December 21, 2011

The Secret Birthday Bike – Rusty’s FS

This bike never showed up on the waitlist, because it was partially a surprise for my good friend Rusty (his birthday was yesterday) from me and his lovely wife Natasha.

But it’s worthy of a writeup, since I’m incredibly jealous of it and most of the parts have been hidden in the back of my garage for like a month so that Rusty wouldn’t catch wind of what was going on.

So, first, the bike is way fancy, obviously. And it’s way light – 23.5 pounds as shown, and it’ll be pushing 23 once Rusty puts his fancy seatpost and saddle (shown are my old junker Bonty saddle from the mid-90s and a Thomson I had sitting around) on there. If you really went nuts on a few parts (cassette, rear derailleur, tires, ti bolts, etc) I bet you could get to 22. Wow.

Geometry:
100mm travel front and rear
71* head tube, 71* seat tube. Rusty has LOOONG femurs, so it’s a very slack seat tube angle, and consequently a shorter front center (65.7cm) than you’d expect given the toptube length.
109.5cm/43.1″ wheelbase
62cm/24.4″ toptube, 50cm/19.7″ seat tube, 77.5cm/30.5″ standover
44cm/17.3″ chainstays
13.5″ (unsprung) BB height
130mm/5.2″ head tube, for a tapered steerer
Direct mount for a front derailleur, if Rusty ever decides to run one.

And of course, there’s the parts spec. Rusty geeked out about pretty much every part on the bike (except a few bits like the wheels that we surprised him with):
-Enve 29″ XC rims laced to DT 240 hubs (15mm front, 10mm rear)
-Easton EC90 bar, Ritchey WCS stem and foam grips, Easton EC90 post (not shown), SLR saddle (not shown)
-Fox RLC 100mm taper fork and King HS.
-M970 cranks, Crank Bros with ti spindles, Paul chainguide
-X9 shifter and rear derailleur, PG1080 11-36 cassette, Homebrew 36t ring
-Magura MT-6 brakes (I am very impressed with these) and Storm SL rotors
-Ikon 2.2 tires front and rear.

What would something like this set you back? About $6200.

How does it ride? Well, so far we’ve only ridden it around the parking lot, so who knows, but I will say this – it is disconcertingly light, and disconcertingly stiff. Those are probably both good things. I’ll get the full report from Rusty when he’s back in TX on dry trails.