thekaiser

Some Crankbrothers pedals have had adjustable shims/contact pads on each side of the clip mechanism, to fine tune shoe/pedal contact. Similarly, some other brands of pedals have had plastic tuning shims on the for/aft edges of the pedal, for the same purpose. Can't remember who, but I think they were UK brands. Many also offer adjustable pin height on the cage, but that isn't quite the same as raising a smoother cage interface surface, although it might help depending on if you are looking for support or grip. Unfortunately, for a Shimano pedal fan like myself, all of those options mean switching to a less preferred clip mechanism. The other way one can go about it is from the shoe side, if you find a shoe that has an excessively deep cleat pocket, which would prevent easy clipping in/out, you can use cleat shims to move the cleat out to where you want it, and then as the sole wears, you can gradually remove the shims to keep the cleat/sole relative height in the optimal zone. Lastly, you can build up the worn sole of your shoe with Shoe Goo, or a similar shoe repair product, although I've found the durability is pretty poor, so you have to re-do it after every few rides. Anyway, hope that helps.

Very similar situation to you...been riding since I was 12, but after 30+yrs of riding various non-e bikes, I took a ride on an Turbo Levo and now I am hooked and looking at buying an e-bike. Your setup sounds interesting for a few reasons. Would you mind sharing roughly what your DIY combo ran you, cost-wise? I am curious how it compares to an off the shelf option from a traditional bike company. Besides the potential cost advantages, I like the idea of the Bafang motors due to their apparent serviceability vs. the more throwaway nature of Shimano and others' motors. Also, can you share if the Bafang motors have the same clutch "rattle" problem when coasting on descents that Shimano and Bosch have? BTW, from the images above, are you able to identify that McLaren is using a Bafang motor? I had wondered if it might be one, given that Bafangs are known for putting out some pretty impressive power numbers, but I don't know them well enough just to spot a de-badged example in a photo, given the variety of models they make.

No, I think I saw that he works for Intense now in some expanded role (not simply wrenching for the pros but also doing R&D and product management, or something like that), so he stayed with Intense when Gwin left for Crestline.

Yeah, it is funny to go back and read reviews from 6-10 years ago. The part that is a bit damning of the "expert opinion" in the reviews is when they say that that the, for example, 66 or 67 degree head angle is "plenty stable" without falling prey to the "sluggishness" of something radical like 65.5. Now, just a few short years later, that same 65.5 degree angle is "steep" and "twitchy". At each phase of the incremental move towards longer/lower/slacker bikes, there seems to be a desire amongst the expert class to pretend that bikes have finally arrived at the perfect point. It really makes you respect the few, brave, people who were already doing the modern numbers years ahead of time, even though those numbers were considered to be radical overkill at the time.

@JudyYellow: I thought the same thing regarding the similarity to the Hopey's. Apparently there is a connection. Hopey retired and stopped production in the recent past, and Jeremiah Boobar (formerly of SRAM and Cannondale) has picked up the torch with Hopey's blessing under the Pademelon name. This new design is based on the Hopey but has some refinements/enhancements, although I don't know the specifics of what has been changed. It is interesting to see these coming back around, as I recall them being a thing in DH in the late 90s/early 2000s, but then they kind of died off. Intuitively it seems like they'd be less helpful now that head angles are so slack, but maybe I'm not fully appreciating the functionality.

That thing is crazy looking! I wonder what the story was (ie. original owner and setup like that from the jump, or original owner who suffered an injury after owning it for a while and needed it modded, or stolen and modded by a non-MTB enthusist, etc...)?

@cedric-eveleigh: RMR may be suggesting what he thinks is a more accurate way of doing things, but I would also challenge your claim that "high pivot" is an "existing term...(with a) commonly accepted definition that it involves idler pulleys". The current generation of bikes with relatively high pivots may mostly have idlers too, but historically, most of the early single pivot full suspension mountain bikes (Cannondale, Pro-flex, Boulder, Trek, Mountain Cycle etc...), prior to the horst link bikes hitting the scene, had very high pivots and no idler. Even through the late 90s and early 2000s, there were bikes both for XC and DH use with insanely high pivots (look up a pic of a Bianchi Super G for fun). Now, to your point, they may not have been marketed specifically as "high pivots" but they most assuredly were high (or even very high) pivots. I think it is a stretch to assume that at some point "high pivot" became a sort of almost trademarked term that can't be applied unless an idler is attached to it, just because that is the form that the current crop of high pivot bikes tend to take. And how would one describe the pivot point of those older bikes accurately if not using that exact term? Now, having said all of that, I agree with you that it seems like Rotwild is putting some marketing spin on this bike, trying to capitalize on the current "high pivot" vogue while having a bike that doesn't really have the suspension characteristics (putting aside the idler issue) of a high pivot. This bike has a minimally rearward axle path, so to suggest you get the benefits of a high pivot is really stretching it. P.S. I really dig your drivetrains, keep up the good work and innovation!

@R-M-R: I, for one, agree with your point about not using the drive type ie. direct vs. indirect, as a sort of purity test for if a bike can be described as high pivot. Pivot height is one, very distinct, design element. The presence, or lack thereof, of an idler pulley, is another, very distinct, element. There is no need to conflate the two. Regarding ways that pivot height could be described accurately, I've wondered about the challenge of defining what is actually a "low", "medium", or "high" pivot, and while we all generally get the gist of the terms, it seems like the actual lines between those categories are somewhat in the eyes of the beholder. Do you have any suggestions about how one could put an actual numeric value on the height of the pivot, via IC or something like that? Or, since IC can and does move significantly on some bikes, would it be more consistent to classify them by the amount of for/aft movement of the rear axle, adjusting somehow for differing total travel numbers?

@jjhobbs: There is a guy up higher in the comments who was saying he was at Bike Park Wales, and someone tracked his van from there, via an Apple Airtag, back to the restaurant where he and his buddies were eating after a day of riding. The perps then stole the bikes from the van in the restaurant parking lot. That suggests that at least some of the bike thieves are locating their prey at the ride spot, rather than the hotel car park, although I'm sure you're right that thieves of all sorts are trawling hotel car parking areas for anything valuable.

@notthatbryan: Wouldn't the "get someone else to "park you in", take care of the stealing the whole van issue? Unless they stole the car blocking the van too.