today, it will always stick in my mind as one of the most vibrant builds I have done.

We didn't break the bank, rather, we spent money where it needed to be spent, and left the rest for future upgrades far down the road. We came out with a pretty nice bike with one of the coolest color schemes I've seen in a long time.

While avoiding high dollar drivetrain and brake components, we did manage to embellish a little. One of the beautiful things about the Royale Wheelset, is that you can either blow it up, or go totally stealth. We went big, and carried the theme over the entire bike.






And you know what? It works. My philosophy of bike building is, if you are going to be spending a chunk of your hard earned cash, have fun with it. Sure, all black looks as cool as Darth Vader's suit, but color is good too. Do things you wouldn't normally do. It's not like you are getting 3 brand new multi-grillion dollar bikes every summer.
Mix it up.
Live a little.
Do what makes you happy. We are here to help and expedite, not judge.

Have fun with it. It's a bike. It's made for fun. It's your bike.

Father's Day Massacre

Yesterday was not a good day to be riding a bike.
We went to Snake Mountain in Addison to meet up with the Sunday morning crew.
Dark clouds loomed over the lake, but we were pretty sure we'd be able to get our ride in.
We made the climb, but noticed that the mountain had received some heavy rain within the last few hours. The ground was pretty wet, and there were a couple of big trees down across the main trail to the top.
Once we got into the single track, things took on a more serious tone. The rocks and roots were all wet and slippery, great care had to be taken to stay upright. We finished the trail The Altar without major incident, and headed into Bounty Hunter. This is where I sliced one of my tires.
The hole was far too big for the Stan's sealant to fill, and it erupted latex like a volcano.
Always coming prepared, I had a tube in my Camelback.
Which had a bad valve and would hold no air.
Mandy had a tube so we got it installed but only after being devoured by hungry mosquitoes.
We were about 15 minutes behind the group. As we hacked our way down the wet rocks, we discovered that one of Mandy's pedal cleats was missing.
One of the group had turned back to see if we were OK, at which point the guy checking on us got a flat. fortunately the whole group was about 100 yards down the trail, and we waited for him to get it changed.
At which point the rain came. With a few rumbles of thunder. Great.
The flat also turned out to take another 15 minutes to fix, as it was coupled with a chain issue.
We were ready to be done. Fortunately it stopped raining, but we were on our way out, beaten by the mountain.
On our way down, we came across two riders from our group who had cut out ahead of us. One of the had launched a water bar and came down badly. After high siding his bike, the next thing to hit the ground was the left side of his face. Twice. It was the same guy who had come back to check on us in the singletrack.
Although he walked out on his own, he was pretty messed up. Mandy had called 911, so there were some paramedics at the trail head when we finally got down. Wow.
I haven't heard on his condition, but we left him in good hands.
Jay Pro took a big digger on his road bike. A high speed collision left a nasty rash on his backside.
Mandy's cousin in VA took a hard spill on her bike too.

First Impressions - White Brothers Fluid 135

Wow. Pretty much sums it up right there. Rarely will a single component change affect the entire feel of a bike, but this one does. It actually improves the way the RIP rides, to a level that I had been looking for since I first threw my leg over 'ol Blue.








The Details
The White is a coil sprung fork, with an air compression assist and oil damped rebound. It has beautifully machined lowers with a leading 20mm axle. It is pretty. It weighs in at 4.68lbs with an uncut steerer. I measured 128mm of actual travel, which is right on par, as White measures the 10mm bottom out bumper as part of the travel, even though you don't really get that travel.
More on that in a bit.

Installation
I thought for sure that removing the Maverick was going to be a nightmare. Fortunately, it came quietly. The Chris King front hub was easily converted from the 24mm Maverick axle to a standard 20mm thru axle, the hub shell is the same, and axles are interchangeable. I had to re-dish the wheel to center it in the fork.
I also needed to space the brake caliper over 5mm to center the rotor, I used 5mm chainring spacers, and some longer bolts. It was a snap.

Parking Lot Test Ride
The front end of the RIP now sits quite a lot higher. With my Reba, I used a 100 x 10° stem, the Maverick had it's own direct mount 95mm stem, and with this set up, I'm using a 90 x 10° stem (it's what I had). This new shorter cockpit actually turns out to work for me. Quite well.
I found while bouncing around that I was compressing the fork I was kissing the bottom of the crown with the tire. That's how I knew how much travel I was getting...
I pumped the air assist up to 95 psi, which seemed to cure it.

First Real Ride
Thursday is our Five Hills Bikes shop ride night, and what a perfect venue for seeing what the fork is capable of.
The climb up is pretty stiff, we gain 900ft in 3.5 miles, but it is paved, so it goes pretty quick. I noticed right away how slack the RIP now sits. While climbing prowess was not affected too terribly, it wasn't as comfortable as the lower front end of the Maverick. Out of the saddle climbing was much better though, as long as you kept your upper body still.

We did 6 Flags, followed by Joe's, which are by far, my favorite trails. This is where the bike began to shine like it never had before.
Handling was greatly improved, despite the slackened angles. I was able to rip through turns that always used to slow me down. The front end is STIFF. in fact, it is a lot more stiff than the Maverick, which I found to be pretty darn stiff. Tracking is amazing.

Well, all this adds up to added confidence, which in turn adds up to changing the line you ride. I decided to open things up a little. I was gliding over parts of the trail that used to rattle me. I was missing some sections of the trail all together, which is when I found that the air I put in the assist chamber may not have been enough. I buzzed the tire a couple of times coming while landing. From that point, I minimized my airborne time, until I can get a call in to White today.
Everything else was amazing.

The higher front end raised the lowish BB to a point where pedal strike was greatly reduced. I think that this may be why I was able to ride so fast through certain sections that gave me trouble before. I only clobbered the ground twice, which I would deem acceptable in the situations I was in.

Nit Picks
The front axle can be pretty tricky when trying to mount it to a roof rack. Because of the thru axle, an adapter is needed. My Topeak Alien is not the best tool for getting the job done, so I will be installing a "car 5". A small price to pay for the performance gain.
The fork has a fair amount of stiction, but White states that it takes about 10 hours of use before it breaks in. We'll check back on that later.

Verdict
It's a keeper. I have a ride planned on Snake on Sunday, which is where it will receive some serious abuse. I think this may actually make riding there fun...

The Next Installment

The new kid on the block is the White Brothers Fluid 135, now adorning the RIP9. I'm pretty excited about this fork. I measured an actual travel of 128mm, which already eclipses the Maverick's 119. The penalty is about 1/2 lb though, but it's a compromise I'm willing to make. It weighs in at 4.6lbs. It also brings the front of the bike slightly higher. The at rest BB height is now a smidge over 13.5". Will it be enough? We'll see tonight, when the Maiden voyage is planned. Any local readers are encouraged to join in. Call the shop for details, we'll be on "The Hill" tonight.



There was a good turn out at last night's race at Catamount. I rode Kermit, which also was sporting a new shiny black fork, the White Brothers Magic 100. I have had a little experience with the fork last year, and once I learned that the course would be in the woods, I needed to shed the rigid fork. The Magic weighs in at 3.98lbs with an uncut steerer. From what I can tell, the handling was not compromised in any way. I rode as fast as my gearing would let me (35-21), and finished my three laps in just over 50 minutes. I was 28 out of 40 in my race.
Look for a detailed review on the Magic in the coming weeks. It's staying on the bike, and I'm changing my gears...

Maverick Long Term Update

So I've had the Maverick DUC 32 front shock on my RIP for quite a while now, I've had a chance to ride it on just about all of our trails. This is what I've found.

Installation
I won't lie, I was not a fan of installing a fork with a rubber mallet and hacksaw on the list of necessary tools. A fork that costs this much should mount up easily and without the need to go caveman on it. I was more than a little frustrated getting the upper crown on correctly.

Set up
The initial set up with my fork was somewhat of a learning exercise. I had the legs out of the fork on numerous occasions trying to get the right oil heights and viscosity, the right negative air spring rate etc, but I was able to find a setting that did what I needed eventually. It seemed like every time I changed one setting, I had to rethink the others. It took up until last week to finally get it all figured out.

The Ride
On my very first ride, I hit a large root which produced a very large clunk from the headset. I figured that the upper crown must have finished seating itself, because you can only hit the thing so hard with a hammer in the stand and feel good about it. After I checked every bolt, and tightened them back up accordingly, the noise was gone, and has yet to return.

The quality of travel is actually quite amazing. It feels very well damped and controlled while seated, but get out of the saddle and it has a tendency to dive. But add pitch to the equation, and there goes most of your usable travel.

From these photos, you can see that I'm pretty much bottomed out. While the fork will extend into depressions keeping the front wheel firmly planted on the trail, situations like this demand raw positive travel.





It seems adjusting this out of the fork is not possible at this time. Maybe a platform valve of some kind would help immensely. Or maybe I need my own personal Maverick tech to play with it every time I want to ride.

They have been extremely helpful too, I would add. I'm not even going to talk about what I had to do to one of these forks to get it to work on one particular set up, but they were there every step of the way.

It certainly goes where pointed with no drama. The direct mount stem is the first I've used since my days on my Boxxer equipped DH bike.
It's always good to know where you're going.

I did manage a few large drops (3-4 feet) this Sunday, and it soaked them up with aplomb.

One of the problems I have with certain bar/stem/shock combos, is that my hands get beaten up. I use carbon bars to help with this, but my Reba always used to pound my palms numb. Not so with the Maverick. That is a big plus for me.

I have read on some of the mountain biking forums that some folks have had issues with the fork on off camber sections of trail. The complaint is of the bars wrenching out of your hands while going over rocky sidehills. This could be caused by not having the axle secured properly, one leg could rotate while the other stayed put. I never experienced this, as I paid extra special attention to the clamping force on the quick release. I found Maverick's quick release to work pretty well, but the one thing I would improve is to give the tension bolts a coat of threadlocker or something to stop them from coming out of adjustment. It seemed like every time I had them open, I had to fiddle with them to get them back to the correct tension. On more than one occasion, the QRs were too tight, and I lost the skin the knuckle of my thumb more than once on the brake rotor trying to re open the damn thing. That was super annoying, as I have a small car and I have to use a roof rack to get where I'm going to ride. Time spent fiddling with one's gear gets big BOOs from me.

The Verdict
For what it is, the Maverick is a pretty good fork if you are an "in the saddle" rider. I can see that on long epic rides, the fork's lack of weight and buttery softness would be a big benefit. It is an amazing climbing fork, the inverted design allows it to react to even the smallest of bumps, and the direct mount stem kept it pointed the way you wanted it in technical rocky ledgy climbs. You can tune it 100 ways to Sunday, allowing you to get the ride you want in for most applications.
The down side, is that there isn't much you can do about the dive on the fork if you are riding steep, technical descents. "Out of the saddle" riding effectively turns the fork into a really expensive rigid fork on descents, or a giant pogo stick in short sharp thrusts up.
The clatter of the stanchion guards was a little unnerving at times too. It made a racket on almost every bump hit.

What initially had me pretty excited about the fork was the possibility of more travel for my RIP, ended up to be something I don't think it was ever intended to be. It is not the 4.5" travel all mountain fork the RIP so badly needs to reach its full potential, but it is a good fork for the cross country minded trail rider.

Stay tuned for the next installment on the RIP. That's kind of a funny joke...

A Night at the Races

Wednesday nights are for racin!


The Catamount race series, in it's second race of the summer, featured the race support of Five Hills Bikes and Bike 29. We got there early and set up the tent. Last week was the all inclusive support night, where all the participating shops had a tent set up. I was twiddling my thumbs most of the time, as the other shops are well established and folks knew the names.

"Five Hills? Where are you guys from?"

This time though, I was pretty busy, adjusting derailleurs, airing up shocks and lubing chains. I even had some of my own customers show up to race. It was also good to get the word out that there is another competent bike shop that is dedicated to mountain biking near by. I've already had one new customer step up into the world of big wheels because of our participation.
Waterbury is fast becoming synonymous with world class mountain biking. You have seen many pictures on this blog of the stuff we ride regularly on this blog.

"You're in Waterbury? Those trails are awesome!"

The most exciting thing for me though, was the debut of the Bike 29 Jersey. As you can see, they really stand out. Many folks commented on how good they looked, and you can easily pick them out from afar. I think that most shop jerseys are way too busy, and you don't really see any of the logos clearly until you get close.




There is no doubt about which shop is being represented here. See ya out there!

Ride Report - Virginia IMBA Mountain Bike Festival

(Guest blogging - yet again ) Last weekend, while George kept a handle on things at the shop in VT, and our little boy enjoyed some quality time with the grandparents, I had the distinct pleasure of a road trip weekend. All the way from central VT to Harrisonburg for the Virginia IMBA Mountain Bike Festival.

I'm blessed to have a cousin who lives there, loves to mountain bike and is really involved in the local clubs - so it was easy to pop down for the weekend and fit right in. After I arrived I checked out some newer in-town trails for a short run and followed that up with some (definitely not available in Vermont) tasty vegetarian Vietnamese food and I was ready for my first day of riding in the George Washington National Forest.

We headed out of town and started our ride by climbing 9 miles up to Reddish Knob and a spectacular view of the mountains and West Virginia. Then, as the saying goes, it was all downhill, except for the uphill parts. One major rock garden on the way down (see first photo) and then loads and loads of swoopy smooth descending and more than a few embedded babyheads.

Sunday was the day of the big Shenandoah Mountain Trail Ride. Over 50 people joined this ride along the ridge of the great big Shenandoah Mountain. After a big, long fire road climb there's something like 16 or 17 miles of singletrack along the ridge. It's not particularly technical by VT standards, but the climbing is very respectable and the rocks and other hazards on the trail add a level of difficulty. If something happens to you in the middle of this ride - you are a long way from help.

Speaking of things happening. About two miles into the singletrack portion, I had a bit of a run in with a stick. In case you're wondering, stick vs. SRAM X0 -- stick wins and Mandy walks/coasts/carefully pedals back to the car while trying to figure out how to explain to her husband the demise of a particularly expensive piece of machinery.

Though I didn't get to experience the full epic ride - I've got a score to settle with the SMT and I'll be back and next time I'm bringing reinforcements.

Everyone that I met down there was super friendly and welcoming. The size and involvement of the cycling community is very impressive. There were tons of mountain and road bikers and they seemed to really identify themselves with the clubs and organisations supporting cycling. Even more impressive was the wealth of rides available in the George Washington National Forest and surrounding area. It's hard to tell when you're just visiting for a couple of days, but there seems to be enough to keep a rider busy for weeks. Thanks to Sue and Matthew for a fantastic weekend!