# whats the best carbon hardtail frame?



## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

I need to buy a new carbon hardtail frame soon and I decided I need to use the help from the public.  

Ive considered ebay frames but they do not ofer maximum quality, and they are heavy.

Which is considered the best carbon hardtail frame today for crosscountry racing and maratons, not the most expensive but the lightest weight, excelent stiffness for maximum power transfer, and durable?


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## limba (Jan 9, 2004)

There is no "best" for most things in life but the Scott Scale and the Giant XTC have been around for years and always get great reviews. The new Rocky Mountain Vertex is worth a look too.


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## smellycat (Dec 4, 2007)

My vote would be for the 09 Orbea Alma. Its by far the best I've ridden. It's the best IMHO at soaking up the bumps and rails through the turns. I rotate bike often and its the best out of the 3 HT I've had: S-WORKs Carbon HT, Scott Scale, XTC, now on a GF Superfly and I notice the difference but the big wheels help.


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## Cheers! (Jun 26, 2006)

I wonder if http://www.parleecycles.com/ will make you a custom fitted hardtail frame.


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## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

limba said:


> The new Rocky Mountain Vertex is worth a look too.


The large size Vertex Team frame weighed in at 1220gms with seatpost collar. They list for $1795 CDN. Not a bad deal. :thumbsup:


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## Cheers! (Jun 26, 2006)

If I had stupid amounts of money I'd search for a frame that no one else has.

How about a Bianchi Carbon?


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## nathanbal (Jan 30, 2007)

cannondale taurine


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## wannabeRacer (Feb 9, 2004)

that Bianchi frame is sweet and fast looking bike!


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

Cheers! said:


> How about a Bianchi Carbon?


uuuh - the Bianchi looks just like any off-Ebay asia-carbon frame (which it basically is with a different paint scheme).

I haven't seen any mentions of Simplon , Canyon , No Saint and Ghost.

The Simplon is the lightest to date, the Scott always gets the best reviews and is 2nd-3rd lightest with others following quite a bit behind.

Orbea and Rocky Mountain both share soft frames, by far the softest frames of all tested carbon-bikes in german magazines. Storck , Simplon and Canyon are very stiff and some too unforgiving (Storck). So for a carbon-frame it is to find the right mix of stiffness and "compliance".


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## liam2051 (Apr 19, 2008)

The bianchi frame is quite unique, there was a "bianchi" build on the forum awhile back.....it looked about as italian as a chinese phonebook, the real deal is beautiful


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## Ausable (Jan 7, 2006)

I am becoming a Canyon fan: look here
http://www.canyon.com/_en/mountainbikes/specs.html?b=810


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## slyboots (Sep 16, 2005)

nathanbal said:


> cannondale taurine


+1
And a Lefty.


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## HotzKiss (Jun 24, 2004)

How about a focus frame or the marin team carbon.


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## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

And Spesh, Norco and Whyte are doing some nice carbon hardtail frames too.

Depending on what kind of ride duration and terrain you have in mind, having a super super stiff hardtail is not always the ultimate solution. As Nino says, the carbon Vertex is not one of the stiffest in testing, but even at that it is many times stiffer than the previous scandium frame. If the frame is too stiff, it will just beat you senseless. My experience so far on the carbon Vertex 50/70RSL frame is that it is one of the most comfortable HT's I've ridden, as well as being light and stiff enough for my 195 pounds. I'd hate to have the frame be as stiff as my old Easton Ultralite tubed hardtail, which I loved for it's handling but hated for the hurtin' it delivered.


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## limba (Jan 9, 2004)

Yes, the 2010 carbon Norco looks very nice.


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## Cheers! (Jun 26, 2006)

How about a Look 986 carbon hardtail?










OR

How about a BMC Team Elite Carbon Hardtail?


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## Hardtailforever (Feb 11, 2004)

I would say that for a 26" bike, the "best" in terms of drivetrain stiffness, light weight and superb handling in a race bike, would be:

Trek Elite 9.9
C'Dale Taurine
Look 986

As far as cutting edge tech, the Trek and C'dale, with their integrated parts and drivetrain components (BB90/BB30, super stout head tubes) offer improved handling and stiffness over bikes like the Scale and Alma. The Look 986 has a buttery ride for a hardtail with the seatmast elastomers built in, and it's such a rare and beautiful bike that it's worth a look.

Haven't ridden the specialized S-Works, but I've heard good things. For light weight with less comfort/handling consideration, the Scott Scale is hard to beat, although it could use an update at this point. Also, I would comment that in my opinion, the Alma 26" and BMC carbon are a bit harsh riding, although both are very stiff.

For 29er, the Alma is outstanding, and the wheels really do soak up the bumps better than the 26" version. Also, the GF Superfly is worth a look in that category as well.


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## Broccoli (Jun 11, 2008)

The best carbon hardtail frame is custom made for you from titanium.


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## limba (Jan 9, 2004)

Yes, if you have the bucks a custom titanium frame would be awesome.


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## ohadamirov (Jun 26, 2008)

limba said:


> Yes, if you have the bucks a custom titanium frame would be awesome.


If you have a little more euros to invest on a SPIN custom carbon frame, would be the lightest option.


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## Cheers! (Jun 26, 2006)

limba said:


> Yes, if you have the bucks a custom titanium frame would be awesome.


Personally I think after riding a Ti hardtail for the majority of the 2009 season. It is the best hardtail I've ever ridden.

For the money of the frames being presented in this discussion, you can easily afford to have a custom Ti frame made to your measure. There is also 3D racing (Chris Herting) who will make you a custom sized Aluminum Scandium Enriched frame cheaper than carbon frames presented here. After trying my Ti Lynskey hardtial, I think if I unlimited funds, I would have Independant Fabrications build me a Custom Hardtail made from Stainless Reynolds 953 tubing.


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

*well...*

I'm really sorry to say that as me too i really appreciate some of those sweet titanium offerings...however that's really retro. Actual carbon frames outperform the Titaniums in every single aspect except the sleek look. If you have ever thrown a leg over a nice high-end Carbonbike you won't look back anymore. Sad but true.


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## Broccoli (Jun 11, 2008)

nino said:


> I'm really sorry to say that as me too i really appreciate some of those sweet titanium offerings...however that's really retro. Actual carbon frames outperform the Titaniums in every single aspect except the sleek look.


Care to share where you can order custom geometry and tubing in carbon?



nino said:


> If you have ever thrown a leg over a nice high-end Carbonbike you won't look back anymore. Sad but true.


Utterly and completely false. If you ride some smooth trails in a park, maybe. If you take one for a rough adventure race, titanium and steel wins hands down. Durability, toughness, ease of maintenance, ride, cost, availability of custom option, realistic final weight for a trail ready setup - everything is better or equal.

I guess OP knows all that and wants a standard carbon frame with traditional geometry. Nothing wrong with that. Plenty of good choices offered. But making claims about "won't look back anymore" is laughable.


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

*blind test...*



Curmy said:


> Care to share where you can order custom geometry and tubing in carbon?
> 
> Utterly and completely false. If you ride some smooth trails in a park, maybe. If you take one for a rough adventure race, titanium and steel wins hands down. Durability, toughness, ease of maintenance, ride, cost, availability of custom option, realistic final weight for a trail ready setup - everything is better or equal.


well - the germans once did a blind test on different frame materials. steel, aluminium,scandium,titanium,carbon...exact same bike setup, same bike weight...you know what? the so-called comfort factor of thin steel or titanium couldn't be detected by the testers.

I's about a year or two now that the germans include a so-called "comfort factor" in their bike tests and they definitely show that it isn't titanium or steel that wins here (that's what the myth is all about).

A seatpost has more effect in smoothening the trail than the frame material. And the better crabon makers have the knowledge to make frames stiff where needed ( for best power transfer and steering precision) yet compliant when it counts to smoothen the trail surface.

A lightweight Ti-frame is just softer and more flexy while not even close in weight to a decent aluminium frame let alone carbon. There's so many tests of Ti frames and they ALL fail miserably by todays standards. They have a myth, they have the shiny finish, they have a supernice optic, they are really cool...but the ride itself is just beeing passed by new technology. As i mentioned already: sad but true.

oh- i forgot- custom carbon:
http://www.corratec.com/content/en-.../mtb/?model=handmade_mtb&offset=0px&x=79&y=39


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## Broccoli (Jun 11, 2008)

nino said:


> well - the germans once did a blind test on different frame materials. steel, aluminium,scandium,titanium,carbon...exact same bike setup, same bike weight...you know what? the so-called comfort factor of thin steel or titanium couldn't be detected by the testers.
> 
> I's about a year or two now that the germans include a so-called "comfort factor" in their bike tests and they definitely show that it isn't titanium or steel that wins here (that's what the myth is all about).


Prime example why trying to quantify everything does not often mean squat in the real world. And I love numbers - but in my career as an experimental physicist and an engineer I have learned not to end at them. And this is a good example. Just like the lowest rolling resistance tire by itself does not make you the fastest on a trail. If they can not properly quantify the obvious real world advantages of material - it means the test is irrelevant.



nino said:


> A lightweight Ti-frame is just softer and more flexy while not even close in weight to a decent aluminum frame let alone carbon. There's so many tests of Ti frames and they ALL fail miserably by todays standards.


Slightly more soft and flexy is often good. Small difference in weight is irrelevant. I will not even touch a lightweight aluminum hardtail frame. Steel and titanium is durable and performs exceptionally well, and it lasts on the trails. "Fail miserably"? I have respected your opinion so far, but I think this one is utterly idiotic and detached from reality.

P.S. We have hijacked this thread far enough - I will not respond further to your patent nonsense that is obvious to anybody with a clue.


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## ettore (Nov 13, 2004)

Devinci makes a Desperado in carbon now; sadly I have no idea of the frame weight.


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## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

Oddly enough the Desperado Carbone is a budget build (RF Evolve cranks, X-9, Eggbeater MXR's. I wonder if that's a cheap Chinese carbon frame.


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## wannabeRacer (Feb 9, 2004)

sergio_pt, if you want the best and the lightest HT frame, then look into Scott Scale unless you go custom carbon? There are a few custom builders out there? I wish Parlee make mtb frame's, I would order one now ;-)


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

I have read awesome tips here thanks :thumbsup: 
Probably my next frame has already been mentioned here. 

The storck frames always impressed me for how large carbon tubes they use everywhere, that looks very cool on the bike. Not just the looks but also the good results on the tests puts it on my list. 
I've seen a video with Markus Storck holding a piece of the downtube of a storck carbon frame, its impressive the large diameter the super thin sidewalls and how soft it looked like when he pressed it a litle hard with hands. wont that make a softer frame?

Scott scale is another popular frame and also good I think, its going in the list.
I have thought about bianchi oetzi too, its a nice looking frame used by a lot of guys here but its not one of the lightest at around 1300g and chinese looking like nino said  


Simplon, Canyon, No Saint, Ghost, Trek Elite 9.9, C'Dale Taurine, Look 986...
Thats the frames I'll be 'studing' next 

nino do you have any new german magazine tests? thanks


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## Broccoli (Jun 11, 2008)

sergio_pt said:


> the super thin sidewalls and how soft it looked like when he pressed it a litle hard with hands.


Ouch.

I guess it really differs how people use their bikes...


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## LMN (Sep 8, 2007)

I have a couple of Alm's. They have been great bikes. I am surprised that they are considered a soft frame, honestly my old Alloy Norco EXC 1.0 was a softer riding bike. The best part of the bike is the built in fender, hard to believe but in the wet it is great.


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

*Tests...*



sergio_pt said:


> I have read awesome tips here thanks :thumbsup:
> Probably my next frame has already been mentioned here.
> 
> The storck frames always impressed me for how large carbon tubes they use everywhere, that looks very cool on the bike. Not just the looks but also the good results on the tests puts it on my list.
> ...


Sure i have some tests but i can tell you that Scott still is the winner (after 5 years with basically the same frame) and Storck is still considered too stiff, too unforgiving. The competition is getting close, in some aereas even better but when it counts on the trails the Scott seems to have the right mix of stiffness/compliance for most of the testers.


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## Stalk (May 24, 2005)

I'll vote for that Bianchi frame. It's definitely unique and I just happened to ride one, well except the white paint 

Just waiting for R1 brakes to finish up No-longer-budget build. That and MRP 1.x 50g guide for 1x9 drivetrain.


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

Curmy said:


> Ouch.
> 
> I guess it really differs how people use their bikes...


sure check this videos

http://www.bikeequipmentonline.com/Rebelion-10/p/BE1510



nino said:


> Sure i have some tests but i can tell you that Scott still is the winner (after 5 years with basically the same frame) and Storck is still considered too stiff, too unforgiving. The competition is getting close, in some aereas even better but when it counts on the trails the Scott seems to have the right mix of stiffness/compliance for most of the testers.


its an hard decision when you need to buy an expensive bike part... 
Strorck is now applying the VVC Technology which makes the frames more compliant, like we see on the videos. If the frame maintains its superior stifness in power transfer and now better confort by VVC then it should be a better frame that scott scale. Thats my couriosity in see more comparison tests.

I found this test but I dont know when it was done.

btw anyone knows whats the SGI index?


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## fixbikeguy (Aug 28, 2008)

Aren't they all made by Giant? Hehehe.


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## unsuspended (Dec 17, 2005)

fixbikeguy said:


> Aren't they all made by Giant? Hehehe.


Everything is made by Giant according to every lbs that sells Giant.


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## conrad (Jan 27, 2004)

*surely the question is how long will it last?*

I have both high end ti & steel frames, now married with kids i want my frames to last a few years say 5 before I replace them....money being what it is. 
Carbon rides well for sure it, can be made to do anything but at what cost. My ti is 9 yrs old still rides as g8 as the day I got it, my steel is even older rides the same.:thumbsup: Component up grades are all I do. I can't afford to pay for a new frame every two years.....divorce grounds here.......boys:nono:


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## Jake Pay (Dec 27, 2006)

*Where was my bike made?
*​*Please do not paste this article into a blog, website, or email as the content may be updated from time to time. Instead, please link to this page so your reader will have the most current information. Thank you.
*


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## Cheers! (Jun 26, 2006)

I thought most of the carbon bicycle frames come from the following factories:

TenTech
Martec
Gigantex
Giant

Here is a story that I have saved on my Hard drive for a long time...

The bike biz
by Dan Empfield, Sept-Oct '02
(www.slowtwitch.com)

With Interbike right around the corner I thought I'd write a bit about how the bike business works-not everything about it, but the nuts and bolts of how a bike gets from the "paper napkin sketch" to your local bike shop's showroom floor.

If after reading it you think I've injected unneeded and gratuitous sex be advised that, as they say in Hollywood, "It was necessary to move the story along." There is a soft underbelly to this business-the dirty little secrets that nobody in the biz particularly wants end users to read about. I'm convinced that Slowtwitch readers are, by and large, adults and can "handle the truth."

The first thing you need to know about the bike biz is that there is a stateside component to any bike project, and an Asian component to it as well. This is true whether or not the bike's frame is built in the U.S. It is very rare, except in the case of a small, custom frame builder, for any bike to be sold in the U.S. without a significant contribution, or even control, from the Asian side of the Pacific. This is because the Japanese first, then increasingly the Taiwanese over the past 20 years, have become so expert in making certain components and sub-assemblies that even those bikes made entirely in the U.S. are not "entirely" U.S.-made.

One example of many that I might point to is my own Yaqui Carbo, my current tri bike. It's made by Ves Mandaric in San Diego, out of American-made Easton Scandium tubing. U.S.-made through and through, right? But it's got a carbon seatstay which is made in Taiwan, as are the chainstays, the bottom bracket shell, the head tube, as well as the Syntace aerobar and brake levers, the hubs and rims, and of course the Dura Ace components are Japanese made.

Over the next days I'll publish chapters describing each element of the process, after which I think you'll know much more about why your bike gets built the way it does.

THE PRODUCT MANAGER
THE TAIWANESE AGENT
THE TAIWANESE FACTORY
THE ASSEMBLER
DISTRIBUTION
ENGINEERING, QC, AND SAFETY
CASE STUDY

THE PRODUCT MANAGER

In the bike biz the "product manager" is a staple. This industry is different than others in how a product manager works. In the pharmaceutical industry, for example, it is common for a drug to be managed by one person or team from the clinical trial stage through FDA approval, through the manufacturing process, and to continue on managing much about how the drug is marketed and sold. Not so in the bike biz.

A bike product manager is generally a younger fellow who will husband a model from its earliest stages through to its completion, that is, through the manufacturing process. It'll be a finished product, ready for marketing. The product manager rarely has input in how the bike is sold, just in how it is made.

Who is a product manager? Will he know anything about tri bikes if he's tasked with managing a model of tri bike? It varies from case to case.

American Bicycle Group's Jeff Menown is typical of product managers, but with some differences. He's in charge of spec'ing the parts on Litespeeds and Merlins when they're sold as complete bikes, but he doesn't have control over the spec of the frames (other Litespeed employees handle titanium frame geometry, tube spec, etc). Menown is a classic product manager when it comes to Quintana Roo's complete bikes, in that he handles the whole process. Many of QR's complete bikes are made in Taiwan, and for those Menown will rely on help from the agent ABG uses in Taiwan, who will also be the agent for certain other U.S.- and European-based bike and/or component and accessory companies. He'll also husband the entire manufacturing process of a Litespeed aluminum bike since-like QR-it is built outside of Litespeed's Chattanooga factory.

Menown is not a triathlete himself, but he's close to triathlon. He came over to ABG from Quintana Roo, and his long-term companion, Cherie Touchette, is a pro triathlete racing primarily on the XTerra circuit. He came to QR when it purchased component maker Real Design, and Menown's strength is in his knowledge of Taiwan-built componentry. For any complete bike that'll sell for less than $2000, it's imperitive to have a product manager who understands what Taiwan is capable of. Taiwan has made good frames for a long time, and can now make exceptional composite products, such as forks, cranks, and aero seat posts. Only in the last several years has it been possible to buy a high-quality rear hub and crank from a Taiwanese factory, and Taiwan is just now getting its arms around how to make a race-quality brake caliper. It's not quite yet up to speed on cassettes, and it's got a long way to go when it comes to matching Japanese and Italian shifters and derailleurs. For saddles, seat posts and stems, Taiwan is increasingly the place to shop, and its tube factories are so good that several (or even most) of the well-respected bicycle tubing brands have much of their midrange and less exotic tubing made in Taiwan. When you can spec a Taiwan-made part in a bike, you'll save money. Menown knows just how much "Taiwan" he can stick onto a bike and still have it perform properly.

I don't want to overplay how much autonomy Menown or his contemporaries have. In fact, he and they have very little. The big decisions at ABG are made in committee. Menown's job is to present the options and suggestions, and then when everybody signs off on the final spec Menown will "chaperone" the bike through manufacturing and point it toward its "date" with the end user.

Trek's situation is somewhat different. It has a product manager who oversees the entire bicycle division, including Gary Fisher and Klein bicycles, and his name is Joe Vadeboncoeur. Underneath him is John Riley, who is product manager for just the Trek brand. Neither "Joe V" nor Riley are triathletes. But Trek is cognizant of the need to have those in charge of a project that actually are experienced in the avocation for which the bike is designed, and it'll assign pro-ject managers to a particular line. That has been the case when Trek has made a recumbant or a tandem. Mark Andrews is an engineer at Trek, and is himself a triathlete, having competed in Kona a half-dozen times and has six Penticton's under his belt. He was the project manager for Trek's Hilo line.

In the case of Trek, every bike model has its pro-duct manager (Riley) and also maybe a pro-ject manager (Andrews for the Hilo).
There is also a design engineer, which in this case is also Andrews. The term "engineer" is not used to make the employee feel more important-i.e., sanitation engineer-this person is a trained engineer. Then there is the purchasing agent. None of the people mentioned thus far are involved with grinding the poor sub-assembly salesman into sharpening his pencil to the nub. Trek, like any successful company, employs "pros" to do that. This differs from ABG, where Menown will probably hold a fair bit of sway over the purchasing process, whether it be outsourced complete bikes or parts.

Interestingly, Trek's marketing department oversees all issues having to do with paint, graphics and model names. A product manager or project manager may not know what the bike is called, or see what it looks like, until after a prototype is finished. This is also the norm at ABG.

Trek has a separate quality (testing) department, and the larger companies like Trek and Cannondale have extensive testing facilities. Finally, the finished bike goes to Trek's assembly engineer-again a real engineer-who will calculate the size of the box needed for the bike, decide if the packing materials are adequate to withstand the forces of shipment, how long the cables need to be, whether the brake levers are properly shimmed for the size of the handlebar, and so forth. You might say that the design engineer is the "input engineer" and the assembly engineer analyzes the "output" and makes required changes in the bike, its parts, or anything that relates to how the finished product operates.

An example of how things can change from the "input" stage to the "output" is in the case of Trek's initial WSD bikes built in the late '90s. These are women-specific road race bikes, and in the smaller sizes have quite steep seat angles (up to 76 degrees). Trek found that the bikes weren't shifting properly, and they needed a front derailleur bracket that placed the derailleur back to a more normal 73 (or so) degrees. I was running Quintana Roo and Merlin back then, and QR in San Marcos was making a custom clamp-on front derailleur bracket for Merlin's new Aerial tri bike. It was a complicated piece that was made on an expensive Fadal horizontal CNC mill bought mostly to make this particular part. Trek approached us and wanted to buy the piece for its steeper WSD bikes, but we quoted them a price that was too high for them to pay. They ended up performing a secondary machining operation to an existing Shimano front derailleur bracket, and it solved the problem for them. The story just indicates how bikes can be drawn up a certain way, but don't always operate as planned (I'm sure Trek's assembly engineer has many such stories, as would his counterpart at any bike company).

One final word about product managers. They are the most likely to be wined and dined by component, frame and sub-assembly factories. Sure, you can ply Trek's John Burke or Cannondale's Scott Montgomery with food and drink and yes-they're their companies' Big Kahunas-but they'll still defer to their product managers when it comes to spec and factory decisions. Joe Vadeboncoeur is therefore one of the most powerful figures in the bike biz, as is Bob Margevicius at Specialized, and their counterparts at C'dale, Giant, Raleigh and elsewhere. The only people weilding as much power are the Taiwanese agents, and even those inside the bike "beltway" do not on the whole realize how much power they have, and how much wealth they create and transfer. More about them in another installment. (Note: Margevicius, aka the "king of spec" in the bike biz, has within the past year moved over to head up purchasing for Specialized).

THE TAIWANESE AGENT

What I'm going to write about Taiwan will not only be news to you, but to 95-percent of those in the bike industry. Only those who've actually spent significant amounts of time over there, looking under the hood of that country, understand what's going on.

I don't care who you are, or what your preconceptions are about Taiwan. The reality of Taiwan would blow you away. If I wanted to build a space shuttle or a nuclear missile, and I had my pick of cities in which to build it, I'd probably choose L.A. But if I had to simply build a whole spitload of reasonably technical and intricate widgets, I wouldn't pick L.A., or Chicago, or Pittsburg. I'd take Taichung. And not just because of pricing. Taichung, with its 1 million people, might simply outproduce (if you measure output by weight) L.A. and its 10 million people. This city is styled an "education and cultural" center, but as far as I can see it's built around the idea of producing a maximum amount of manufactured stuff. The city is like a huge mitochondreon. It's one big powerplant.

You'd never know it by looking at it. It just seems like any reasonably dirty city in any emerging country. Choose any sidestreet in Taichung, walk halfway down, and ignore the fact that there is no fancy corporate sign outside announcing that fat blowhards sit inside behind oak and cherry desks, the way it would be in America. Just open the door, walk in, and be prepared to be bowled over by rows, and rows, and rows, and more rows, of CNC mills and lathes. And then walk into the adjacent room and hear the pounding of a half-dozen giant forging presses.

Next door might be the tubing mill, with a dozen draw benches and a room full of CNC tube benders. Down the street from that guy is the extruder. Or perhaps just a small shop with a few machines.

And so on.

Impressive as all that is, what ought to scare the bejeesus out of "high tech" artisans in any first world country is what Taiwan can do with composites. I've toured the cream of the crop in composite factories in the U.S. When I go to Taiwan and tour those factories, they look exactly the same, except three times the size. Instead of one million-dollar walk-in autoclave on the floor, there are three our four. Funny thing is, they sit unused. Why? Because they're used for curing commodities like carbon golf shafts, which are now so easily made that even Taiwan can't make them cheaply enough! It can't compete with Mainland China!

But the Taiwanese aren't complaining, because they own many of the factories on the mainland as well. Your Kestrel Talon, for example, is built by a Taiwanese company, but not in Taiwan. It's built in that company's mainland factory, as are many of the carbon forks you're riding, including many which are made by American composites companies.

What Taiwan lacks is U.S. and European design sensibilities. Kestrel's Asian contractor can make fifty times the Talons that Kestrel can make in it's Watsonville, California factory, and it can make them for half the price. But it could never have made the first Talon without Kestrel's design expertise.

There is one company in Taiwan, however, which bucks the trend and it is Giant. While I doubt that anyone from Trek is interested in commenting for the record, I'd be shocked if this American powerhouse doesn't see Giant-not Cannondale or Specialized-as its chief long-term competitor. Giant is not just a contractor. It has its own ability to invent and streamline processes, and it's got just enough ability to keep pace with its competitors on the design side. It's telling that so many start-ups in Taiwan-like Kinesis and Topeak-are headed by ex-Giant execs. In fact, in Taiwan it's termed "Giant U"-as in Giant University. When you hear that a certain firm is headed by graduates of Giant U it means that they've come up through the Giant system and were employees at that firm, where they learned how to compete.

All that is what makes Taiwan impressive. What has happened in the last five years, however, is that Taiwan has become an absolute juggernaut, and ironically it's because Taiwan was almost put out of the bike business. The downturn in the MTB market which started a few years ago, combined with the upsurge in the ability of mainland factories to produce bike commodity products, meant that Taiwan bike factories were working at only about half capacity at best. Then, all of a sudden and with no warning, Schwinn went bankrupt, leaving Taiwan firms owed as much as $10 million per firm. Schwinn, the mainland "problem," and the MTB downturn was a triple blow to Taiwan, yet it was all forseeable. The same thing happened in Japan fifteen years ago, when cyclical market forces combined with the emergence of Taiwan put so many Japanese firms on the brink.

As a result, many Taiwanese companies realized that if they wanted to keep from folding their tents they had to do one of three things: 1) They could become brands themselves, like Giant, Topeak, KHS, Race Face, FSA, Titec, and many others, and in so doing cut out a layer or two of distribution and protect their margins; 2) They could invest in, or start up, mainland factories, or even factories in Vietnam or South Asia; 3) They could upscale their technical abilities, which is how Shimano survived the crisis in the bike industry in Japan.

Point three above explains why, within the short span of three or four years, Taiwan has become adept at making intricate things like cranksets (trust me, it's very hard to make a bicycle crank), and to work very adeptly in composites. Trying to get a Taiwan company to make something better than it wanted to make was very tough ten years ago. Dragging them up-market, while they're kicking and screaming, was a chore and was usually a fruitless exercise. Not so now. Nothing like an empty bank account and an idle factory to motivate someone.

I write all of the above to explain to you how important Taiwan is, even to a "made in the USA" company like Trek, Cannondale or ABG. Take C'dale as an example, which alone among the three companies makes all its frames in the U.S. I have frequently visited small, back-alley aluminum forging companies in Taiwan and noticed, lo!, a Coda crankset popping out of the forge and getting its flash knocked off. C'dale is desperately dependent on Taiwan for its business, since it owes so much of its margin to the making of its own components. Likewise, many or most of Trek's Bontrager stems, seat posts, saddles, rims, hubs, etc., are Taiwan-made, and it's like that with every company's logo'd bike bags and handlebar tape, and the no-logo stems and handlebars that go on entry-level bikes.

If you're going to get your bikes, or your parts, made in Taiwan, you've got to have a presence over there. If you don't, you're just asking for trouble. Many Taiwan factories will make you a first article and yes it'll look great, and then in production they'll make unmitigated crap for you. You've got to employ a babysitter, and I suspect that would be true in any country. Furthermore, even with the best intentions a factory will make a mistake. Often, when mistakes are made in manufacturing, they are not made singly. It's like when a strand of DNA falls prey to a random mutation. Not just one strand of protein is malconfigured. They're all malconfigured, as long as that mutated DNA keeps on churning out product. You need an agent to watch the process, and that agent needs to be there in person, and it needs to be an Chinese-speaking agent.

You may own your own agency. Trek and Ritchey have company-owned firms over there tending to their business. The great majority of western companies contract with independent agents, however. These are Taiwan-owned companies manned by Taiwanese, and they take (let us say) 5% of the cost of the product as their fee. In theory.

One of the "benefits" to having an agent-one of the "duties"-is for the agent to find you your factory. Yes, this is necessary. You'll find, though, that lo and behold your product, which you thought was being made just fine, is now all of a sudden being made by a different factory. Why is that? "Because I just didn't like the quality that was coming out of the old factory," your agent may tell you. "I had to reject too much." Well, shucks, okay, you're the agent, you know best.

Perhaps this is exactly what was happening. Or perhaps another factory promised to pay the agent an additional 20% on top of the 5% the agent was assumed to be making, whereas the first factory drew the line at 10%. Or perhaps the new factory gave a particularly aggressive and attractive price on some job entirely unrelated to yours if it could also get your business-without, of course, you being a party to any of these negotiations. You'll never know, because the way it works is that you don't pay the factory for your product. You pay the agent and he pays the factory. Or you pay the factory, and the factory rebates to the agent. You never pay the agent only his cut, so you don't really know what the agent gets paid.

The main reason Trek and Ritchey have their own company offices in Taiwan-though they may not say so-is in order to break what one executive termed to me the "Taiwan mafia." Personally, though, I've come to view all this differently. If a manufacturer really considered what 5% of his business amounted to, he'd wonder why a Taiwan agent would work so cheaply. The truth is, he may not. What we may term payola or mordida is what many of them have to do to earn a living. There are agents-not very many-who're up front, and will say, "I can't do this for 5%, I need 25%." The only difference is that this agent is telling you the truth. Your pricing may not be any different whether you use a 5-percenter or a 25-percenter. If you've got some piddly job you want done, any agent you use might be a "25-percenter" (one way or the other) and I wouldn't blame that agent.

When I first went over to Taiwan, I brought my American sensibilities with me, and I injected them into my Taiwan dealings. I would have none of these shenanigans. I don't think I solved anything that way. Nowadays, if I were to do any business over there I'd go with the flow and, like sausage, I'd just enjoy the product and not worry about how it's made.

Perhaps my impressions were unique, and I've mischaracterized how it works over there. It seems, though, while chatting up my contemporaries at other companies in the bar at the Taipei Hyatt across the street from the convention center where Taipei hosts its annual bicycle trade show, that my experiences were typical.

THE TAIWANESE FACTORY

There are two kinds of factories in Taiwan: those which make parts for the bike biz, and those which just make parts. It is eminently preferable to find the latter, and the best agents in Taiwan are those which can ferret out a factory that can forge, machine and polish a hub shell; or extrude, draw and butt a #7005 tube, without knowing that it's for a bicycle.

The latter is important because there are economic precedents associated with the bike industry. If you go to a crank maker and ask that shop to forge and machine a crank, and broach and coin the square-hole, you're going to pay a certain "industry" price. Likewise, if you go to a stem maker and ask for a stem, you'll pay for a stem. If, however, you find yourself a good quality 3-D forging factory that can forge you a rather complicated tube, that factory doesn't need to know how a stem works in order to perform that job.

What you'll need, however, is your own engineering capabilities, your own testing facility, and your own CAD-CAM-literate designers. This factory can make you your stem, but it can't tell you if it'll break. If you need your factory to tell you that as well, you'll have to get your stem made at a factory that makes bicycle stems, and you'll pay a premium for that.

Likewise with any other process. There's the bike industry price, and there's the not-bike-industry price, if you know where to look. This is where hard work and pavement-pounding comes in. I've been lucky to know certain people who were good at pounding the pavement and finding the best factory and the lowest price.

This dynamic doesn't work with frames, however. You've got to get your frames made at a frame factory, because bike frames must be incredibly precise. It always makes me chuckle when I see somebody come into the bike biz from some "higher" industry, thinking that because he's been making car parts or tank turrets or airplanes or speedboats it's just got to be simpler making bikes. What these people don't realize is that the tolerances one must hold in this business are at least as close as as in just about any other industry. Consider this: I (when I was in the biz) would reject cranksets if the total runout exceeded one tenth of one millimeter at the large chainring. That means the bottom bracket, and the squarehole cut into the crank, must be absolutely perfect, and the crankarm absolutely straight. It means the metal must be sufficiently hard at that joint so as not to deflect under the heavily leveraged load applied at the pedal. Very, very hard to do.

Likewise, frames are hard to make, if you want them to be straight. It's very hard to make a frame in which the rear wheel is centered inside the chainstays, and centered underneath the rear brake hole, and where the front and rear triangle are true to each other, and where the head tube is parallel to the seat tube. It's so hard to do that, that I've seen manufacturing companies that make very precision car parts just throw up their hands after years of trying to make frames and say, "It can't be done."

That's why cycling is its own industry, and those who do it well can command a premium. The smart product manager or agent knows what it's safe to have have manufactured at a non-cycling facility, and when you've got to go to a factory that knows the bike biz.

Probably even more intricate than a frame factory is an assembly factory. Assembling a bike isn't easy if you need to do it in a hurry. I've got a full bike shop in my garage, and it'll still take me two-thirds of a day to build up a complete tri bike. I don't know how many man-hours go into assembling a bike in a Taiwan assembly factory, but I'd guess it's measured in minutes. I wouldn't be surprised to know that a bike is assembled in 15 minutes, though those "minutes" are spread out over ten or fifteen different workers along an assembly line.

When I told my friend Steve Hed that I was writing this series, he laughed and said, "I wonder what the environmentally-minded among your readers will think about cycling after you tell them about Taiwan!" Of course it's "green" to ride bikes in place of cars. Making bikes is another story. It's a dirty business. Certain rivers in Taiwan are absolutely sterile of life because of what factories dump into them, and the bike factories are no exception. It's sorry to see, because Taiwan is, in its natural state, not unlike Hawaii. It's a tropical paradise with mountains that reach 13,000 feet into the sky. But when I go running in Taipei I have to take a taxi 2000 feet up Yanming Mountain, just outside of town, so that I can run above the thick belt of smog.

That's frankly one of the allures to having your bike made in Taiwan or Mainland China. Your paint is on that frame for good. There's no way any shop in America would be allowed to use the sort of paint, or the processes, that are used in the Orient. What it does to the environment, or to the workers who make the product, is another story.

But it must also be noted that the investment in bike-building infrastructure is much greater there. There is a terrific amount of automation. The sorts of robots you see in film clips of auto factories are in place in Taiwan, making bike frames and parts. It would be rare to see anything like that in the U.S. Bike building in this country is limited to the realm of the artisan, with the exception of small factories and the very few large ones, like what you'd see in Trek's Waterloo factory, or where Cannondale makes its bikes in the Eastern states.

Perhaps you're getting the picture that many bike "manufacturers" don't do very much manufacturing. While Fuji bikes are made at Fuji's Japanese factory, and KHS's bikes are made in KHS's Taipei factory, and while Litespeeds are made at Litespeed's Chattanooga factory, Specialized doesn't, to my knowledge, own a factory at all (outside the few bikes it makes stateside, which are a small fraction of what it sells overall). I could be wrong about that, but if I am, it's only in recent years that that's changed. This is no slam against Specialized. Nike doesn't make footwear. Neither does Reebok. Most of these companies are just design houses, with sales and marketing offices, and smart CFOs that keep track of the money in and the money out. Those who actually make bikes have, in the main, never heard of Lance Armstrong or Eddy Merckx, and in any case they don't live in towns where recreational cycling would be advised.

THE ASSEMBLER

How important can this step in the process be? In fact, it is often the assembler who handles all the important money transactions. If you're a bike manufacturer in the U.S.-that is, if you're the sales and marketing office that owns a "headbadge" and you have your bikes manufactured in the Orient-you either pay your agent for your bikes or you pay the assembler directly. In either case, the assembler gets the money. Then he pays for all the parts, and he pays the frame company.

These are pretty important people, because they make spec recommendations that are taken very seriously by product managers. There's nothing worse than having your bike all ready to go at the assembler, and then you can't take possession of the darn thing because the stems didn't show up on time. Therefore, when the assembler says, "Better if you spec Profile Design or Bontrager, because [the other stem maker] is an unreliable deliverer," that carries a lot of weight.

Assemblers have their arses on the line. I do believe, if I remember right, that both Merida and FritzJo lost a lot of money when Schwinn went bankrupt year before last. In particular, FritzJo's American arm, Omnium, was hurt pretty badly according to what I heard.

Speaking of Omnium, this is an interesting company. Assembly is a pain in the rear, it's very hard to do. One reason why it has been difficult to make a complete bike in the U.S., and that it's desirable to make one in Taiwan, is it's hard to get the parts hung on the frame for a decent rate. Omnium is an assembly factory in San Luis Obispo, California that has really been a godsend to mid-sized manufacturers, in particular some of those in the sport of triathlon.

If you've got a U.S.-made frame and you're not doing very many units-say, a thousand to four thousand a year-you may not want to take your project offshore. But that's too many frames on which to hang parts here in the U.S. But it's not enough frames to justify building an assembly line. So you send your frames to Omnium and have the parts hung there, and they'll then pack the frames and send them to the retailers. They'll even warehouse them for you.

Specialized got to having more and more frames built in the U.S., and it invested in its own assembly factory in Utah. Trek of course does its own assembly in Wisconsin, and Cannondale assembles its own bikes. But it's rare to find that one company that can be used as an outsource vendor, and Omium is it. I don't know of another in the U.S., although I'm sure others exist.

The only other option is to push the process off on the dealer. Quite a few small manufacturers have an agreement with a parts distributor for a modified OEM arrangement. One New York-based parts distributor called Security Bicycle Accessories pioneered this. You'd call them up and say, "Hey, I sold a frame to Mission Bay Multisport, send them a 'tri kit' today, so that the frame and kit show up at the same time." This is the way it works in theory, but in practice sometimes details fall through the cracks. I don't know how many times dealers have said to me, "The frame is here but it's thursday, my UPS has already come, and the customer is coming in expecting his bike on Saturday morning." Perhaps SBA didn't ship the kit. Perhaps the frame maker forgot to order it. Fortunately, UPS is always a convenient entity to blame. Either way, it's the dealer who has to white-knuckle it.

That's why dealers prefer to have the bikes come into them already complete. But not every dealer is like that. In fact, I've come across some dealers who disassemble and reassemble every bike from the mid price range up, because they don't trust anything but a pro assembly job.

DISTRIBUTION

End users see bikes on the showroom floor of their LBS, or in the pages of mail order catalogs. They don't see the route these bikes take to get there.

There are several ways bikes, or anything your LBS carries, can make their way from welder and painter to you. As the business has gotten more competitive some of the dynamics have changed. But in all cases some form of distribution involved, and the only difference is whether the manufacturer does it himself or whether he relies on a third party to do it for him.

If a distributor is used, the manufacturer will give up a lot more margin than if he uses reps. Therefore, if a company feels it can reach a significant amount of customers by itself, it'll forego selling its product to distributors. Where distributors become almost imperitive to you as a manufacturer is if you're trying to reach retailers in a country other than your own; or if you make a smaller, ubiquitous commodity that needs to be purchased by a very large number of retailers-a much larger number than you have the ability to contact.

A manufacturer like Topeak, for example, is in both categories. This is a Taiwan-based company that needs to sell virtually all its products in some country other than its own. It also needs to sell to a lot of retailers. It might have its small bicycle tools in 2000 retail stores in the U.S., whereas Kestrel might have its bikes in around 200 U.S. stores (Kestrel needing to be pickier about its retailers).

Topeak uses as its distributor a company called Todson, owned by a gregarious East Coaster named Neil Todrys. Todson is one of a rare breed of distributor that also includes Reno, Nevada-based Sinclair Imports, which imports and distributes Carnac cycling shoes. These distributors are what I call "brand builders," because they do more than simply warehouse and ship product. By definition, they are good at building your brand. Deda's components were first introduced into the U.S. market through Sinclair, and while Carnac has given its loyalty to Sinclair in return for having that distributor build Carnac into a robust trade name in the U.S. (against such competitors as Sidi, Nike and Shimano), Deda was, in my view, less appreciative of the good job Sinclair did.

Deda is therefore also now sold by the other kind of distributor, perhaps best exemplified by Quality Bicycle in the Twin Cities area of Minnesota. Steve Flagg has built his company from the bottom up into a juggernaut of efficiency. He is not a brand builder (in my view), but he's just as important to the industry. He's a master of having what you, the retailer, want, and of shipping it on time, and selling it at an aggressive price.

If you're a niche, high-end company, however, like Serotta or Zipp, you might find that you're better off without a distributor between you and the retailer. You might be better off with representatives. These people take a smaller margin than do distributors-like only a fourth to a third as much. This is because distributors buy the product from manufacturers, and warehouse and ship it. They use their own money. Reps are like real estate agents: They don't use their own money to "warehouse" your house, they don't "deliver" your house, and they don't buy and and re-sell your house. A bicycle rep's only expenditure is in the soft costs he incurs, chiefly in traveling from shop to shop.

These are independent reps. They are self-employed, and they'll have anywhere from four to eight "lines" that they represent in a territory, which might be as large as several states, or as small as a couple of Southern California counties. Typically it's the apparel, footwear and accessory companies that employ reps, though a very few high-end companies that make high-priced products have become masterful at gaining and using an independent rep force, and Serotta and Zipp are two of them.

Larger manufacturers, like Trek, have company reps. These are employed directly by Trek, as Trek doesn't want its reps to do anything but sell its product. I feel the cut-off point in the bike industry for employing company reps is $100 million in annual sales. That means that Trek, Specialized, and Cannondale-and maybe Giant-are the only bike companies in the U.S. that can afford company-employed reps (if my formula is any indication).

One reason you don't see as many bike manufactures making headway in countries other than their own is the sheer economics of it. Forget the issue of import tarifs, and even shipping. Having a distributor inbetween your product and the retailer adds a huge multiplier to the retail price. If you wonder why Colnagos and De Rosas are so expensive in the U.S., it's not just because of the artisanship. It's because of the extra layer of margin, which adds several hundred dollars to each bike. Unless you've got enough muscle to come in and set up shop with your own distribution in a foreign country-as Trek and C'dale have successfully done in Europe and Canada-exporting a low-margin product like a bicycle is tough.

Not so, however, an image-driven product that has a low cost basis, or a product that might have high development costs but high gross margins. An Oakley sunglass, for example, or a Giro helmet, might have a high cost associated with the development and marketing of a model, and for the cost of the mold, but once you finally get to the point of flipping them out of the molds like Big Macs it's not difficult to absorb an importer's margin and sell them into another country.

When you realize the dynamics of how and where a product is manufactured, and the class of product you're talking about, you can understand why a certain manufacturer might enjoy a robust overseas market, while another is locked into a chiefly domestic customer base.

ENGINEERING, QC, AND SAFETY

Bicycles are devilishly hard to engineer and test, both for performance and for safety. On the performance front, you soon see after spending a bit of time in the wind tunnel that the forces and vectors and all that stuff are unpredictable by simple virtue of the application of mathematics. You affix little strings to points on the bike and you see that in several places the wind actually points in the same direction the bike is traveling! Rolling resistance and wheelsize? Just as hard to test for.

You'd think that testing for safety would be a lot easier. You just put a fork or stem or complete bike into a testing machine and it either breaks or it doesn't, right? Thinking that, my company bought a $10,000 bike testing machine from Taiwan-state of the art-what the other companies use-problem solved.

The first bike we tested was a new model of Merlin off-road bike, because we'd been experiencing failures in the machined unistay in the back-an aluminum piece that clamped the seat stays below it and a single unistay above it. We put the bike in the machine to see how many cycles our new, revised clamp would last. The chain stays broke first. Great, problem fixed. Except afterward we put the old clamp in, and again the chain stays broke first. Regardless of what clamp we affixed to the seat stays, the chain stay broke first. We never could break a clamp. It was obvious that the machine didn't apply forces to the bike the forces are applied "in nature," because Merlin never did break any MTB chain stays in this model. Only the seat stay clamp.

This is what makes testing and engineering bikes very hard. You never know what is going to break. That is why it is only of dubious value to hire an engineer to do your engineering, if that person is not familiar with and experienced in bike manufacture. Einstein couldn't calculate the forces on a bike. I'd rather hang my hat on a guy who's been making bikes out of various materials for fifteen years then a rookie engineer just out of college. Of course it's nice to have an experienced bike designe actually be a trained engineer, and there are a few of those out there, like the Cervelo folks and the maker of my own personal bikes, Ves Mandaric. But when push comes to shove, I'll take Keith Bontrager, who to the best of my knowledge isn't a college degreed engineer, over just about anyone who does have a diploma hanging on his wall.

There are some companies that really do go the extra mile in testing. I suspect Cannondale is the best among the big bike companies. If you're a parts maker who wishes to have your product spec'd on a C'dale, your part really has to jump through hoops. Not only does C'dale put your component through all sorts of structural tests, it has an oxidation test as well. If your part'll rust too fast-rejected.

Reynolds Composites allowed us to photograph a typical fork testing machine, which uses a protocol quite similar to others in the industry. Reynolds does a prodigious amount of testing both on its forks and on those of its competitors. The fork being tested is pictured on the left, with a piston across the bottom of the photo that pushes the fork blades, deflecting them what looks to be about a centimeter or so. There is a readout on the top center of the photo that shows the amount of deflection per cycle, and the counter on the top right shows how many cycles the fork has gone, not having yet failed. Once a certain amount of deflection is reached, the fork (or bike, or component) is deemed as having reached "failure."

Certain companies set a standard for testing, and it's nice when the industry can agree on a protocol, because then you know that your new stem (if you're a stem manufacturer) is safe because it's gone 300,000 cycles before it failed, and 150,000 cycles is deemed safe. Unfortunately, there isn't that much commonality in protocols. I know fork makers, for example, that just test a lot of their competitors' forks, and their way of assuring that their fork is safe is to make sure it lasts longer than the other forks in the industry.

CASE STUDY

Funny thing, I'm helping a brand new company with some advice on how to get going with Asian manufacturing. When they read this final installment they may think twice. Admittedly, though, I chose what is certainly the sexiest, juciest example I've come across in a while. Most of the time things go more or less well. But there are exceptions.

Like the time I had bikes made overseas and did so without the aid of an agent. I flew over to watch my production. I was there for a week-the week my first production of bikes were slated to be made. The bikes didn't get made. Each day there was another excuse. "The chainstays didn't show up. The derailleurs didn't show up." I left without watching them weld a single frame. I got the bikes some weeks later in America. They were awful. I rejected more than half. That's the way it goes, or can go.

In the case I'll write about today, Hed cycling made a handlebar. John Cobb was employed to aid Hed in the design and testing of the bar. Cobb made several trips to both Europe and Taiwan in helping get the bar going. Cobb also had other products on which he was working, including a new fork.

Meanwhile, a longtime friend of Steve and Annie Hed, Morgan Nicol, had just left after a long tenure as the European head of Ritchey. The split was acrimonious. At the same time, Ritchey went in another direction concerning its Taiwanese agency-it decided to hire its own people and set up its own captive office in Taiwan. Ritchey's just-abandoned agent, Joseph Chao, went into partnership with Nicol, forming a components company called Oval.

Steve Hed had never done much manufacturing in Taiwan before, and needed an agent in Taiwan. His friend Nicol recommended Chao.

Nicol was also slated to be the Hed's new European distributor for its wheels, and for other products on which Steve Hed and John Cobb would collaborate. All was friendly, one big happy family.

Just a few weeks before the Interbike show, however, the Heds come to learn that their carbon aero bar is no longer theirs. It was to be an Oval product. They understandably felt betrayed by their Taiwanese agent, Chao, because they'd been dealing in good faith with Chao, and had sent money to Chao for Chao to pay the factory for tooling costs. The Heds did not have very much leverage when trying to appeal directly to the manufacturer which made the Hed's bar for them, because that manufacturer's contact was Chao. Plus, agency relationships with manufacturers are strong, since it is common for an agent to have other products manufactured in that factory. Simply put, the Heds felt they'd been outmaneuvered.

What about Nicol, Chao's partner, and Hed's longtime friend? Things had soured a bit after an agreement couldn't be reached for distribution of Hed's products in Europe. The Heds would not be able to appeal to Nicol for help. It must also be said that Nicol had a set of grievances against the Heds which revolved around how the European distribution deal for Hed wheels fell apart.

I'll not get into the particulars of that, nor take sides. I write this just to show you how things can end up, and it happens with every company, big and small, at one point or another. Things went sour with Cervelo (several years ago) and a frame vendor. It happened with Trek and Rolf Diettrich. There are many examples I could cite. Sometimes relationships don't work out. Sometimes things end up in court. Generally when they do, both sides lose.

This one has a happier ending. The Heds were able to reach an agreement with Nicol and Oval at Interbike, less than a week ago as of this writing. The Heds got their aero bar back. Oval had a very good showing of its (Cobb's) fork, of its aluminum version of an aero bar (not unlike the Deda bar Lance rode in the Tour), and of its other products. Oval will in the future very likely be a force in the components business. John Cobb remains friends with all sides. Hed's bar was one of the hits of the show.

The moral of the story is, there is no moral-there are no morals. Or ethics. Or friendships. None that you can count on. Not when you're getting a product manufactured. There's just protection, and you have to make sure you have it.


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## TheRedMantra (Jan 12, 2004)

http://www.ruesports.com/


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## Stalk (May 24, 2005)

With some frames cheaper than XTR Cranks let's say, not even mentioning fork, I wouldn't be too concerned with "high" investment up front. 
On my build I have in order of money spent: Brakes, Wheels, Fork, Frame, Cranks ...
I just happened to get XTR's for real cheap while Euro was low, otherwise it would cost more than frame 

Opps, meant to be reply to Conrad post


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## Cayenne_Pepa (Dec 18, 2007)

lol....Cheers/Jason is quantifying with long-winded data again...


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

*Prototype...*



sergio_pt said:


> I found this test but I dont know when it was done.
> 
> btw anyone knows whats the SGI index?


Problem is this Storck was a pre-prototype and was never available to the public!! The versions people could get are heavier and waaaaay stiffer...and ALL testers found them too stiff. Storck got critizided BIG time in the german WW-forums for this.

SGI is the stiffness to weight index.

The Scale weight you see there is with integrated seatpost.therefore they weren't able to duplicate the comfort-testing on that frame too. so this test is a "bit" misleading


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## JaLove (Dec 24, 2006)

Doesn't Trek make their high-end OCLV frames here in the US from scratch?


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## luckyride (Apr 12, 2009)

Cheers! said:


> How about a Look 986 carbon hardtail?
> 
> 
> 
> ...


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

luckyride said:


> Cheers! said:
> 
> 
> > How about a Look 986 carbon hardtail?
> ...


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## WR304 (Jul 9, 2004)

Curmy said:


> Care to share where you can order custom geometry and tubing in carbon?


There are a few companies that will make you a custom geometry carbon fibre road frame.

Parlee Cycles is one example.

http://www.parleecycles.com/custom.html

Calfee will make you a custom geometry carbon fibre road frame or a custom geometry bamboo mountain bike frame.

http://www.calfeedesign.com/Bamboomtn.htm

http://www.calfeedesign.com/pricelist.htm

I suspect that either company would make you a custom carbon fibre hardtail frame if you offered them enough money. Calfee mention that they make them but don't offer them to the general public.

I'm sure there are other companies that offer custom carbon fibre frames too. Those were just the first ones I thought of.


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## yellowbook (Aug 21, 2005)

I doubt it, even Storck (High End German Brand with incredible price tags) has their stuff made in Asia.


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## WR304 (Jul 9, 2004)

yellowbook said:


> I doubt it, even Storck (High End German Brand with incredible price tags) has their stuff made in Asia.


Calfee can even make you a carbon fibre recumbent trike.:eekster:

http://www.calfeedesign.com/stiletto.htm

I think it's more the carbon fibre monocoque frames that are limited in sizes due to their construction.


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## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

WR304 said:


> Calfee can even make you a carbon fibre recumbent trike.:eekster:
> 
> http://www.calfeedesign.com/stiletto.htm
> 
> I think it's more the carbon fibre monocoque frames that are limited in sizes due to their construction.


The mold cost is what makes the monocoque frames so expensive to do, a custom carbon monocoque would be a McLaren or Lola magnitude of budget to do.


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## JaLove (Dec 24, 2006)

Trek OCLV frames are all hand made in the USA according to them and they say so on their site. I know I've seen a walkthrough video somewhere that showed the actual carbon being laid for several frames in a big room somewhere on cyclingdirt or somesuch site:

"Each of our three OCLV carbons are designed to give riders the right balance of performance and value. All of these OCLV frames are hand-made in the USA."

http://www.trekbikes.com/faq/questions.php?questionid=89

Their frames seem to be really different from most of the other ones out there, eh?


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## Jake Pay (Dec 27, 2006)

Yes.......
All *OCLV* carbon frames. (road and mountain) are still made in Waterloo, Wisconsin.

~Jake


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## Flystagg (Nov 14, 2006)

Does anyone know the weight of a trek 9.7 or 9.8 hartail frame? The 9.9 has an integrated seatpost as well rft:


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## John Kuhl (Dec 10, 2007)

I don't know about there hardtails, but in the classifieds there is a
Trek Top Fuel 9.9 SSL size 18.5 frame that weights 4.05 pounds with 
the shock. That is one of the lightest FS frames I have seen.


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

*heavy*



Flystagg said:


> Does anyone know the weight of a trek 9.7 or 9.8 hartail frame? The 9.9 has an integrated seatpost as well rft:


Trek are (super)heavy:
http://light-bikes.com/bikegallery/BikeListing.asp?id=319
http://light-bikes.com/bikegallery/BikeListing.asp?id=177


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## TheTruth (Jun 11, 2009)

Someone already posted it but heres another pic of that sweet BMC Elite. I know nothing about it other than it looks really fast


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## kentkreitler (Jul 29, 2006)

The new Giant XTC Advanced SL is a very, very good frame.


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## nathanbal (Jan 30, 2007)

i'll say it again... cannondale taurine, carbon sl lefty and hollowgram SL cranks.

cannot be beaten (unless you get a scalpel)...


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

nino said:


> Trek are (super)heavy:
> https://light-bikes.com/bikegallery/BikeListing.asp?id=319
> https://light-bikes.com/bikegallery/BikeListing.asp?id=177


those are OLD frames. but I dont like trek frames much anyway.

been checking the prices and for the price of a storck I could buy a scale + new wheelset + formula R1 brakes  storck just asks for too much money for a frame (2500€). 
Shouldnt we start reading news about the 2010 bikes?

Then there is the stevens SMC 1 Team, now riden by the portuguese elite with good results.








It has good results on the test. Has anyone tried this frame?



nathanbal said:


> i'll say it again... cannondale taurine, carbon sl lefty and hollowgram SL cranks.
> 
> cannot be beaten (unless you get a scalpel)...


Why do you say that? what are the frame strenghts?


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

*C'dale...too heavy*



nathanbal said:


> i'll say it again... cannondale taurine, carbon sl lefty and hollowgram SL cranks.
> 
> cannot be beaten (unless you get a scalpel)...


the 09 Taurine weighs 1338g according to a test of german BIKE magazine. Not what we are looking for when we talk about a lightweight frame. It gets better with the fork though but i wouldn't want a lefty anyway...


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## WR304 (Jul 9, 2004)

nathanbal said:


> i'll say it again... cannondale taurine, carbon sl lefty and hollowgram SL cranks.
> 
> cannot be beaten (unless you get a scalpel)...


I test rode a 2008 Cannondale Taurine last year whilst looking for a new bike. The top tube on the frame was really wide with barely any taper for knee clearance.

After 30min approx of the test ride the insides of my knees were black with bruises from hitting the top tube every few pedal strokes. The Taurine frame seemed to accelerate well but it was fairly clear that I wouldn't be able to ride one long term.


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## Mighty Matt (Apr 22, 2009)

sette impulse from Price Point. only $500

http://www.pricepoint.com/detail/19...rames/Sette-Impulse-Carbon-Mountain-Frame.htm


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## LAN (Jan 26, 2004)

I have a Trek 9.9 SSL in 17,5" that weighs 1203g + 59g headset. You also save around 35g because you don't need the bottom bracket cups, just the bearings. So it't comparable to frames around 1150g.

I also have a Storck Rebelion 1.0 that weighs 1110g is superstiff and handles better than any hardtail I have used. It's very expensive but also very rare, so you don't have the same frame as 10 other guys at the startline.


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## hanjin (Apr 24, 2008)

Fuji makes some nice carbon frames too. I have a Mt. Fuji Pro and it amazing.
[SLM 1.0]http://www.fujibikes.com/Mountain/HardtailRace/SLM10.aspx[/URL]


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

LAN said:


> I have a Trek 9.9 SSL in 17,5" that weighs 1203g + 59g headset. You also save around 35g because you don't need the bottom bracket cups, just the bearings. So it't comparable to frames around 1150g.
> 
> I also have a Storck Rebelion 1.0 that weighs 1110g is superstiff and handles better than any hardtail I have used. It's very expensive but also very rare, so you don't have the same frame as 10 other guys at the startline.


Could you post some pictures of your Rebelion? Its so rare that I would like to see some more. 

I would buy the Storck Rebelion 1.0 if it wasnt so expensive. They could produce in more quantities and reduce the price to the consumer.


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## Stalk (May 24, 2005)

You mean you have nice Bianchi, err I mean nice Pedal Force, err I mean ... 

Mt Fuji Pro uses different frame than SLM series. However I completely agree it rides very nice.

http://www.fujibikes.com/Mountain/CarbonHardtail/MtFujiPro.aspx


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## bholwell (Oct 17, 2007)

Has anyone mentioned MSC?

https://www.mscbikes.com/images/quadres/wcr-carbon.jpg

https://www.mscbikes.com/bicis.php?idioma=CONS_ANG&any=2009&bici=3

And the Sette Phantom sure seems like a good deal.


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## LAN (Jan 26, 2004)

I think I have posted pics before, but here are some more:


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## Cheers! (Jun 26, 2006)

LAN: That must have set you back many pretty pennies. One of the things I really like about the stork frames that it locates the brake caliper between the seatstay and the chainstay.


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

WOW now thats a serious machine LAN, very nice build. thanks for sharing the pictures.

This is what what I need to buy one of these days....


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## Cheers! (Jun 26, 2006)

That is a lot of saddle to bar drop!!!! I wish I was that flexible.


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## rrl (Sep 21, 2008)

lets wait to hear more about the ibis tranny... i bet that its one of the best out there:thumbsup:


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## wannabeRacer (Feb 9, 2004)

I like this bike very much....

Have you thought about Mavic SLR wheelset or custom wheelset (240s hubs, stans rims & Ti spokes)?


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## nathanbal (Jan 30, 2007)

the taurine gives you the ability to run the carbon SL lefty which is a 1.1kg, 110mm "fork" that is stiffer than any other comparable fork in the market. It also gives you the ability to run the hollowgram SL cranks, which from memory are around 600g for a 2 ring setup, including BB. Its also stiffer than anything else on the market.

it might be a little heavier than other carbon hardtails, but given the weight savings you get from the other components (also keep in mind the headset is integrated)... you get an amazingly stiff BB, headtube and supple rear end... plus the lefty just rocks.


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## LAN (Jan 26, 2004)

Here is some pictures of the work in progress: Trek 9.9 SSL.


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## Kitakeng (Oct 29, 2006)

+150g for lefty steer tube 

btw any news on new 2010 lefty which has one piece clamp and said to be 100g lighter??


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## yellowbook (Aug 21, 2005)

Cheers! said:


> That is a lot of saddle to bar drop!!!! I wish I was that flexible.


Not really!     









------------------

Personally I don't like the Rebelion built, but I love the Trek, that thing is sweeeeet!!!!


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## bhsavery (Aug 19, 2004)

wannabeRacer said:


> sergio_pt, if you want the best and the lightest HT frame, then look into Scott Scale unless you go custom carbon? There are a few custom builders out there? I wish Parlee make mtb frame's, I would order one now ;-)


I asked them that myself and they said...

maybe soon.


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

LAN said:


> Here is some pictures of the work in progress: Trek 9.9 SSL.


It looks very finished to me.
How do you compare the rebelion 1.0 with the trek 9.9SSL?


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## Megaclocker (Sep 28, 2005)

rockyuphill said:


> And Spesh, Norco and Whyte are doing some nice carbon hardtail frames too.
> 
> Depending on what kind of ride duration and terrain you have in mind, having a super super stiff hardtail is not always the ultimate solution. As Nino says, the carbon Vertex is not one of the stiffest in testing, but even at that it is many times stiffer than the previous scandium frame. If the frame is too stiff, it will just beat you senseless. My experience so far on the carbon Vertex 50/70RSL frame is that it is one of the most comfortable HT's I've ridden, as well as being light and stiff enough for my 195 pounds. I'd hate to have the frame be as stiff as my old Easton Ultralite tubed hardtail, which I loved for it's handling but hated for the hurtin' it delivered.


To be honest I think that my Vertex Team ride pretty similar to my steel hardtail, BUT at half the weight. This is a good thing.


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## yellowbook (Aug 21, 2005)

sergio_pt said:


> It looks very finished to me.
> How do you compare the rebelion 1.0 with the trek 9.9SSL?


I would be interested in the same thing.

Storck raves about stiffness, but I always wondered how stiff are todays carbon frames compared to klein frames.

I contacted bike magazines about that, but they sad they have no data about the stiffness of klein frames, but I'm sure that everybody knows how stiff kleins are.

So if that rebelion is even by a hair stiffer than my adroit, I don't wanna ride it.
I've been riding Kleins pretty much all my life and I like the stiffness, but now going on 40 I sure like my carbon seatpost and low pressure in my tires with the eclipse system, to take at least the edge off, but once you you start to pedal, that thing goes nothing but forward.

As taken from the beboppedals website, which part I always liked:
\


> Are you telling me that my Klein isn't stiff?
> Of course not. But it isn't stiff because it is made of aluminum. It is stiff because it has way oversize tubes. A bike with tubes that size made of titanium would be even stiffer, and in steel it would be so stiff you wouldn't want to get near it. Capish?


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## Hardtailforever (Feb 11, 2004)

JaLove said:


> Doesn't Trek make their high-end OCLV frames here in the US from scratch?


Trek OCLV frames are made in-house.


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## lost_biker (Jan 2, 2009)

Consider the IBIS Tranny. I don't know how good it is though.


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## jw8725 (Jun 12, 2009)

are Klein bikes dead? What ever happened to them? I owned an altitude and a Q carbon Pro.


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## yellowbook (Aug 21, 2005)

Yes, pretty much. They're only distributed in Japan as far as I know.
At least the japanese website is up, the US and European is down.


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## jw8725 (Jun 12, 2009)

yellowbook said:


> Yes, pretty much. They're only distributed in Japan as far as I know.
> At least the japanese website is up, the US and European is down.


Whats the big deal with Japan then?


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## yellowbook (Aug 21, 2005)

From what I know, they still consider it " the sh1t!" regardless of it actually being a Trek bike and Gary being not involved anymore.
Kleins remained popular in Japan:
http://www.kleinjapan.com/


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## bikefun (Jun 15, 2006)

For all around value, the Giant XTC is the best buy. The Look is nice, but pricey....


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## Margaritaman (Aug 25, 2008)

Another vote for the Scale


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## wannabeRacer (Feb 9, 2004)

yellowbook said:


> Yes, pretty much. They're only distributed in Japan as far as I know.
> At least the japanese website is up, the US and European is down.


I like the Klein bike, but when I check the website its on Japanese. Does anyone know where I can view the bikes in english?


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## yellowbook (Aug 21, 2005)

Yeah, I think the Scale and the Max Ari/Ghost Lector are the "best".

Then Look and Storck for exclusivity.


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## Bender (Jan 12, 2004)

wannabeRacer said:


> I like the Klein bike, but when I check the website its on Japanese. Does anyone know where I can view the bikes in english?


Google is your friend


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

I read that Bianchi is releasing a new Carbon frame with integrated seat post for 2010. Anyone has pictures of it?? It is supposed to be very light too.
If it still comes with v-brakes that might be a good option to me because I will not have to buy disc brakes and wheels. 
We should start hearing news for 2010 products in 2-3 months so I'll be waiting till there to decide what’s the best carbon frame I shall buy. But probably I’m going with a scale. We’ll see.


Margaritaman how does your CB wheels ride?


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## limba (Jan 9, 2004)

Yeah, if you don't need a bike right now wait for the 2010 models. Everyone will have carbon frames next year and most of them will be made in the same factory.


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## Kitakeng (Oct 29, 2006)

yellowbook said:


> From what I know, they still consider it " the sh1t!" regardless of it actually being a Trek bike and Gary being not involved anymore.
> Kleins remained popular in Japan:
> http://www.kleinjapan.com/


Dead stock bikes now sold as 2009 models.

ever few models, crappy parts as usual.
they dont even bother to change their colour scheme now.

Users in Japan know it for sure.

Klein is over...


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## josliver (Oct 5, 2007)

*Probably the best carbon hardtail frame & fork*

I would not spend the kind of money needed for an extreme hardtail before trying (among others already refered), two excelent options:

Trek 9.9 SSL - at least 2007 frame was very good, confortable "enough" in terms of vertical absortion and very efficient - 2009 is for sure even better - must try.

Specialized Stumpjumper HT S-Works & fork - I believe this is one of the best options (if not the best) - Tried the 2008 frame and the feeling is fantastic, extremely solid and efficient. All the power you put on the cranks is used, no power is lost but vibrations are partially absorved by the frame, in a way that must be experienced. 
So far, is the best feeling I experienced in an HT ( I have to admit that I do not have a lot of experience, but already tried a few top bikes).
2009 frame with the new Spech fork must make an wonderfull bike, the new fork is so good on my Epic, must also be good on the HT.
Hope I can try one of these Stump HT one of these days.
You can easily make it around 8.5 Kg. 

Regards ... JO


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## yellowbook (Aug 21, 2005)

sergio_pt said:


> We should start hearing news for 2010 products in 2-3 months so I'll be waiting till there to decide what's the best carbon frame I shall buy.


You'll see everything in about 2 months.
http://www.eurobike-show.de/eb/?lg=en

And they will have all the pics:
http://www.light-bikes.de/forum/pics/index.php?c=1


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## Broccoli (Jun 11, 2008)

Here is some first hand account on durability of one of the options.

http://forums.mtbr.com/showthread.php?p=5812711

And that post is about Scott:
http://forums.mtbr.com/showpost.php?p=5814536&postcount=51


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

Curmy said:


> Here is some first hand account on durability of one of the options.
> 
> http://forums.mtbr.com/showthread.php?p=5812711
> 
> ...


Funny you post that "Scott"-link:
if you would read the text above you could see that the germans did/do durability tests for ages to see if carbon is better in the long term. Not only handlebars, seatposts, cranksets but also framesets. The result is that carbon long passed the other frame materials in every aspect.

If you are interested in a frame that can sit 20 years out in the rain, or 100 years in salty water and still look the same than be lucky with your Ti-frame. The question in here was for the best lightweight hardtail frame and if it has to be light a Ti-frame is already out of the question. If optics and durability are the main subject Ti is indeed in the mix again. Ti frames can be great nontheless as can steel and aluminiums. No question. But if the OP asks for best i doubt Ti is what he is looking for.

Remember that "blind-test" i mentioned? The germans did a test to see if the myth about Ti and steel frames offering better rides is true and did a test with a whole bunch of equally equipped bikes all covered completely so testers had to make comments on the bikes just by feel (picture below). There were severeal biiiig brands under the covers and you know what? Titanium wouldn't stand out in comfortness nor would steel. However in other criterias they would suffer with comments like flex, wobbly steering, soft BB when hammering out of the saddle....but comfort is on another sheet. Comfort can be built in exactly to your likings in a carbon frame. Specialized is trying this for a couple of years already and the last offerings indeed seem to have that effect in a very positive way. Others still build their frames just plain stiff (Storck). But when you try to make a lightweight Ti-frame it is just flexier. Ti had great reviews a couple of years ago when lightweight aluminium frames were still in the 1500-1800g range and common steel frames weighed well over 2 kilos.These days nice carbon frames weigh around 1000-1200g which for Ti isn't doable anymore without too much flex.


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## Broccoli (Jun 11, 2008)

nino said:


> Funny you post that "Scott"-link:
> if you would read the text above you could see that the germans did/do durability tests for ages to see if carbon is better in the long term. Not only handlebars, seatposts, cranksets but also framesets. The result is that carbon long passed the other frame materials in every aspect.


Staged test in laboratory conditions is not always well correlated with actual real life experience. I have seen a lot of examples of this in scientific experiments. That is exactly the part that makes "rocket science" difficult. But hey - you may choose to believe whatever you want, and keep changing frames every year.


----------



## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

Curmy said:


> Staged test in laboratory conditions is not always well correlated with actual real life experience. I have seen a lot of examples of this in scientific experiments. That is exactly the part that makes "rocket science" difficult. But hey - you may choose to believe whatever you want, and keep changing frames every year.


Maybe you don't want to accept it but that "real world" is ecaxtly what they did in that blind-test.

Ayway-i'm still on my 05 Scale...and my dad has still his 30 year old custom-made Pinarello in his basement as well. Is durability really making a frame any "better"?

But hey - i'm kind of in the same boat:
I still have my '98 Honda CR 125 motocrosser in the garage, i still can go fast on it, i can still win some races on it against actual , big 450cc 4-strokes (just did a couple of weeks ago)...i am still convinced that 125s are fast and fun to ride....yet i do have to accept that todays offerings are superior. 125s were lighter, cheaper, lasted longer, 125s are much easier to start, less chance to stall, services would cost way less, motor overhaul could be done by most at home unlike 4-strokes....but are they better than todays 4-strokes?


----------



## Broccoli (Jun 11, 2008)

nino said:


> Maybe you don't want to accept it but that "real world" is ecaxtly what they did in that blind-test.


I perfectly accept what they did in the test, and it is a valid data point. But that test does not have any bearing about actual experience of actual users that thanks to the modern technology that you are using at this very moment are readily available for everybody to study and analyze.

I am glad that our Scott serves you well. Some folks running lightweight aluminum and carbon frames in local adventure races and all around riding had not been so lucky. Me - I do not want to rely on luck, when there are cheaper and better alternatives available.


----------



## Stalk (May 24, 2005)

I'm not sure I'm getting the drift. So I guess it's all about that Carbon frames may break?
Any frame may and everyone on this forum have seen lotsa carbon/alu/TI broken frames, so what?

Does TI frame makes better bike cause it 200g heavier? Or does carbon frame makes better bike cause it's lighter? If we are not to rely on scientific experiments to measure rigidity, compliance, durability than what we should base opinion on? On few posts from MTBR? I knew a guy who knew a guy who rode with guy whos _____(insert you bike of hate here) exploded during one ride and we 5/10/50/500 miles away from cars.
And there are guy who don't swim in ocean cause he seen sharks there while flying on the copter (real case BTW).

TI would always play it role in MTB world, but I have yet to see one that many may call "best light frame". Purely out of this thread, vast majority points on carbon frame of choice. And then of course "German magazines" there


----------



## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

Stalk said:


> I'm not sure I'm getting the drift. So I guess it's all about that Carbon frames may break?
> Any frame may and everyone on this forum have seen lotsa carbon/alu/TI broken frames, so what?
> 
> Does TI frame makes better bike cause it 200g heavier? Or does carbon frame makes better bike cause it's lighter? If we are not to rely on scientific experiments to measure rigidity, compliance, durability than what we should base opinion on? On few posts from MTBR? I knew a guy who knew a guy who rode with guy whos _____(insert you bike of hate here) exploded during one ride and we 5/10/50/500 miles away from cars.
> ...


I have to agree here.

I usually don't give all that much on magazine tests if it's about a specific brand (you know, big companies having full-page ads in that same issue...) BUT in this case they were out to test different frame materials and it's abilities in general. This kind of info is very interesting. Same when they do tests on durability where they simply shred all different kinds of frames just to see how much abuse they can take (Carbon,Ti,Steel,aluminium...high-end and low-end as well)

By now there are clear numbers and testresults available showing that (good) carbon is superior and not as fragile as people may want to believe. Titanium on the other hand is not as good a material for "best" cycling frames either as these same people may still believe. Sure it has to be done right but that's the same with each and every material used anyway. I don't think Curmy is talking about cheapo Russian or China Ti-frames here either....

Anyway - my example with my old motocrosser above also points in the direction that also "old"-style equipment can do very good. Make that even very-very good. It may be even more durable, cheaper....But it just won't be the "best" anymore.


----------



## Broccoli (Jun 11, 2008)

Stalk said:


> I'm not sure I'm getting the drift.


[offtopic]
The drift is that Nino made a typically smug assertion that anything other then a composite frame, especially one that he would happen to use, is obsolete and does not perform nearly as good. He proceeded to deny that steel and titanium frames ride well, especially on some terrain rougher then a path in a Swiss city park, based on some obscure staged "test". He then asserted that lightweight carbon racing frames are just as good or better at being dragged by a tired adventure racer around rocky ravine at night as a titanium one, and that they are readily available in any custom geometry for a price competitive with handmade steel frames.

I laugh in his general direction.


----------



## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

Curmy said:


> [offtopic]
> The drift is that Nino made a typically smug assertion that anything other the a composite frame is obsolete and does not perform nearly as good. He proceeded to deny that steel and titanium frames ride well based on some obscure staged "test". He then asserted that lightweight crabon racing frames are jsut as good or better at being dragged around rocky ravine at night as a titanium one, and that they are readily available in any custom geometry for a price competitive with handmade steel frames.
> 
> I laugh in his general direction.


They do ride "well" but that's not what the original question was when looking for "BEST".

He wasn't asking for cheapest, longest lasting etc...he asked for "best" and interestingly none other than you came up with Ti (or Al or CroMo).

On a sidenote: he posted this question in the Weight-Weenies forum so definitely looking for a lightweight frame here....and this is the final hit for Ti as there's simply no Ti frame on the planet offering similar ride than todays 1 kilo carbon frames.

By the way - what does your suggested Ti-frame weigh?


----------



## slyboots (Sep 16, 2005)

nino said:


> He wasn't asking for cheapest, longest lasting etc...he asked for "best" and interestingly none other than you came up with Ti (or Al or CroMo).


Actually, he asked for the best CARBON frame (anyone can see the thread topic). So how come some arbitrary Ti frame is suggested as the best carbon frame is beyond my understanding.


----------



## sglspdpenguin (Mar 29, 2009)

*OCLV trek is made state side*

The High end trek oclv frames are made right in waterloo, by hand from scratch. If it doesnt say oclv its not made in the us of A. If you want geared i would go with the new 9.9ssl frame, its sick. Plus lifetime warranty. Thats if you want a usa made frame. Companies have been successfully making all types of frames in Taiwan for more than 20 years. Just get one with a warranty, and remember, you get what you pay for. I.e if you frame cost 500 bucks its going to ride like a 500 dollar frame, and whats a warranty if it breaks in the first month.
Peace


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

slyboots said:


> Actually, he asked for the best CARBON frame (anyone can see the thread topic). So how come some arbitrary Ti frame is suggested as the best carbon frame is beyond my understanding.


Also asked by the OP:..."and excellent stiffness for best power transfer"...

so it had to be:
1.carbon
2.light
3.stiff

Does Ti really fit in here?

1.No
2.No
3.No

BTW: Curmy-i never suggested the Scale.Only when asked about a german test did i mention it. I even mentioned other frames that would fit his search, i also stated other makers made lighter frames, or stiffer ones. Just read again and keep things straight. I also said what finally counts is the right mix of stiffness/ compliance out on the trail. But when talking about light weight and stiffness for best power transfer Ti is really the last frame material that someone might possibly suggest.

That said:
Give me the choice to throw a leg over a no-name carbon frame or a nice Merlin/Litespeed...i would sure pick the Ti!


----------



## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

And I'll reiterate my subjective observation that my current carbon hardtail frame is the most comfortable, resonance-free, and stiffest power transfer of any of the dozen or so hardtail frames I've owned, or frames I've ridden (steel, aluminium, scandium, or Ti). Once you ride a well damped non-resonant carbon frame you'll be amazed at how much resonance there is in any metal tubed frame and how that affects comfort and body wear and tear. 

A buddy of mine who is a die hard titanium hardtail rider (a Merlin and a Litespeed) was just knocked out at how much difference there was in climbing traction and power transfer on a carbon frame when he tried it. 

For me the key is the stiffness/resonance issue. Making a frame super light and stiff pushes the resonant frequency up quite high and there's less material to provide inherent damping. A concept I am very familiar with from loudspeaker diaphragm design tradeoffs. Seeking that happy medium between light enough and stiff enough to still provide the damping that carbon can provide in the right circumstances is going to be the difference between a race day only bike and an everyday/all day bike.


----------



## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

*agreed*



rockyuphill said:


> Seeking that happy medium between light enough and stiff enough to still provide the damping that carbon can provide in the right circumstances is going to be the difference between a race day only bike and an everyday/all day bike.


Agreed.
That's why a certain brand , at least over here, is still on top of testers sheets although there's lighter and stiffer frames available. I's really the perfect mix of stiffness+compliance that makes a good frame stand out. It seems that with carbon some manufacturers are really offering superb frames that do both: transfer all the power to the ground while absorbing some of the trail. This compliance is what once Ti-frames made stand out, what they were famous for. Now carbon offers this at a higher degree with much lower weight and better power transfer. Hard to beat.

BUT then again the germans showed that a simple change of a seatpost can have a huge impact on comfort. And we all know what different wheels , tires and tire pressures can do to a bike as well.

To some ultimate stiffness is good, others prefer comfort in a frame...some of these traits can be felt immediately when doing a comparison on your own but usually it's hard to compare since all the other components do have a big influence as well when riding a bike. Therefore these german tests aren't all that bad since they isolate the frame form the rest of the componentry and give you certain numbers so you can actually compare 1:1. For sure numbers don't reflect a riders impression but at least you get an idea if a frame is stiff or has some compliance.

Shown below a test-bench of a german magazine. The tested frames are actually shredded in the end as they do a durability test (worth several years of actual riding) as well as a maximum G-out test (max. load as you would get by doing a huge jump), also the impact resistance is measured as well as the quality of the laquer etcetc....there's more than 1 frame shredded per make! I think the germans do the most crucial and intense tests actually shredding several bikes/components to death just to find out their durability and max. capabilities.


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## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

The nice thing about a test like that is you can use it to compare frames once you have some experience with one of the frames in the test. As soon as you have a subjective experiential baseline for important ride qualities you could at least guesstimate how frames that are more or less stiff might feel.

I would not have bought a carbon hardtail frame based on my first ride on a test frame last summer, it was far too stiff and punishing. If I wouldn't have had a chance to test ride another version of the carbon frame last fall I would have relinquished carbon frames to the racer or younger riders that might be able to handle the beat down.

This past week I had a chance to ride my carbon Vertex 50RSL frame back-to-back with the production version of the carbon Vertex Team frame, and they've obviously done some tuning on the lighter Team frame as it was only a bit more aggressive in ride quality than the frame I have with similar build kits, last summer I would have classified it as a lot more aggressive. My frame I can ride with unpadded palm gloves, after 90 minutes on the Team I could feel it in my palms and forearms, but padded palm gloves would have been enough to reduce that feeling. The Team proto I rode last summer I could feel at my palms, feet and seat of the chamois after 90 minutes in the saddle, I was really sore and tired.

Ride quality is so subjective, if you don't have any opportunity to ride a frame before buying you won't really know if a carbon frame is the best match to your expectations. The most you can hope for is that you don't get back from your first ride feeling like you've spent and hour in the back of a buckboard on a gravel road or riding a jackhammer.


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

Excelent points of view here. 
Yes I wrote the best CARBON frame because I assume that carbon is the best material available so far to build a bike frame with the properties that a XC/marathon racer looks for, that is stiffness in pedal power transfer, also good stiffness in the head tube area for good handling in cornering, and lightweight. Confort to me is not so important but if carbon can provide that thats great. 

I know there are also other materials but not so good as carbon for what I have read.
I agree with nino about the titanium, its era in frames is passing...

I have a light scandium frame but is too flexy, and it could be 300g lighter than a carbon frame. I had an 6061 aluminium frame with better power transfer but it was heavy, also had an iron frame that had even better stiffness but hooo boy 4kg frame.... 

last option is obvious.


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

boahh the germans rules in bike testing I believe. There isn't one scientific bike test made by portuguese magazines. The punctuation given to a bike is all by the feeling of the biker/journalist, and always expect the most expensive bikes to have the best punctuation. 

I cant read much german but that is a rigorous test the magazine has put the frames through.  :thumbsup: 

nino is that a recent test? can you please post the test results? thank you very much!  

Or post the magazine names that usually releases this kinds of tests, so I can try to fetch them from Portugal  

cheers


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## dirthead (Feb 5, 2004)

I have an Orbea Alma and absolutely love it. The rear triangle is one piece of carbon tubing, bent to form the triangle. That's a pretty unique feature compared to other carbon frames. It's very stiff and quick, but it also dampens a lot of the trail buzz and small bumps. Much more comfortable than any aluminum hardtail I've ever ridden. I think most carbon hardtails are going to be more comfortable than aluminum. The Look 986 is very nice, and I probably would have gotten one but no frames were available in the US when I was buying, only complete bikes. Also, the Orbea is very reasonably priced for a carbon frame.


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## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

http://www.bike-magazin.de/?p=1601

You can buy a PDF of the test using Paypal for 2 euros


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

rockyuphill said:


> http://www.bike-magazin.de/?p=1601
> 
> You can buy a PDF of the test using Paypal for 2 euros


correct - that was the latest where they had professionals ride the bikes and measure the actual times and power output needed for each bike on a given course.

As always there's minor glitches when they do such tests. Although it was very interesting to see that there's really differences between all those bikes they forgot the main and most important.They should have outfitted all bikes at least with equal tires! They didn't for the timed test. I think this is misleading and doesn't reflect the differents bikes capabilities/potentials.


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## bholwell (Oct 17, 2007)

nino said:


> They should have outfitted all bikes at least with equal tires! They didn't for the timed test. I think this is misleading and doesn't reflect the differents bikes capabilities/potentials.


That's not a minor glitch, that's a huge glaring oversight! This would most likely induce more error than the differences seen from frame to frame.


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## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

I'd agree with tires being a huge variable in a test like that. Heck even when I test rode that proto carbon hardtail last year, I used my XTR wheels and tire setup off my scandium bike so the tires and wheels were factored out of my seat of the chamois feeling. 

I suppose they were just testing them as shipped by the manufacturer, but that tells you more about the decisions the product manager made than how the frame works.


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

rockyuphill said:


> I'd agree with tires being a huge variable in a test like that. Heck even when I test rode that proto carbon hardtail last year, I used my XTR wheels and tire setup off my scandium bike so the tires and wheels were factored out of my seat of the chamois feeling.
> 
> I suppose they were just testing them as shipped by the manufacturer, but that tells you more about the decisions the product manager made than how the frame works.


Exactly - too bad they preferred to test the bikes as they came out of the showroom this time rather than do a test with equal "shoes" (wheels and tires). Anyway - they still print the frames numbers individually but all the racers times sheets are for nothing.

And in the final verdict they have ratings for tires as well...and for bottlecages...and if you can lower the seatpost (obviously the Scott with the integrated seatpost gets only 1 out of 6 points here which hinders it from getting the overall win). Anyway - as usual - you have to take such tests with a grain of salt but at least there's so much data on hand that you can still evaluate the important features for yourself. And i also found it interesting to actually see some pretty huge differences in timed laps from one bike to the other regardless of the reasons (tires,weight,geometry, etcetc)


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## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

It's interesting to see how the two riders performed on each bike. Some bikes suited the riders better as the lap time gap between the two riders on the same bike were quite variable. About 23-25 seconds on the Merida, Ghost, Scott and Specialized. Same lap time on the Cannondale(!?), only 13-14 seconds difference on the Storck and Rocky Mountain, and 42 seconds difference on the Rotwild (but it was the slowest for both riders).

The Cannondale seemed to have the biggest variation in position in the chart for the two riders.


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## WR304 (Jul 9, 2004)

rockyuphill said:


> It's interesting to see how the two riders performed on each bike.


From the link above the bikes tested were:

Merida Carbon FLX Team
Cannondale Taurine Team SL
Ghost Lector Worldcup
Scott Scale RC
Rocky Mountain Vertex 70 RSL
Storck Rebelion 1.1
Specialized Stumpjumper S-Works HT
Rotwild R.R2 HT Team

http://www.bike-magazin.de/?p=1601


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

*Watt...*



rockyuphill said:


> It's interesting to see how the two riders performed on each bike. Some bikes suited the riders better as the lap time gap between the two riders on the same bike were quite variable. About 23-25 seconds on the Merida, Ghost, Scott and Specialized. Same lap time on the Cannondale(!?), only 13-14 seconds difference on the Storck and Rocky Mountain, and 42 seconds difference on the Rotwild (but it was the slowest for both riders).
> 
> The Cannondale seemed to have the biggest variation in position in the chart for the two riders.


Interesting also the average Watts needed for these times. I think it's pretty amazing to see these numbers vary this much.


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## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

It makes you wonder about where the power is being consumed, the Vertex has the second lowest power use to have mid-pack times, but only Fumic delivered less power to the Specialized bike but they were also second slowest. So does the lower power use mean the rider wasn't able to develop the power, or they couldn't get the power from their legs to the rear wheel.


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## yampydog (Oct 5, 2008)

*Its a Whyte Carbon*

has to be a whyte 19 carbon team, comes in cool colour schemes too!


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

Thanks for the magazine links!



rockyuphill said:


> It makes you wonder about where the power is being consumed, the Vertex has the second lowest power use to have mid-pack times, but only Fumic delivered less power to the Specialized bike but they were also second slowest. So does the lower power use mean the rider wasn't able to develop the power, or they couldn't get the power from their legs to the rear wheel.


That's interesting because the time spent to complete the course does not have a linear correlation with the energy applied to the rear wheel. I think the energy can only be dissipated in the crankset, frame BB area chainstays and seatstays, and tires, maybe rolling resistance has influence too.

I also agree that the test could be more rigorous if we would like to know what is the best frame because the bikes have different setups&#8230; and we cannot control the rider as a machine, if they did the 8 laps one after the other in the same day the fatigue of the rider might be an issue too when they test the last bikes. So which was the order of testing?

It's interesting to see the merida at the top of the list. It's not one of the lightest bikes (1242g) and not one of the stiffest frames but it's there.

This test made me interested in the Ghost frames they look good and are lightweight (1132g) but I need to see more rigorous testing.

bellow some more data for the weenies like me


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## conrad (Jan 27, 2004)

*all gd stuff...but how strong to sideways impacts is carbon?*

I ask this question as a friend of mines carbon road bike (Avanti- NZ brand) broke the top tube when his girl friend knocked it over onto the vaccum cleaner. It just fell over hitting the top tube mid section.:madman: 
Result a new frame claimed in the insurance.....& lots of carbon jokes....
Ok the frame comes from china..etc etc..another friend hada similar thing happen..got a pinarello as a replacement...no comparision to the avanti.....stiffer/lighter/ etc


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

Here's the same test with english translations...

To be able to give constant readings for all bikes they divided the individual runs over 2 days and gave those riders enough rest between each run.1 lap was just 15 minutes so definitely doable for professionals of their caliber. Each of them did 4 runs on 1 day with the next day doing the other 4 runs.Same weather, same course.

As mentioned there's some glitches as they did test the bikes just as they come out of the showroom...

-To make a valuable comparison test you would have to outfit them at least with the same tires.

-To make a valuable statement you would have to take the highest level of all bikes, not a limited edition of one make vs. a lower line machine of the next with lower priced equipment. Rocky Mountain specs this frame with XT level components only and therefore it suffers in this test with heavy weight and gets punished in the components sector as well. The lighter Team frame is available as frame-kit only. With Scott they tested the "RC" version with lower liner components than the LTD version....while all other makes tested the highest available versions. Somehow strange.

-I found a reason for some of the differences in the Watt readings: there was a longer flat section in that given test-lap where they had a speed limit of 15 km/h. There the C'dale needed a full 18 Watts less than the Storck just because of the tires rollingresistance....however the watts were still taken and therefore the lower reading of the average watts in the end. I alsoo don't get it why they would eliminated a 830m long fireroad section out of the comparison.I mean such sections make part of riding as well and also on such sections differences are valuable. That's where the C'dale took the most profit out of its tires (Furious fred) and that's where a Storck with Nobby Nics would suffer more while on the uphill/downhill sections it's the other way round. 

Anyway - only by reading ALL the test, all the info on how they did the test and what was their intention to do so reveals the different bikes capabilities. As is the graphs and numbers only reflect half of the truth.

I also add a comfort-measurement they took of all bikes. They measured the seatposts flex of all bikes at a given height under a given weight. This shows how much a seatpost flexes under a rider when going over rough ground.As mentioned several times before you can see that there's quite a big difference in here. And once again the integrated seatposts show that they don't do any good...i really don't understand it and think that's just a marketing gag, just something different. What they don't say here is if they measured this all with the same saddle...you know there's flexier saddles so there might be another factor involved they didn't take into account here....anoter grain of salt here.


Damn - i just wanted to upload that translated picture but somehow it doesn't work. so i have to give you the translation this way:

On the left of the list you see 

BERGAUF = UPHILL

Geometrie/Handling = geometry/handling
Federung hinten = rear suspension
Federung vorne = front suspension
Reifen = tires
Flaschenhalter = Bottlecage
Gewicht ohne Pedale = weight w/o pedals
Effizienz Wippen = bobbing efficiency 
Effizienz Pedalrückschlag = pedaling efficiency

BERGAB = DOWNHILL

Geometrie/Handling = geometry/handling
Federung hinten = rear suspension
Federung vorne = front suspension
Versenkbarkeit Sattelstütze = ability to lower the saddle
Bremsen = brakes
Reifen = tires
Steifigkeit = stiffness (measured numbers from the lab)

SONSTIGES = MISCELLANEOUS
Zusammenstellung Komponenten = mix of components/build
Optischer Eindruck/Verarbeitung = optical appereance,craftmanship
Lackqualität = quality of laquer
Garantie = warranty


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

*what they needed to do...*

You know - i always think why they do all this? they want to find out which bike was faster. ok. But as shown above there's too many variables that they didn't take into account.

I would like to see a similar test but maybe just performed on 1 bike !

I then would love to see changes in times/performance when they do change items like tires, wheels,forks,brakes (or just different rotor sizes)....maybe weight tuning as well....the list is almost endless here.

So we would have different times for the same bike with different components.

-stock bike

-with fast semislicks
-high pressure in tires
-low pressure in tires
-with light wheels
-with small rotors
-with larger rotors
-with v-brakes
-with v-brakes on ceramic rims
-with crosscountry-fork
-with full rigid carbonfork
-with long travel fork
-with fork locked out on flat sections/climbs
-with fork all the time open
-with 2x9 gearing
-with 10s
-with a minimum weight tuning
......

the list could be almost endless but i'm sure such a test would reveal some interesting things for a given bike on a given course for a given rider

German ROAD magazine once did something similar considering just AERODYNAMICS on a roadbike. They tested on a wood-track indoors with SRM cranks and a professional timetrialist (Michael Rich, i think he once was worldchampion or at least one of the top TT racers to date). He had to do a steady 45 km/h (=28 mph) on this track and they would measure his watt input needed to reach that speed. He started on a cheapo standard roadracer in upright position and the needed watts were *465* !!

They now started optimizing his position step by step and show the saved watts in that graph below. These numbers clearly show the effect of all changes here...holding on the drops was one of the biggest saving of the test (-37 watt). Later on you can see that a aerodynamic helmet is worth 3 watts...that a skinsuit is worth 10 watts...anyway - in the end he used a Cervelo TT bike with carbon disc-wheels and in his all out optimized position he would need just *293* watts for the exact same 45 km/h speed!!

Now THIS is valuable data, isn't it?

I would really love to see similar performed tests on MTB equippment. I know biger teams such as Swisspower-Scott do similar things when testing /preparing their equipment.


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## slyboots (Sep 16, 2005)

nino said:


> -To make a valuable comparison test you would have to outfit them at least with the same tires.


I suppose they used the same rear wheel (powertap). Did they swap rear tire, brake rotor and cassette on the wheel to match those stock components of the bike being tested?

PS. Damn, I'd love to see that road/aerodynamics test in English.


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## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

nino said:


> I also add a comfort-measurement they took of all bikes.


At least their comfort measurement matches my experience.


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## fos'l (May 27, 2009)

I've been riding a carbon Zaskar. This could be one of the worst iterations of carbon because GT has the "famous" triple-triangle design which might add stiffness and weight. However, seat-of-the-pants data reflect a more compliant ride than any ferrous or aluminum-derived frame that I've ever been on, and power transfer seems great. I'd like to see the timed/power transfer tests performed on different frames with identical 
components.


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

thanks for the translations nino. I need to learn some german.... tricky language. 

It really is a good idea if they could do a test similar to that German road magazine considering just one of the variables that affects performance like bike weight, type of tires, frame stiffness and geometry, suspension setup, wheels, all that things... and then determine which variable counts the most in the bike performance.
Probably it is aerodynamics that influences the most in the bike performance, but what would be the next variable? After one has optimized the bike aerodynamics we could then focus on optimizing the next variable. Something similar like we do with weight tuning, first rotating mass then higher mass then the remain.

I hope this valuable data becomes available to the main public and not just as secrets to the big teams. I could pay for a test like that. 
hope bike-magazin.de has intentions to do this. 

Just realized that Ghost doesn’t sell individual frames just the complete bike.  

Another thing: whats going on with the glued metal on the tip of the chainstays? Looks like its going to pop out anytime in a hard descent. why dont they just make a continuous carbon tube?


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## wannabeRacer (Feb 9, 2004)

what does everyone think of the BMC Carbon hardtail compare to the Scott Scale and which one would you choose?


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## Flip03 (Nov 24, 2005)

I think after reading all of that you should buy whatever frame you like the look of the most. I dont think you are going to get a duffer really. Then we can move onto what wheels are best........Thats one i like too.


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

*Bmc...*



wannabeRacer said:


> what does everyone think of the BMC Carbon hardtail compare to the Scott Scale and which one would you choose?


Here's another german carbon-comparison test of BIKE magazine. The one above was from December 08 while this one is from June 09, same magazine and same testprocedure.You can actually compare the numbers in the list from one with the other.

@wannabeRacer:
Biggest complaint with the BMC was it's weight: 1385g for the frameset is really heavy especially when you look at the stiffness numbers which are pretty low...you would think it would be at least stiffer but that isn't the case. Overall it still gets a "very good" rating though.
For me no question though which one i would take

This time they tested the new Rocky Mountain flagship Mt.Vertex RSL team.However the Team frame is only 18g lighter than the cheaper 70RSL and has almost identical stiffness numbers as well.


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## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

Rocky began shipping the 50RSL frame early in February this year, and the 70RSL a month or so later. For the trade shows they had Team RSL frames painted like 50/70RSL frames, the early Team frame production was to get the racers kitted out. My custom painted 50RSL frame ended up at 1346gms with seat post clamp and the same size of Team RSL frame I saw at my LBS a couple of weeks ago weighed 1220gms with seat post clamp. I wonder if they got a trade show bike from Eurobike through the German distributor Bikeaction.de


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

rockyuphill said:


> Rocky began shipping the 50RSL frame early in February this year, and the 70RSL a month or so later. For the trade shows they had Team RSL frames painted like 50/70RSL frames, the early Team frame production was to get the racers kitted out. My custom painted 50RSL frame ended up at 1346gms with seat post clamp and the same size of Team RSL frame I saw at my LBS a couple of weeks ago weighed 1220gms with seat post clamp. I wonder if they got a trade show bike from Eurobike through the German distributor Bikeaction.de


if i'm right it's size L


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## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

nino said:


> if i'm right it's size L


My frame's a Large.


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

rockyuphill said:


> My frame's a Large.


Eurobike was last September...maybe the 1st test was done with such a bike but this seems to be a new one.
But what do you complain anyway? The RM frame is listed at 1235g...that's about the number you give above.Frame weights can vary too...


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## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

No complaints about the 50RSL frame I have at all, I love the way it rides, even if it is 125gms heavier than the Team frame. :thumbsup:


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## Broccoli (Jun 11, 2008)

nino said:


> as there's simply no Ti frame on the planet offering similar ride than todays 1 kilo carbon frames.


Blatant lie. And no amount of powder puff numbers can change that fact.

You can not even get a sub 1-kilo frame with relaxed angles - or with requisite durability and strength for trail riding.

OP is seeking a lightweight racing frame, which is quite a narrow choice. Nothing wrong with that - but generalizing it to the full spectrum of cycling experiences is invalid.


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

Curmy do you know any good titanium frames with the same mechanical qualities as a carbon frame and at less than 1100g? I'm open to sugestions. 

By now I have more doubts than when I started searching. 
Anyone has real data (stiffness, weight etc.) on the Cube Elite HPC and Giant XtC ADVANCED SL 0 carbon frames? 


thanks


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## Broccoli (Jun 11, 2008)

sergio_pt said:


> Curmy do you know any good titanium frames with the same mechanical qualities as a carbon frame and at less than 1100g? I'm open to sugestions.


No, I do not, nor did I imply there is one. Sorry for thread hijacking, I understand that what you are looking for was clearly stated in the title. We all need different things from our bikes. Personally, I do not ride competitively, so I would value robustness - and availability of modern relaxed geometry more then a few shaved grams. I just was ticked off by some blatantly generalizing statements about benefits of some particular material, but I should have known better then arguing with some opinionated posters.


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## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

Curmy said:


> No, I do not, nor did I imply there is one. Sorry for thread hijacking, I understand that what you are looking for was clearly stated in the title. We all need different things from our bikes. Personally, I do not ride competitively, so I would value robustness - and availability of modern relaxed geometry more then a few shaved grams.


You should try a carbon framed hardtail. A buddy of mine was a diehard Ti SS guy and after he tried a carbon bike his faith in Ti being the only material was severely shaken.

I'm about 195 pounds and the carbon hardtail I've been riding is at once the most solid feeling and comfy hardtail I have ridden. I'm riding my carbon hardtail on technical trails that I wouldn't tried my previous steel or alloy hardtails on because they didn't inspire confidence in technical conditions. My carbon hardtail is pure XC race geometry with a 100mm fork and it feels major manoueverable in technical conditions and gives me so much more choice for lines. It only weighs 20.17 pounds so it floats uphills and you can make it do anything or go anywhere descending on technical surfaces. The stiffness of the frame combined with the grippy Race Kings have me riding more technical trails comfortably.


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## kentkreitler (Jul 29, 2006)

sergio_pt said:


> Curmy do you know any good titanium frames with the same mechanical qualities as a carbon frame and at less than 1100g? I'm open to sugestions.
> 
> By now I have more doubts than when I started searching.
> Anyone has real data (stiffness, weight etc.) on the Cube Elite HPC and Giant XtC ADVANCED SL 0 carbon frames?
> ...


My Giant XTC Advanced SL weighed in at 1160g at size L. I also have one in size small (don't ask why...), it weighed the same, on the same scale. The latter is the painted SL0, the other the "frame only" graphics. My bet is that the giant is the best frame, regardless anything.


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## iClique (Oct 7, 2008)

Go for the Tranny!


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

Curmy said:


> Blatant lie. And no amount of powder puff numbers can change that fact.
> 
> You can not even get a sub 1-kilo frame with relaxed angles - or with requisite durability and strength for trail riding.
> 
> OP is seeking a lightweight racing frame, which is quite a narrow choice. Nothing wrong with that - but generalizing it to the full spectrum of cycling experiences is invalid.


c'mon Curmy

Please don't take sentences out of the context here.
WE (=all the posters in this thread except you) are talking about a frame that matches his search: light,stiff...

Once again, i don't care if a frame lasts longer than i live...this doesn't make it any better for me nor for the poster.That's NOT what we are looking for. My sentence was aimed at Ti-frames not offering the same race-performance oriented ride qualities at the same weight that you get out of todays "1 kilo" carbon frames. Maybe this time you understand it? WE are talking about ultralight frames and there is no Ti-frame matching the carbons performance here. Thats s what you also agreed just above.

You don't race, maybe you never did so you seem to lack that will to look for the ultimate performance edge some of the guys in here are looking for. I do understand 100% what you are trying to say. I do agree that Ti-frames may be more durable, that they might offer a more relaxed ride with slacker angles (obviously race-carbons aren't intended for those type of riding), that Ti has it's own aura...that there's Ti frames offering a great ride....BUT that was not asked in here. It was asked which frame would be the best combination of light,stiff etc. and that's just not where Ti matches at all.

It's just that. Simple. No assertions at all - just 100% facts.

BTW: Maybe time to throw a leg over a nice "plastic" bike, what do you think? Maybe your "old-school" mind would also change a bit? Rest assured that once you sit on such a roecktship your will to go faster raises instantly. When every pedal stroke goes 100% forward...


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## Broccoli (Jun 11, 2008)

rockyuphill said:


> My carbon hardtail is pure XC race geometry with a 100mm fork and it feels major manoueverable in technical conditions and gives me so much more choice for lines. It only weighs 20.17 pounds so it floats uphills and you can make it do anything or go anywhere descending on technical surfaces. The stiffness of the frame combined with the grippy Race Kings have me riding more technical trails comfortably.


Why do you think I have not tried any carbon hardtails? I did ride Trek and Specialized for extended test rides, Giant for a little bit. As far as the ultra-lightweight jobs, no, thank you. I do in fact drag bikes over rocks at night. And I actually would pick carbon over lightweight aluminum for this. My next bike will likely be a short travel 29r for 8h+ rides, and I would want a more relaxed geometry. I am thinking custom steel front triangle with Ventana-made rear.. Which has no bearing on the question in this thread at all, so I should leave. Let Nino wave numbers in the air.



iClique said:


> Go for the Tranny!


I am actually very seriously considering it as a travel bike - taking in a plane with me dissasembled. Neat construction.


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

funny frame









hooo this is very convenient for marathon races! When you get tired just take off your wheel, unsrew the RD, sit down grab the beer and open it with your frame!











thanks for the weight kentkreitler


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## slyboots (Sep 16, 2005)

You don't even need to unscrew RD, cos it's a single speed dropout.


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## Igor Gordienko (Jun 27, 2007)

sergio_pt said:


> Anyone has real data (stiffness, weight etc.) on the Cube Elite HPC and Giant XtC ADVANCED SL 0 carbon frames?


I have Cube Elite HPC that is 1320g at size M (18" height, 585mm ETT, 2007 year) including derailer handler and Syntace headset. I cannot compare it with other carbon frames and It would be nice to know if somebody has data on stiffness of Cube carbon frames.


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

Igor Gordienko said:


> I have Cube Elite HPC that is 1320g at size M (18" height, 585mm ETT, 2007 year) including derailer handler and Syntace headset. I cannot compare it with other carbon frames and It would be nice to know if somebody has data on stiffness of Cube carbon frames.


Your cube is heavier than what was measured by bike-magazin. Probably its a newer frame.

they say its an excellent frame. Another good candidate for best carbon hardtail frame.

Interesting the heavier frames have the higher stiffness numbers. Just have to decide whats stiff enough and whats light enough.


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## Cayenne_Pepa (Dec 18, 2007)

I would say Cannondales' new 2010 Flash High-Modulus frame is tops. At only 980g a German independent tester found it to be stiffest to-weight ratio frame ever tested.


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

Zachariah said:


> I would say Cannondales' new 2010 Flash High-Modulus frame is tops. At only 980g a German independent tester found it to be stiffest to-weight ratio frame ever tested.


thats interesting for a skiny frame made to flex everywhere. Could you post the data?
thanks


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## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

And of course with a stiffness to weight ratio measure, that won't translate directly to overall maximum stiffness regardless of weight.


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## Cayenne_Pepa (Dec 18, 2007)

WR304 said:


> Calfee can even make you a carbon fibre recumbent trike.:eekster:
> 
> http://www.calfeedesign.com/stiletto.htm
> 
> I think it's more the carbon fibre monocoque frames that are limited in sizes due to their construction.


The BEST THING about riding a carbon recumbent with my woman...would be the view looking behind!!!


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

rockyuphill said:


> And of course with a stiffness to weight ratio measure, that won't translate directly to overall maximum stiffness regardless of weight.


thats correct. You just have to know whats light enough or whats stiff enough for a given weight.


----------



## Cayenne_Pepa (Dec 18, 2007)

sergio_pt said:


> thats interesting for a skiny frame made to flex everywhere. Could you post the data?
> thanks


http://www.velonews.com/article/94319


----------



## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

Zachariah said:


> http://www.velonews.com/article/94319


Interesting again.

So the absolute stiffness for the Cannondale Flash is 97Nm/deg.
I think we cannot compare the tests done by Dirk Zedler and bike-magazin because we dont know if they are exactly done the same way, but if yes its a good number for a 950g frame.

Velonews writes:
Cannondale sent a Flash Carbon frame, which they assured was totally stock, to the German tester Dirk Zedler. Zedler is best known for his rigorous testing for Tour Magazine and is known to manufacturers as a reliable third-party tester for frame integrity.

Cannondale engineers say the Flash Carbon was the highest-scored mountain bike for strength-to-weight that Zedler had ever done. The test procedure goes like this: the frame is held horizontally by the rear dropouts and there is a single support beam under the center of the headtube. A steel bar is then inserted into the headtube and a weight is hung by this bar where the tire patch would normally exist. Measurements are then taken for the flex of the frame. The resulting score was 102 (stiffness to weight). This number is calculated by dividing the force and distance, 97nm/deg by the frame weight in kilograms, 0.95kg.


----------



## tnickols (May 24, 2008)

LAN said:


> Here is some pictures of the work in progress: Trek 9.9 SSL.


why put disc brakes on a road bike?


----------



## culturesponge (Aug 15, 2007)

*930g 18" Merida 2010 0.Nine frame*

sorry for reviving this thread

been researching the Merida 2010 0.Nine carbon hardtail

frame's apparently 930g in 18" or 960g with BB30 which is 35% stiffer

5 year warranty for riders under the 120kg weight limit (including race use!)

....anyone have any experience of Merida hardtails?


----------



## Cayenne_Pepa (Dec 18, 2007)

culturesponge said:


> sorry for reviving this thread
> 
> been researching the Merida 2010 0.Nine carbon hardtail
> 
> ...


Gunn-Rita Dahle Flesja seems to do well on a Merida.


----------



## culturesponge (Aug 15, 2007)

*2010 Focus Raven 900g with BB30*



Zachariah said:


> Gunn-Rita Dahle Flesja seems to do well on a Merida.


brilliant name that Gunn-Rita Dahle Flesja

have gone off the Merida already - now lusting after the 2010 Focus Raven Extreme frameset

900g with BB30 + integrated cable routing & North American distribution (sometime soon)

...looks (abit) like a Vertex in this photo

http://www.bikerumor.com/2009/08/14/spy-shot-2010-focus-carbon-fiber-hardtail/


----------



## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

The Vertex is a bit curvier looking in headtube area.


----------



## Broccoli (Jun 11, 2008)

tnickols said:


> why put disc brakes on a road bike?


Because it can be wet on the roads.


----------



## culturesponge (Aug 15, 2007)

*900g 2010 Focus Raven Extreme frameset with BB30*



rockyuphill said:


> The Vertex is a bit curvier looking in headtube area.


aha! ...isn't there a Gary Fisher carbon frame that's also very similar?


----------



## Mighty Matt (Apr 22, 2009)

nino said:


> Funny you post that "Scott"-link:
> if you would read the text above you could see that the germans did/do durability tests for ages to see if carbon is better in the long term. Not only handlebars, seatposts, cranksets but also framesets. The result is that carbon long passed the other frame materials in every aspect.
> 
> If you are interested in a frame that can sit 20 years out in the rain, or 100 years in salty water and still look the same than be lucky with your Ti-frame. The question in here was for the best lightweight hardtail frame and if it has to be light a Ti-frame is already out of the question. If optics and durability are the main subject Ti is indeed in the mix again. Ti frames can be great nontheless as can steel and aluminiums. No question. But if the OP asks for best i doubt Ti is what he is looking for.
> ...


just had a thought. forget carbon go with a custom duct tape bike. now that would be awesome. any color you want and very customisable.


----------



## The Beater (Aug 17, 2008)

I am shocked no one has mentions the Cannondal Flash 950 grms claimed weight. Not my cup of tea but it is light


----------



## purdyboy (Nov 15, 2005)

I'm still interested in info on the Merida carbon frame.

There is a slim possiblity of me getting a sweet deal on this frame around Dec/Jan.
(FLX1000/2000 - whole bike actually) 
I've read that the frame is both stiff but comfortable due to the flex stays, and at around 1.0kg the frame weight is great.

Wondering if it will be a good bike for a smooth 145lb rider to use on XC and general singletrail use - and as a good platform to build up with future weight weenie-ness.
It seems like a poor mans Scott Scale, at worst, which is fine by me (...poor man).

What do you know about the frame???


----------



## frequent crasher (Apr 16, 2008)

how about 2010 Merida 0.9 carbon frames. Weighed a 18" frame last week, 980grams or 2.16 lbs.


----------



## Serlab (Aug 7, 2008)

*Carbon Hardtail*

I would definitely consider the Look 986 or the Cannondale Flash Carbon.


----------



## limba (Jan 9, 2004)

I *am* seriously considering the Cannondale Flash. Mostly because the old Scott guy helped design it.


----------



## invol2ver (Jul 14, 2009)

another vote for scale:thumbsup:


----------



## Jake Pay (Dec 27, 2006)

purdyboy said:


> I'm still interested in info on the Merida carbon frame.


Here here, if I had the $$$$ that frame would be mine








~Jake.....​


----------



## culturesponge (Aug 15, 2007)

a 16lb flash is just amazing, but i just can't get beyond the garish NASCAR(ish) graphics, shame as there's some really nice paint on several 2010 Cannondales


----------



## LMN (Sep 8, 2007)

Recently I was doing some serious drooling over the 2010 Orbea Alma that was sitting in my basement.


----------



## Broccoli (Jun 11, 2008)

LMN said:


> Recently I was doing some serious drooling over the 2010 Orbea Alma that was sitting in my basement.


That is creepy.


----------



## LMN (Sep 8, 2007)

Curmy said:


> That is creepy.


"People who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones".


----------



## rockyuphill (Nov 28, 2004)

culturesponge said:


> aha! ...isn't there a Gary Fisher carbon frame that's also very similar?


Not really, Fisher's only carbon hardtails are 29" and not that curvy.


----------



## kentkreitler (Jul 29, 2006)

Not enough votes for the new XTC Advanced SL in this thread.


----------



## Devildog (Feb 25, 2009)

Two thumbs up for the Ibis Tranny. Cant beat the versatility. 
SS? no problem. Geared? no problem. Bottle opener? no problem. Ability to fit in a suitcase? no problem. 
Very sexy looking too. I'm currently saving every penny for one. Unfortunately, it's a lot of pennies.


----------



## culturesponge (Aug 15, 2007)

*2010 Cube Reaction GTC SL*



rockyuphill said:


> Not really, Fisher's only carbon hardtails are 29" and not that curvy.


i'm not ribbing RM products, carbon Vertex's are a thing of great beauty

but okay then, another similar design perhaps is the fantastic 2010 Cube Reaction GTC SL or the S-Works Stumpjumper 29" hardtail or the Niner Carbon Air 9 or the Focus Raven Extreme?

http://www.cube-bikes.de/xist4c/web/reaction-gtc-red_id_36136_.htm

http://www.focus-bikes.com/bike_detail.asp?active=1&jahr=2010&lang=english&rub=mar&pr=753016&do=idx

...........edit to edit photo's................


----------



## jmerrey (Jul 26, 2009)

Oclv


----------



## heatstroke (Jul 1, 2003)

Yeah - I test rode it. It was a medium and came in at 930g. Complete bike 18lbs. 
Merida's workmanship is excellent, and the frame has been getting pretty good reviews.


----------



## purdyboy (Nov 15, 2005)

Thanks Heatstroke.
Does the Merida rear triangle 'do what it says on the box' in terms of vertical compliance?


----------



## yellowbook (Aug 21, 2005)

Maybe Cannondale needs to be mentioned in here, but I'm sure other CF Frames are just as durable:


----------



## Psycho Marco (Nov 7, 2008)

Why is it that in the last pictures the saddles are to hi in relation of the handlebar? riding those bikes must be a PITA


----------



## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

I'd like to see more videos like that with other brands like scott, cube, ghost, storck.


----------



## spartan23 (Jun 14, 2004)

*Cannondale Flash*

++ for the C'dale Flash but be prepared for a hefty price tag 

*$9600 for the Flash Ultimate* :eekster: :eekster:


----------



## kentkreitler (Jul 29, 2006)

It's quite funny that most people in this thread that recommends a bike or a frame, have never even ridden it...


----------



## yellowbook (Aug 21, 2005)

Psycho Marco said:


> Why is it that in the last pictures the saddles are to hi in relation of the handlebar? riding those bikes must be a PITA


:lol: :lol: :lol:

My ex-bike:


----------



## xcatax (Mar 26, 2009)

I bet orbea alma oms , its 1kg frame and you save i-links coz it comes with it  .


----------



## Smart Sam (Jul 12, 2008)

As far as carbon goes I would put my vote in on the new Lapierre Pro Race 900, other wise the new Titus Fireline is my favorite HT frame.


----------



## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

So... we have a nice display of bikes here now but I still do not what's the best carbon HT frame for racing and marathons and haven't decided which frame to buy... its kinda difficult decision. can I just pick one and be happy?...
Has it came out any more BIKE magazin tests on hardtail frames? I'd like to compare more manufactures like Beone, stevens, focus, giant, orbea, bianchi....
cheers


----------



## conrad (Jan 27, 2004)

*every one has a choice/favourite so choose 1*

Simply put choose the closest one that meets your requirements........and you are happy with it's test results.....you can always change it later anyway.........if you want
read the tests, take one for a ride if you can...decide on your spec build........& just do it.

I did that with my steel & ti frames.......choose what I wanted & build them up according to my spec.....I'm very happy...sure there are better newer frames now...but I don't really care..it's about what you can affort & suits your needs at the time.:thumbsup: 
To many cooks spoil the broth......as it were......every one has a opinion but only yours matters as you are paying....for it.


----------



## spartan23 (Jun 14, 2004)

kentkreitler said:


> It's quite funny that most people in this thread that recommends a bike or a frame, have never even ridden it...


ummm your're right I have not ridden a "Flash" but having a race bred FS scalpel (that can run/ outperform most HT's), I can already envison what the 6lb lighter, SRAM XX equipped HT Flash can do


----------



## Jake Pay (Dec 27, 2006)

*What's the best carbon hardtail frame?*

sergio,

7 months and still no bike


----------



## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

I'm glad i kept my Scott Scales...i just heard a rumor from a Scott rep that next years lineup will be killer  Right now the Scale is in its 6th year (!!) and according the two major german bike magazines still amongst the top five HT offerings on the market. 

If i had to shop for a new frame it would probably be the Merida followed by the Scale. C'dale is a no-go for me. Too many custom standards/solutions and too much $$$. But to be sure you would need to ride such a bike before buying it. The geometry needs to suit you otherwise it's too much of a compromise.


----------



## eliflap (Dec 13, 2007)

here, finally , a Flash carbon 26" hi mod on scale

M size , 960 g


----------



## yellowbook (Aug 21, 2005)

I think that's very impressive for right out of the box.


----------



## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

conrad said:


> Simply put choose the closest one that meets your requirements........and you are happy with it's test results.....you can always change it later anyway.........if you want
> read the tests, take one for a ride if you can...decide on your spec build........& just do it.
> 
> I did that with my steel & ti frames.......choose what I wanted & build them up according to my spec.....I'm very happy...sure there are better newer frames now...but I don't really care..it's about what you can affort & suits your needs at the time.:thumbsup:
> To many cooks spoil the broth......as it were......every one has a opinion but only yours matters as you are paying....for it.


yes you are right. My favourite was the Ghost frame for the looks and for the positive points on the test. I was about to buy it yesterday on a local bikeshop, but them they only sell the ugly black/red frame. Mailed the manufacturer to see if they could get me one with the Pro team colors and the answer was: "It's impossible to buy only frames",  so Ghost is out of the list.



Jake Pay said:


> sergio,
> 
> 7 months and still no bike


hehe you are right too. Its an expensive purchase so I want to make the right decision. Meanwhile I stopped searching for a new frame because I had to buy other important stuff, but now I'm back on it again.



nino said:


> I'm glad i kept my Scott Scales...i just heard a rumor from a Scott rep that next years lineup will be killer  Right now the Scale is in its 6th year (!!) and according the two major german bike magazines still amongst the top five HT offerings on the market.
> 
> If i had to shop for a new frame it would probably be the Merida followed by the Scale. C'dale is a no-go for me. Too many custom standards/solutions and too much $$$. But to be sure you would need to ride such a bike before buying it. The geometry needs to suit you otherwise it's too much of a compromise.


And you are right too.  Scott Scale has been one of the favourite MTN bikes for bikers for many years, Probably my next choice... Tell us more details about the next years Scott.
Thought about cannondale too but I also don't like the different BB and suspension, and more money.
Why would you choose the Merida now?


----------



## LAN (Jan 26, 2004)

I just got my o.nine xx frameset in size 18"

The weight is 1027g without bottlecage bolts, seatclamp etc.
The headset weight is 57g (without starnut/topcap)

It seems to be compatible with the narrow XX crankset, and it has huge tire clerance at the same time. I mounted a Schwalbe Al Mighty 2,6" downhill tire in the rear triangle, with room to spare.


----------



## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

LAN said:


> I just got my o.nine xx frameset in size 18"
> 
> The weight is 1027g without bottlecage bolts, seatclamp etc.
> The headset weight is 57g (without starnut/topcap)


Nice.

I see there's some headset cups installed.Is the weight including them? if so that's another 15-20g if that's a semi-integrated crankset.


----------



## LAN (Jan 26, 2004)

I think the cups are glued in the frame, so yes the 1027g weight is including the cups.

The rest of the headset weighs 57g (2x bearings 19g each, crown race 3g, top cover 16g)


----------



## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

LAN said:


> I think the cups are glued in the frame, so yes the 1027g weight is including the cups.
> 
> The rest of the headset weighs 57g (2x bearings 19g each, crown race 3g, top cover 16g)


No-looks not like they are glued in. Looks like a semi-integrated headset to me with the cups already pressed in.So that's bout 20g you can subtract from your frames weight.

Pictured below such a FSA semi-integrated headset including those 2 silver cups that get pressed into the frame.

By the way - a Tune BUBU weighs 12g less (pictured below)

Just one question:
what's the seattube diameter down low where a typical front derailleur would fit? I know it's supposed to be used with that direct mount-style derailleurs but those weigh a "ton" (ca. 115g). I think you should be able to fit a Dura Ace at around 80g including Top-pull adapter. So which diameter is the seattube down there?

Looking closer i note the rear derailleur cable is running down the rear seatstay and has an opening facing upwards...no good! There you need a "bassworm" or a good seal otherwise the cables get sticky in no time.Or better yet a full lenght liner like the Alligator i-links come with.


----------



## LAN (Jan 26, 2004)

The tube is oval where the braze-on clamp can be mounted. I have a Parlee 34,9mm clamp that I can try, that is so thin and flexible that it might work. A alu clamp will probably not work.

Okay, the cups looked like they were glued in, but you might be right. What is the Tune Bubu weight without topcover? I'm probably going to run the headset without it to reduce the stack height. The headtube is larger than most "m" frames.

So the frame is 1007g then.


----------



## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

LAN said:


> The tube is oval where the braze-on clamp can be mounted. I have a Parlee 34,9mm clamp that I can try, that is so thin and flexible that it might work. A alu clamp will probably not work.
> 
> Okay, the cups looked like they were glued in, but you might be right. What is the Tune Bubu weight without topcover? I'm probably going to run the headset without it to reduce the stack height. The headtube is larger than most "m" frames.
> 
> So the frame is 1007g then.


ok-a oval seattube hinders you from using lightweight road derailleurs...this alone adds about 40g then (just like on the Cannondale Flash)

The Tune Bubu shown above needs the top cap.it covers the bearings.but it is definitely a bit lower than your 0815 FSA headset.

Does the Merida frame come with PM rear disc mount or is it still IS? In other words do you still need to use an adapter to fit the rear brake?


----------



## LAN (Jan 26, 2004)

it's postmount, so you don't need adapter

I just tried with the parlee 34,9mm clamp, and that did not fit. But the carbon clamp is real flexible, so if you get a custom made clamp from btp or mcfk I think it will work.

This will be a Di2 bike, so I have to get a clamp to work, but if I was running a standard mechanical setup I would just get the XX and tune it with alu/nylon bolts. A little heavier, but probably better shifting.


----------



## nikoli8 (Mar 23, 2008)

I almost bought this frame, in Tawain 3 months back... It looks sweet!


----------



## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

Are there any stiffness measurements on the merida o.nine frame?


----------



## LAN (Jan 26, 2004)

Nino posted stiffness data in the Focus Raven Extreme thread.

It's has average stiffness, not as stiff as Storck/Canyon, but stiffer than Orbea/Trek.


----------



## bottleboy (Apr 14, 2009)

Post the lnk plz


----------



## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

LAN said:


> Nino posted stiffness data in the Focus Raven Extreme thread.
> 
> It's has average stiffness, not as stiff as Storck/Canyon, but stiffer than Orbea/Trek.


thanks. I missed that post. I also have the same magazine in paper they sent me for free, but I cant read a bit of german...  Is there an English translation or Portuguese of German bike magazin?

The cannondale flash team was the best in that test.

http://forums.mtbr.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=498502&stc=1&d=1258639570


----------



## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

double post


----------



## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

sergio_pt said:


> thanks. I missed that post. I also have the same magazine in paper they sent me for free, but I cant read a bit of german...  Is there an English translation or Portuguese of German bike magazin?
> 
> The cannondale flash team was the best in that test.
> 
> http://forums.mtbr.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=498502&stc=1&d=1258639570


no-that's an older test you show there.


----------



## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

nino said:


> no-that's an older test you show there.


my bad. that link was in clipboard...
your post with the correct link http://forums.mtbr.com/showpost.php?p=6329651&postcount=65


----------



## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

Here's my homework with the data from two bike magazin German tests:

Which one would you guys pick?


----------



## 88 rex (Aug 2, 2007)

Flash.


----------



## limba (Jan 9, 2004)

88 rex said:


> Flash.


Yup. That's the bike for 2010.


----------



## culturesponge (Aug 15, 2007)

out of your finalists i'm really liking the Merida O.Nine frameset (complete build isn't bad also)

...but i wouldn't build another 26" hardtail considering the speed advantages of 29" wheels on a hardtail race bike - my own 29" frames choices are a coin toss to decide between the Niner Air Carbon or Cannondale Flash 29'ER 1 framesets:

Air Nine Carbon: http://www.ninerbikes.com/fly.aspx?layout=bikes&taxid=271

Cannondale Flash 29'ER 1 http://www.cannondale.com/usa/usaen...29er/Details/1295-0FS291S-Flash-Carbon-29er-1


----------



## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

sergio_pt said:


> Here's my homework with the data from two bike magazin German tests:
> 
> Which one would you guys pick?


Problem is that in that test they tested the Scale RC with integrated seatpost.Usually the Scale weighs a lot less and would rank way higher.

Anyway - for me the flash is a no-go because of too much custom standards. I don't like it t when a manufacturer limits me in choosing oarts. As mentioned before the front derailleur alone will add 40g for example. All those nice absorbtion properties are due to that Cannondale seatpost (which is heavy). So if you replace the seatpost with a light one gone is also the nice comfy ride...
It might be for sure one of the sweetest bikes in stock trim but when built on your own i would look elswewhere.

That's where i see the Merida up front which only has the front derailleur problem (adding 40g...). I have never ridden a Merida but it would be one to look closer at.

And regarding the weight and ride the Scott is still one of the best frames and still rated high by all testers. It has the right mix of stiffness and comfort and the weight is great too if you look at the versions without (!) integrated seatpost.


----------



## quax (Feb 21, 2009)

First of all, it is my believe that despite all the media/forum suggested differences HT frames are all pretty much the same. In that price range you're looking at they are all good. 

Regarding the Flash I fully agree with nino. I almost fell for it myself considering too replace my Scale with it. However, I kept my Scale and got a Spark for comfort. If you want comfort on a HT go high-volume-tires-at-low-pressure. If that's not enough get a FS. By the way, in one of those tests, despite having similar stiffness, the Canyon scored better in "comfort" than the Flash. It's about half the price, isn't it? Canyon probably offers the best price-performance ratio, the frameset for about ~ €1250 (but unfortunately a funny seat tube).

I'd really base my decision on a) system weight (not only frame) and b) extensibility (e.g. no funny formed seat tubes or funny seatpost diameters or funny forks)


----------



## Kwik (Aug 7, 2007)

All the flashes in the tests are preproduction versions. There was one testbike in or local shop size L weighing 7,5 kg total as claimed.

Now there is a real production version in the shop size M weighing 7,8 kg total. They put an frame only on the scale of the real production version en it did weight about 1200 gram. So real frames could be heavier, didn't see frame only on scale myself so I have no prove. But I did weight the complete bike myself at 7,8 kg size M.

My cannondale CAAD5 frame (2002)size M weights about 1550 gram. Strong, stiff, good comfort, bought its second hand so cheap, can use roadfront mech at 78 gram. And the paint job is even beter then the flash I think.


----------



## nathanbal (Jan 30, 2007)

eliflap has a picture of a medium flash frame only at 960g from memory...


----------



## limba (Jan 9, 2004)

Yeah, I've seen at least three Med. Flash frames that weigh under 1000g. Even when you add the direct front derailleur the frame is still lighter than almost any other.


----------



## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

What is the weight of the current Scale without integrated seatpost? 
In Scott website they say the weight is 980g for all versions...  
The Scale is cool. I'm leaning towards Stevens Scope too, for the weight, frame structure feels strong, standard cablerouting and seatpost diameter, direct PM. It's the bike used by the Portuguese MTB Team, they have been doing good with it.


----------



## quax (Feb 21, 2009)

My Scale 10 came in at 1058 g (size M).

Can't say anything about the Stevens but the price for the frameset looks really nice. Once owned the Juke from them, very lightweight alu frame. I liked it.


----------



## Mattias_Hellöre (Oct 2, 2005)

As I said before in a another thread, I´m willing to do a clamp that could work on a Flash if anyone is giving me a mockup of this seattube.

Like using these:
https://byzarah.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/img_2717.jpg

A good suggestion maybe?


----------



## bottleboy (Apr 14, 2009)

Cant find any reviews of carbon hardtails ón the Internet. Could someone post a link or img from a Magazine? Im very interested in the Scott scale models, but ofc others too. Regards


----------



## Broccoli (Jun 11, 2008)

bottleboy said:


> Cant find any reviews of carbon hardtails ón the Internet.


----------



## letsride29 (Feb 3, 2010)

*I vote Orbea Alma*

I vote with smellycat. Orbea has proven itself over and over.


----------



## letsride29 (Feb 3, 2010)

Quax likes the Scale (Scott). I've got a friend who recently bought ($$$) one and he's also really into it. I'm curious to ride it. Has anyone done a comparison of the Scale to the Alma?


----------



## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

letsride29 said:


> Orbea has proven itself over and over.


No true - Julien Absalon did-not Orbea I think that guy would win on a old steel commuter as well...

Those frames are heavy and rather flexy...they're definitely not amongst those frames that take the most benefit out of carbon.


----------



## oldassracer (Mar 26, 2009)

Cheers! said:


> That is a lot of saddle to bar drop!!!! I wish I was that flexible.


wow being that flexible - some guys would never leave the house...:nono:


----------



## xcatax (Mar 26, 2009)

nino said:


> No true - Julien Absalon did-not Orbea I think that guy would win on a old steel commuter as well...
> 
> Those frames are heavy and rather flexy...they're definitely not amongst those frames that take the most benefit out of carbon.


Are you talking about new Orbea alma OMG 2010 frame or old ones?










I thought that was coming close 1kg

Salu2
Juan


----------



## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

xcatax said:


> Are you talking about new Orbea alma OMG 2010 frame or old ones?
> 
> [/IMG]
> 
> ...


It doesn't really matter-Orbea so far has not built any decent carbon frames.
Neither light nor stiff...as mentioned they don't get the best out of carbon but they have the best rider which covers the weaknesses


----------



## LMN (Sep 8, 2007)

nino said:


> It doesn't really matter-Orbea so far has not built any decent carbon frames.
> Neither light nor stiff...as mentioned they don't get the best out of carbon but they have the best rider which covers the weaknesses


There a lot more to a bike then weight and stiffness.

The question is what is the best Carbon Frame, weight and stiffness are definitely factors but not the deciding factors. Long term durability, ride quality and geometry are arguable the much more important. Weight and stiffness are just easiest to measure, the others can be rather subjective.

My wife raced my 08 Alma for a season and then for the past two years I have ridden and raced it just about exclusively. The bike has close to 10,000km of hard off-road miles on it with zero problems from the frame. It may not be the stiffest or the lightest bike out there but in the important durability category it has to be the near the top.

Of course my major complaint about it is the single water bottle mount on the small frames. Fortunately for us vertical challenged people that has been fixed on the new frames. (Oh and the new frames are built around a 100mm fork).


----------



## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

nino said:


> It doesn't really matter-Orbea so far has not built any decent carbon frames.
> Neither light nor stiff...as mentioned they don't get the best out of carbon but they have the best rider which covers the weaknesses


Orbea has not built any decent carbon, nor aluminium frames...  I have an alu Orbea and it's heavy and wobbly. :madman:  that's why I need something better.



LMN said:


> There a lot more to a bike then weight and stiffness.
> 
> The question is what is the best Carbon Frame, weight and stiffness are definitely factors but not the deciding factors. Long term durability, ride quality and geometry are arguable the much more important. Weight and stiffness are just easiest to measure, the others can be rather subjective.
> 
> ...


Long term durability is not an important quality for race bikes, you can have a new frame every race, but important for someone that wants to keep the bike for some years. Difficult to measure but I may also say If the frame is stiff it's strong, if it's strong it's durable!
Ride quality, I suppose you mean comfort, it can be and it's measured, no problems here to me. If I need more comfort I may add a more forgiving seatpost.

Frame geometry is also important but any decent top level race frame as the correct geometry for it's purpose. And if it's the best it's a top level frame.


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

I was told that the KTM carbon frames are around 900g. Cant find any real confirmation about this. Anyone has a KTM carbon hardtail bike? http://www.ktm-bikes.at/en/mountain/race/hardtail-carbon/Myroonprestige.php


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## LMN (Sep 8, 2007)

sergio_pt said:


> Long term durability is not an important quality for race bikes, you can have a new frame every race, but important for someone that wants to keep the bike for some years. Difficult to measure but I may also say If the frame is stiff it's strong, if it's strong it's durable!
> Ride quality, I suppose you mean comfort, it can be and it's measured, no problems here to me. If I need more comfort I may add a more forgiving seatpost.
> 
> Frame geometry is also important but any decent top level race frame as the correct geometry for it's purpose. And if it's the best it's a top level frame.


Depends upon what you define as long term. I don't like to name names but I know many racers who were without their race bike in the middle of season because their three month old frame failed. Some riders on *big* factory teams last year were riding their duallies because their hardtails had broken.

There isn't a race team out there with budget to have a new frame for every race. Stiff does not equal strong. Two completely different properties. Actually an big component of durability is flex.

Geometry does matter and not all geometries are the same. Small differences make or break a bike. The fastest bike I have ever ridden is a 96 Norco Torrent. The frame was 4lbs noddle but the geometry was perfect. It may have been a tiny bit slower on the climbs but more than made up for that on the descents. If I hadn't sheered the head tube off the bike I probably would have gotten some disk tabs welded on and would still be riding it.


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## Kwik (Aug 7, 2007)

Often stiff means taken more and sharper hits, with aluminium stiff and light rims break easier than light and less stiff rims.


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

Kwik said:


> Often stiff means taken more and sharper hits, with aluminium stiff and light rims break easier than light and less stiff rims.


The terms stiffness in carbon rtechnology have nothing to do with "hard" like we had it with aluminium frames.

As Cannondale shows they were able to produce a ultralight yet uber-stiff frame with great absorbing qualities at the same time.They know how to get the best out of the fibres. Orbea on the other hand offers heavy frames that lack in stiffness which also results in less steering precision. German magazine-testers say that those frames are for lighter riders only...and a heavier frame has nothing to do with better durability at all! That's wrong thinking.


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## 88 rex (Aug 2, 2007)

nino said:


> As Cannondale shows they were able to produce a ultralight yet uber-stiff frame with great absorbing qualities at the same time.They know how to get the best out of the fibres.


Yea, what he said.

If someone is serious about racing and looking for a carbon hardtail, then I find it really hard to recommend ANYTHING over the Flash in terms of weight, stiffness (based on tests), and "plushness" with the SAVE technology and seatpost. Also, a decent warranty and no weight limit.

The ONLY negative would be $$$.


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## ptcutch (Aug 3, 2009)

Loved my Scott Scale Ltd until I cracked the rear drivetrain side seat stay. Not sure when I did it but it did look like it got dinged off a rock. Scott is going to do a crash replacment for a good price with the Scott Scale RC with integrated seat post. Decent response and easy to deal with Scott through LBS. Also picked up a Scott Spark LTD for the upcoming season as I liked my Scale so much!


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

88 rex said:


> The ONLY negative would be $$$.


There's more:
Most of the "comfort" comes from the heavy seatpost ca. 220-230g.Once replaced with a seatpost with decent weight that's gone.

Lefty - you love it or hate it.I personally don't want a Lefty.And it's heavier than the lightest forks out there (DT Carbon...) and stem choice is limited as well...

Direct-mount front derailleur: adds about 40g over lightweight solutions

Weird rear brakehose routing.


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## 88 rex (Aug 2, 2007)

nino said:


> There's more:
> Most of the "comfort" comes from the heavy seatpost.Once replaced with a seatpost with decent weight that's gone.
> 
> Lefty - you love it or hate it.I personally don't want a Lefty.
> ...


What's the weight of the post?

Brake hose routing, there's nothing wrong with it. Now you're just nitpicking. Functionally you can't fault the bike.


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

88 rex said:


> What's the weight of the post?
> 
> Brake hose routing, there's nothing wrong with it. Now you're just nitpicking. Functionally you can't fault the bike.


okok-you're right: for US-cowboys that is the way a hose needs to be mounted


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## sfer1 (Feb 22, 2009)

Yep, that brake hose routing sucks. And the Merida O.Nine's looks even worse.


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## Dex11 (May 4, 2005)

Really bad brake hose routing.....especially on such an expensive frame.
Why don't they put the brake mounts on the chain stays ?


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## Megaclocker (Sep 28, 2005)

Any one ever tried an Axman frame ?

The MS6B seems rather nice.










BB30 + Integrated seatpost @ 1120gr

https://www.axman.com.tw/products/products_show.php?pid=240&cid=7

I would like to try one, but I can't find how to buy them...


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## COLINx86 (Apr 8, 2009)

Looks extremely like Sette Phantom only with Integrated seatpost and bb30


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

With 31.6 mm seatpost, 34.9mm Front dérailleur, what is the next best option after Stevens? I have been waiting for the frame for over 3 months and now they tell me they don't sell me the frame! WTF I just fell like to say very bad things :madmax: 

I have all the parts set up for this frame now which one should I get?


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## parkincake (Aug 10, 2006)

the new on one carbon selection...

http://www.on-one.co.uk/news/products/q/date/2010/04/14/new-carbon-and-titanium-bikes-for-2010


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## sfer1 (Feb 22, 2009)

I'm looking at a new frame, because my GT Zaskar Carbon Team might be cracked.

My bike is all black and I want to keep it that way. I want a black frame.

I like the 2010 Scott Scale Limited, but I understand it's not for sale separately.

I noticed that the 2010 Scale Limited and all the 2010 Genius Carbon frames have similar, minimalistic graphics.

The Scale 10 seems to have a completely different style of graphics though. Is this the 2010 Scale 10 frame? If that's the case, why doesn't it look like the other 2010 frames? 
I'd definitely get the Scale 10 frame if its graphics were similar to the 2010 Genius 10's.


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

Yes Scott seems to have stalled in graphics and frame structure over the years. The scale 10 is very similar to the last year, and the other year and the other... 
Might it mean it's a good frame and they don't want to change it.


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## sfer1 (Feb 22, 2009)

I don't mind the frame structure, except for the 34.9mm seatpost diameter (I would use a 31.6mm seatpost with a shim), but what's with all that brown? It looks like... crap.


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## Kwik (Aug 7, 2007)

From my dealer I heard that next year there will be a new scale and Spark.


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

weird diameters sucks. Do we need to wait till 2011 to get decent colors, direct PM, stiffer BB etc?


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## sergio_pt (Jan 29, 2007)

Kwik said:


> From my dealer I heard that next year there will be a new scale and Spark.


Do you have any more details?


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## Kwik (Aug 7, 2007)

No sorry. If I have I'll post them. But probably for real info(pictures) we will have to wait until Eurobike I think?


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## spartan23 (Jun 14, 2004)

nino said:


> There's more:
> Most of the "comfort" comes from the heavy seatpost ca. 220-230g.Once replaced with a seatpost with decent weight that's gone.
> 
> Lefty - you love it or hate it.I personally don't want a Lefty.And it's heavier than the lightest forks out there (DT Carbon...) and stem choice is limited as well...
> ...


keep in mind, the manufacturer (Cannondale built this bike as an over all people bike)- meaning you can be 100lbs or 200lbs- this bike will hang, now if you want to lose weight, there are plenty of room for that :thumbsup:

over all its still the lightest fully built HT out of the box :thumbsup:.

BTW whats lighter than the Lefty Speed Carbon SL 110


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## nino (Jan 13, 2004)

sfer1 said:


> I don't mind the frame structure, except for the 34.9mm seatpost diameter (I would use a 31.6mm seatpost with a shim), but what's with all that brown? It looks like... crap.


That's bright RED, not brown.
I personally don't like these bright and agressive colour schemes of this years Scott bikes. The LTDs are decent black but the lower ,ine bikes are just dosc-coloured.

@Sergio_pt:
Me too i got the info from a Scott rep (here, from Scott's base in Switzerland) that the new Scale and Spark will be killer! They upped the number of engineers and it seems they once again want to set a new benchmark just as they did with the Scale and Spark years ago. The actual frames of the Scale and Spark are both a couple of years old yet still among the best available. Go figure...


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## sfer1 (Feb 22, 2009)

Red is the Scale 20. That's brown or maybe dark orange. I don't think many people have brown/orange components to match it, so it's an undesirable color choice however you call it.


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## quax (Feb 21, 2009)

one can still get a black-white 2009 10 frame. Is no different than a 2010 but should be cheaper.

A new Spark 2011? Damn, just got one this x-mas.


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## sfer1 (Feb 22, 2009)

The 2009 Scale 10 is half white. I think it looks even worse than the 2010 Scale 10.


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## quax (Feb 21, 2009)

Beatuy lies in the eye of the beholder ;-)


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## Axis II (May 10, 2004)

*Pedal Force*

It's been a great frame for me with no complaints. I've had many podium finishes on this frame and I won't be looking for another any time soon. Start up another group buy and save some ching.


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## nikoli8 (Mar 23, 2008)

I'm lovn my Tomac....


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## Mountain Cycle Shawn (Jan 19, 2004)

LAN said:


> Here is some pictures of the work in progress: Trek 9.9 SSL.


Are those Trigon forks? How does it ride? Are they a suspension corrected length?


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## Oliverfiallo (Aug 3, 2011)

Norco


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