Thought Experiment: The $22,000 Trail Bike Build

We're in an era where when motorized bikes can fetch $15,000 price tags and even non-motorized bikes can push into five figures. A lot of comments on articles about these bikes rightly point out you can buy a motorbike for the same money but what if we could take it further. For $22,000, you could buy a Mini Cooper, a speedboat, a downpayment on a house, a racehorse or 38,000 bananas. In this thought experiment, we're attempting to build a bike that matches all of them. Forget dentists, this one's for the Tooth Fairy.

Before we begin, there are a few rules we've tried to follow. Firstly, nothing too custom or ridiculous. Yes, we know there's a gold-plated bike that exists and costs $1 million but, let's be real, nobody is ever going to be buying let alone riding that. For that reason, anything gold plated, jewel-encrusted or personalised was instantly off the table. Secondly, no motor. It would be pretty easy to add $5,000 of value onto an already existing eMTB build but that's not the aim here, we want this to be a thoroughbred trail bike. Finally, it has to make sense as a bike build - this means no double crown forks on a 130mm frame or super lightweight XC race wheels on a bike we want to handle the rigors of everyday riding.

With all that said, check out the full build below:

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Frame: Huhn Cycles Moorhuhn 129 Ti - $5,950 (€4,900)

If Covid lockdowns have blessed us with one thing, it's eccentric bike builders having the time to make their dream projects come to life. Ralf Holleis of Huhn Cycles is one such builder and over the course of the past 12 months, he has created some of the most stunning bikes being produced today. You may have expected a carbon super-bike to take the frame slot in this build, but Ralf's additive manufactured, fully-titanium Moorhuhn 129 Ti takes the top spot.

More info, here.

A more expensive alternative would have been the Unno Dash or Burn. These handcrafted, carbon bikes from Barcelona come with a hefty price tag of €5,000 but that does include an Ohlins shock, which would have prevented us from spending a hefty chunk of change on...

Shock: Intend Hover - $1,200 (€989)

We're staying in Germany for suspension and the Hover shock from Cornelius Kapfinger's Intend brand. Ralf built up his European Bike Challenge winning version of the Moorhuhn with this shock so we're glad we could too.

More info, here.

In an ideal world, we would have been able to stock a Push ElevenSix shock on this build, but unfortunately Huhn Cycles isn't on the list of brands their shocks will work for. The ElevenSix is actually a few cents cheaper than the Hover but we could have fitted a Sprindex spring on the shock to give us another $120 worth of kit.

Fork: Intend Bandit - $2,427 (€1,999)

The front damping of the build will come from Intend as well. We're going to spec the recently released Bandit fork that has an asymmetric design to increase bushing distance and air volume. The maximum stroke on the fork is 190mm but it's adjustable in 10mm increments and we'd probably run it with 150mm, the lowest it goes. Technically this fork was only available until the end of 2020 so if that counts it out we'd swap it out for Intend's Hero, which is $240 (€200) cheaper.

More info, here.

Derailleur + shifter+ cassette + chain: SRAM X01 Eagle AXS - $1145

SRAM's AXS groupset continues to be the most expensive on the market but that's with good reason, it's still the only wireless one on the market. We could have spent a bit more money and gone for the XX1 spec but we're keeping true to this being a trail bike and not an XC bike so we stuck at the X01 level. For simplicity, we're going to make most of the drivetrain SRAM with a couple of bougie upgrades.


More info, here.

Derailleur Cage: Ceramic Speed OSPW X for SRAM Eagle AXS - $706 (€579)

The Ceramic Speed OSPW X is a derailleur modification that claims to save weight and reduce lost watts for more than $700. Given that I'm spending virtual money, I'd say that's a very worthwhile upgrade.

More info, here.

Cranks: Sturdy Cycles - $1,773 (£1,250)

Rather than go with the standard SRAM Eagle X01 Dub crankset, we thought it would be worth spending a bit more money here on Tom Sturdy's cranks. These cranks were originally designed to make custom lengths for his frame customers (he's even made down to 125mm cranks), and he wanted to improve frame clearance without adding q-factor. 3D printed out of grade 5 titanium, these cranks can be ordered with tuned length and stiffness for the bike and will do nothing to hurt its looks either.

More info, here.

Pedals: Garmin Rally XC Power Meter Pedals - $1,199 + Garmin Edge 1030 Plus - $600

How do you get a $1,200 pair of SPD pedals? Well, these have not one but 2 power meters in them... OK, they're still ludicrously expensive but they take us another step closer to that $22,000 target. We have to pair them with a computer so we chose the top of the range Edge 1030 Plus.

More info, here.

Wheels: Enve M7 - $3,000

Enve's first appearance on this list comes courtesy of their M7 wheelset. These wheels come specced with Chris King ISO 6B hubs and we picked the custom decals option to bring the grand total for the wheels to $3,000. Once again, there were more expensive options out there, most notably the Syncros Silverton, one-piece carbon wheels but, as we said, this is a trail bike, not an XC bike so we settled for the slightly cheaper pair.

More info, here.

Tires: Maxxis High Roller II - $180 + Cushcore XC - $149

To be honest, there isn't a great deal of difference in the price of tires, especially when you're trying to spend $22,000. We plumped for some High Rollers because, why not? We fitted them with some Cushcore because we want to protect those wheels we just spent three grand on. We decided that the cost of a couple of strips of rim tape and cups of sealant would be negligible so we didn't include them in the calculations.

More info, here.

Brakes: Trickstuff Maxima - $1,335 (€1,100)

Another trip to Germany, this time for some Trickstuff Maximas. These brakes were designed with one goal in mind, to make the most powerful brakes on the market. They may be slight overkill for this build but they're too good to say no to.

More info, here.

Bar and Stem: Gemini Kastor - $793 (€650)

We assumed before beginning this article that we'd be going to Unno for our frame. That didn't work out but we're still going to be getting some handmade, Barcelonian carbon on the build thanks to a set of Gemini Kastor bars. The Kastor is designed for head angles between 64° and 67°, which just about works for the Huhn frame we're using.

More info, here.

Dropper Post: RockShox Reverb AXS - $800

For much the same reason as the SRAM AXS parts above, their wireless dropper is going to be the seatpost of choice for this bike. There is another wireless option in Magura's Vyron but that costs about $300 less.

More info, here.

Saddle: Schmolke Sl119 - $363

This part comes via some inspiration from Dangerholm who used the Schmolke TLO 55 saddle on his insanely light Scott Genius build. With that saddle not looking exactly enticing for a long trail ride, we instead went for the more padded version, the Sl119, which is still super-light and, of course, expensive.

Other:
Grips: Rev suspension Grips - $90
Headset: Chris King InSet 5 - $174
Bottom Bracket: Chris King Threadfit - $178
Rotors: Trickstuff - $92
Bolts: ProTi ≈ $80


So there you have it. Yes, you can now buy off-the-shelf bikes for $15,000 but you can pretty easily go much higher than that for a custom trail bike if you like. There are a few other ways you could consider trying this. Our first thought would be to do a super-light XC build with lots of exotic carbon, lightweight parts from small manufacturers but we'd also be interested to see how far you could get with a Fox Live Valve-equipped trail bike with a custom paint job. Put simply, if you want to spend a lot of money on mountain bike parts, there are plenty of people out there who will be more than happy to help you.

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What would you have done differently and how would you have spent the money? Let us know in the comments below