There seems to be so much talk these days about looking past whatever bike you're on, avoiding the trailside chatter about what bike or component works well or doesn't work at all, and instead just really relishing on what I hear people call "
the ride, maaan!" That expression is sometimes accompanied by a glazed over look in their eyes as terrible reggae music and hazy smoke radiate out from their truck, which is real shame given that there's great reggae music they could be bumping at the trailhead instead. Don't take my flippant attitude the wrong way, though, because I'm in it for "
the ride, maaan!" as much as anyone else, but I don't feel the slightest bit guilty about getting a chubby over an exciting new (
or old) bike. I also don't believe that I have any right to shake my head at anyone who does the same, or really does want to argue with me about 27.5+ wheels or why I think gearboxes are dumb.
Lusting about exciting and interesting gear does not take away from one's love for the sport or the amount of so-called soulfulness that they experience when riding bikes on singletrack, even if they do want to be on the latest wheel size. In fact, I believe that there are often so many great backstories to the bikes we ride, and especially the people who built and designed them, that the personalities of the machines themselves only add to the event.
Intense's Jeff Steber poses with a prototype that he was tacking together on a Sunday back in 2012. Photo by Ian Hylands
Maybe I'm the one that's stoned, but I often find myself looking back at some of the bikes I've owned, or maybe only ever seen in old issues of Mountain Bike Action from the late '90s, and getting the same sort of wistful connection that I do when flipping through a classic car magazine at the supermarket. Sure, talking about a 1999 Giant ATX One DH bike in the same sentence as a Miura or bright red Dino is a stretch that's probably going to cause the car nuts out there to send me e-mails with only four letter words in them, but, at least for me, all three examples have a similar but different allure. There's no way I'll ever be able to see an ATX One and not think of Myles Rockwell's surprise victory at the 2000 World Champs in Spain (
sure, Nico flatted, but a win is a win), and I have no shame in admitting that I cut out a full page magazine photo and taped it to the wall above my weight bench. His race bike was heavily modified, no doubt, but the production ATX Ones, with their skinny little down tube and boxy frame, have a pedigree to them that gives me goosebumps to this day. To me, that lump of aluminum, steel, magnesium and rubber that's now probably not worth much more than an entry-level hardtail has more soul ingrained in it than any rider who goes out of their way to tell me how much they're in it for ''
the ride, maaan!''
| Some of the bikes I've spent time on feel more like classic cars to me now in that I remember them fondly, flaws and all, rather than forgetting about them when the next best thing came along. They're a bit like those one or two special exes you likely have that, while knowing that you're better off apart, you'll always look back and smile about. |
Just like many other sports, mountain biking is blessed with plenty of colourful characters, and some of the most captivating of these are the people who have designed, and in some cases even built, the very machines that it seems fashionable to be so blasé about. Maybe it's because I've been very blessed by being able to dive into the backstories behind what most others only see as expensive toys that are designed to strip you of your hard earned money, which is so far from the case that it actually saddens me a bit. I don't care how much misdirected hate one has for any now-large company that's been very, very successful over the years, as I've been there to see engineers so proud of their latest creation that they're glowing like they've just seen their first child born when you ask them questions about their new bike.
Countless hours in front of computers, in the test lab, and on the trail - we could even be talking years' worth of man hours here - and now they're able to show the world what they've created. Yes, it's a bike, and yes, none of them are inexpensive, but clever minds have worked very hard to try and make it even better than the last one. And this applies to so many companies out there, from tiny garage builders to massive brands with whole departs devoted to what colours they'll be using in two year's time.
Identifying it as just another aluminum bike out of Asia would be selling the story behind Kona's remarkable Process 111 far too short. Photo by Amy McDermid
For the men and women who design and create the bikes we ride, these machines must surely have a bit of soul to them. Jeff Steber, the man who welded up his own Intense frames during those early years, might not seem to have much in common with the guy who's spent the last six months figuring out the ideal carbon layup for the 2015 Specialized Demo, and while those examples are separated by many years, I'd argue that there's a certain amount of passion to both acts. But hold on and let me explain myself before you call the hounds on me over that claim. The obvious difference between the two examples is that one has twenty-something years of memories behind it and the other is a shiny, technologically-heavy bike that makes it easy for jaded eyes to roll in their sockets. However, the similarities between the two examples may be more prevalent than you might first assume: I promise both designs were fuelled by equal parts passion and the desire to improve the breed, both were / are seen as being advanced examples of the breed when there were released, and both were mostly manufactured by human hands. Older bikes like those from Intense, Foes, Mantis and many other companies, pull at our heartstrings now, but don't be so shortsighted as to not realize that today's modern machines won't be doing the same thing in fifteen or twenty year's time. Or, if you're like me, maybe you're already appreciating the latest creations.
The bikes we ride are just machines that are designed to do a job, and that's a fact that is hard to reconcile with the knowledge the passionate people have poured their heart and soul out to define the bike's character on the trail. No two bikes are the same, are they? Two different 150mm bikes have very different personalities and ask different things of their owner, which is something that comes about by many hands and minds figuring out how they want their new baby to behave. When you look at it that way, I think you'd be crazy not to think that there's a bit of soul in every bike, which is something that helps you enjoy ''the ride, maaan!'' even more.
Fast forward 15 years and I have a Tracer 275 in the garage with 160mm plus a hardtail and a roadbike. The other day I pussyed out of a bike length double on the Intense because it looked a bit scary. Now I just want a shiny bike with ace bits and worry that my cranks are a couple of years old.
My point is this. I love mountainbiking and have done it for years and always will. However, even though I name my current bikes and get them out of my van hoping everyone else around will be thinking 'lucky bugger', I have long past the point of true pure enjoyment. Those early days when your elastimer forks and v brakes were the nuts. When riding meant riding not furiously cracking off about 12000 differant hub sizes, wheel sizes, tyre sizes, blaa blaa blaa. It still can be that. Any bike today is a billion times more capable than any of my old bikes above. Its what you the rider puts into it. It might be time for a mindset reajustment and to go play out on my bike with friends like the old days ☺
My dark blue 90’s nishiki Manitoba with an rst fork and old school trigger shifters had a name, and was my companion on many adventures. Right up until I broke my back and had to take a few years off, it was my baby. Years later when I pulled it out and threw better wheels and a manitou fork (dropped the weight by a few lbs to be sure) and put my wife on it it felt like moving in next to an old friend.
I name my bikes and I customize them. They are more than a machine, and I have a certain idolotrous love for them.
Read boy's life by Robert McCammon or It by Stephen King and you'll see the magic of a bicycle. Hi ho silver, away!
I will take a look at the McCammon recommended book, it might tweak my standpoint.
I don't mean it's wrong, it is natural, most of us go through it so it should be widely understood, but if someone rides for 10 years, spends lots of time reading about MTB, watching movies and still throws crap at some people who act or rather OWN something that goes against his/hers beliefs, then something is wrong... these days there is so much avaliable media material covering all colors of MTB allowing everyone to have an insight what motivates certain people to do certain things in certain way that lack of perspective is just disturbing.
With that said, every bike is basically a "snapshot" of the cumulative effort of everyone that designed it. It's neat to see what the trends were or what they were thinking when they made it. I also enjoy the riiiiddddee maaaaannnn....
I do own a carbon 160mm squish rig that I absolutely love. I also love my circa '93 Hunter SS in much the same way. It's about the unique personalities they exhibit. I love all the new trick bits and reading about them (yes, even hub widths and wheel sizes), however I also still lust after John Tomac's old 1990 C-26, canti's and all.
Enjoy the soul of the sport, and don't poo on another's parade simply because they look at things differently. Cheers!
And when I'm on the trail the bike always feels amazing. Any time it doesn't it's the fault of rider not machine. Sure, there are times when I'm at a race and I'll be passed by some kid who clearly has more talent and guts than I possess, who's riding some clapped out old piece of junk but that embarrassment passes and I still love my bike. If you can afford it, why the hell not?
The resistance to gearboxes here is the same as the resistance to EV's in the car world. Eventually the better technology will win out because someone that cares enough about doing things better instead of for profit will collect all necessary resources to do so. The bike world just needs its own Elon Musk to send $hitmano & $CAM back to the dark ages where they belong, or force them to do it right like most of us know they've been long capable of doing if they really cared about making better bikes. Rich giant corporations making silly claims about why they can't do a job when smaller companies with less resources yet far greater passion for their craft can do it is a major contributing factor to much of what is so disgusting about the world we live in. $hitmano & $CAM are as corrupt as GM & Chrysler.
The problem isn't as much with durability, although it IS still one of the most fragile parts, but the chain rattling all around the place (Shadow+ was a huge step forward to remedy this, but not a fundamental solution), the derailleur being unsprung weight, proper setup sensitivity are all flaws of the design. Not to mention CONSTANTLY bent hangers. Unless you ride Expresso all the time. I'm not saying a gearbox is the ultimate solution to world hunger, but it could sure take shifting on a MTB to a whole new level.
I didn't mean to start a flame about gearboxes, I just want to hear why would people think a derailleur is better, because I feel like the derailleur is a ridiculously outdated idea as it is right now.
Carbon fibre theoretically has an infinite fatigue life, but what tends to happen is the resin eventually degenerates due to environmental exposure and this then causes the overall composite structure to fail.
carbon fibre composites behave like cromoly steel alloys in that they don't accumulate fatigue stresses with repeat loading (within the intended design load i.e. not massive crash impacts), which has always been an issue for aluminium alloys
See the extent the aerospace industry goes to with airframes made from aluminium alloys, they are very strict on logging flight time, stress events, and have a programme of managing stress / cracking in airframes.
I've seen first hand (as a bicycle workshop manager) aluminium alloy frames used for even mild cycling like city hybrids, develop cracks after 5 years as a result of fatigue stresses accumulating over time - every small bump / knock / load increases this accumulation
Its exposure to ozone, ultra violet even high humidity with concentration of saline (living near the sea), in addition to chemical cleaners, greases used in bicycles.
It's just basic polarisation and it's very typical of modern society. In my experience I find that people who mock other bikes on the trail tend to have very shiny brand new kit; I've never had a guy riding a Deore groupset diss me! I find it hard to get stoked on the mutual joy of riding when that happens - but it's just the norm.
After over 10 years on the last one, I built my most recent bike over last winter. The first thing it got was a lobotomy. Aluminum frame, SLX crank, XT brakes. I tried hard to resist making it unique, but not better. It's there to ride.
All the industry needs is a power big (rich) enough to back a project by someone that actually cares about building better bikes & the derailleur will die just like the hugely inefficient CRUDE oil powered cars will. When the people that don't profit from failures & unsatisfactory performance (the vast majority of people) can actually get their hands on substantially better technology (which gearboxes are) then they'll use it. They'll buy it. If you don't believe me all I have to do is point to 26" wheels, 20 mm axles. Anything that's better than what's trend set by the industry at the time. If the industry that makes the shit agrees on what shit will flood the market, then that's how far the choice extends.
I ride trials, street, DJ & whatever industry bred trend whore term you wanna put on trail riding of any kind all on one gear with no problems. I miss the gears, I could use 5 or 7 but I don't miss what I'd have to sacrifice to use a derailleur ever again.
And a new Alfine hub is around 200$ for me to buy from Sweden, hardly expensive to keep a spare that you will likely not ever have to use any way.
But what would happen with SRAM and Shimano if we didnt need any of their drive train parts?
Heck they could do it as Honda did their last season with a rear mech in a box concept, same parts but out of the way and we get shifting while coasting and all the other benefits.
1- @Caiokv Nothing mechanical is 100% reliable. Gearboxes might breakdown less often but when they do breakdown they will not be able to be fixed by a home mechanic.
2- @johan90 All of your examples with motors can't really be applied to bicycles as weight and efficiency are not anything like as much of an issue as you have power to spare. Alfine 8 hubs don't really have the range to replace a derailleur drivetrain, even a 1x system on their own.
3- @atrokz 1- I haven't updated my PB profile in a while, my new bike has 10 whole gears. They shift perfectly, it is pretty dope. 2- I have ridden plenty of hub and gearbox gear systems from alfines, rohloffs, pinions Nuvincis etc and they all shift either poorly or reluctantly, especially when pedalling. (other than the Nuvinci which, other than being a little heavy at the shifter is ok but just weird as it has no steps between gears and you can select any ratio) 3- Rohloff hubs have nylon torque regulator pins which are designed to break if you over torque the hub to stop you damaging the gears. I imagine other internal gears have similar things too. That was just an example of something that could go wrong. 4- Shimano make the alfine 8 and the alfine 11, Sram make the G8, the dual drive and I think one more, there isn't a conspiracy from them to not make the things, people just aren't buying them.
I am sorry I pissed you guys off but I hope you can see that I wasn't just spewing unfounded bullshit. I hope you have a good day
The Alfine 11 has 400% something range I believe, which is more than I currently have with my 34-11 spread and I cant imagine that it couldnt be increased.
Best compromise I think would be Honda's solution on their RN01, SRAM and Shimano could continue to sell pretty much the same components but we get better reliability and better performance, sure they wont sell as many mechs but still for the most part they can continue to cash in.
Arguments about moto & auto not needing to be concerned about weight & efficiency are also pretty ignorant & dumb. Performance, cost & wear & tear are all tied to weight, no matter the vehicle. The only place that argument carries any "weight" is with something like a tractor where you want weight for traction & performance is a secondary concern.
If derailleurs were a good idear for anything besides profitability they'd be used on motos & autos too. Those machines have so many more things to fail, they don't need shitty drivetrain parts for profits.
A gearbox doesn't go in the rear wheel it goes in the frame, where the BB is. That's the right place for it & for the center of mass of the rig in general. Low & centered. If you wanna argue that road bikes & even XC bikes are fine with derailleurs that's not a "horrible" argument, but on more aggressive bikes, especially DH (where your weight argument breaks down even further) with all the violence the drivetrain is subjected to, derailleurs are almost as dumb as the Bible. The other thing a derailleur provides is tensioning for variable chainstay lengths caused by clunky, gimmicky concraptions deliberately convoluting the suspension process to market something new/different to masses of moron tech wieners.