MikerJ

Gotta agree. While my DVO rear air damper feels good it's died on me quite a few times. The bike with it shared riding duties with 2 other bikes- so not a ton of use. Mid season for a few years in a row my Topaz died. Took many weeks to get it back from DVO so the bike was shut down from prime time riding. Asked DVO if I could buy a back up at cost since the current shock was so fragile. They said no in very short order which I thought was uncool. They are otherwise nice to deal with and following the last rebuild the shock seems to be holding up much better. Ronnie is someone I'd talked to many years ago when working on Zokes. Cool that he's still around.

@dorkbike: Kings are inexpensive. My main trail bike has a King rear that is near twenty years old. Upgraded to 142 years back. It won’t die, runs like new. I have a few other King rears. Almost all are over ten years old and running like new. Price per mile… they are inexpensive. Performance, top tier.

@wydopen: pm’d you. Check your box.

@wydopen: 275 but my son went from 24 right to 275. By 11 he was pretty good and doing real tech and all. There is no longer much of quality for a hard riding kid in 26” that I could find, and I had 275 parts like wheels, forks, tires. 26” would have been a big layout in cash for a tiny window. Pretty sure my son was way less than 11 when he got on it. If interested shipping cost is all I’d want. I’m on the Atlantic side. If it didn’t work out you could sell it yourself. Seemed standover wasn’t that much different from any 26 I could find. It’s a small or XS. My son was of average size.

Years back my son and I built him up a silver black mmmbop I think it was. All hand me down parts from dusty shoe boxes. Except he was fascinated with those new Aaron Gwinn grips. He bought those and promptly ground them into burger. Man he ripped on that bike. Brings back great memories. Still got the frame hanging on the wall waiting for another dad wanting to build it up for his kid.

@kootenayrider: Agree with what you said. And thanks for expressing opinions that differ in a respectful way, which seems real hard for people to do these days, especially from behind a keyboard. As a trail builder of over twenty years who has worked formally with “the State” I know there are a lot of ways to look at this. I’m laid up and sick and probably grumpy. It’s not realistic of me to hope that not everything will be ultimate be driven by money. I fully understand that and have reaped the benefits of that with lift assist riding, better bike tech, etc. I try to keep one foot grounded in realism and another toe in idealism. If a mountain wasn’t already remodeled by a pre-existing ski resort and a lift assist mtb center was created, and followed the model of mass construction, for ethical reasons I doubt I’d ride there. That’s me and I’m not judging anyone who would ride there. But this forum is about giving personal opinions and right now I’ve got the time to give mine. Compared to how many ski resorts we have there are far too few mountains that have epic, all-day, man made trail climbs and descents. I’d say if given the opportunity there might be enough interest for volunteer builders with nothing more than mattock, rake, saw and nippers to make more of that happen. But as long as public land is bogged down with regs and private land is commercialized it’s hard. We have amazing mountains here but due to archaic public regs and private ownership builders are stifled. And well let’s face it, there are too few builders. And the few passionate ones that exist and do most of the work have a hard time respectfully disagreeing. Thanks and ride on, wherever you may ride. PS I’m certain if I rode at Sun Peaks I’d have a blast.

@kungfupanda: Yeah, I find it "fun" too but in a cheap thrill kind of way that gets boring fast. Riding that stuff at speed does take skill though and took me a bit to get ok at it. I'm 52 still ride full on dh, trail ride several hours every week, and been doing it for at least 30 years (I started before I was legal drinking/bar age as I recall.) The raw, rugged, natural tech that has a dozen or so trail features at every turn is what I dig. I find that never gets boring. Its a lot more work to ride clean and "make flow", as you alluded to, but I find way more satisfying. Good to hear that Sun Peaks also has natural tech. To each his own. Probably works out better for me as I can ride all day on the old tech lines and rarely see another rider. While the lift lines for the buffies are packed. I'd be less pessimistic about the whole affair if I didn't see it marking up the mountain so much, or fear of losing the tech. Bikers have grown accustom to that sort of visual impact. My wife who's a big outdoor person but more of a hunter/fisherwoman... well, when she see's what you and I've grown accustom to seeing... she's startled as what we've done to the woods just so we can ride a bike. Not trying to sound preachy or demanding its got to be my way. Just talking out loud while I'm bored and getting over covid. Ride on.

@Jshemuel: Cool but gonna' have to wait until next time around. I've got a new Santa Cruz frame in the garage getting built up. Thanks for the tip though.

All you guys have good point about need the small cogs. Right on. While I've not seen much of what you are seeing its clearly an issue and warrants those cogs. Really - now I don't feel so bad paying for the extra cogs I rarely use. At least someone is using them. Ride on!