# A Rise of a different color



## mike_kelly (Jul 18, 2016)

I'm a retrogrouch. Licensed and registered. Hit the back button now if you are in love with LLS geo.
I have an auto-immune disease that causes me to have bad days and good days.
I needed what a friend calls a "tailwind" eMTB. The Rise really fits the bill for me. I can ride it with the motor off on a good day and when I am having a bad day I can put it in ECO. It really helps.
I like things simple and I am a plain old trail rider that values the most performance from the lowest price. The sweet spot stuff.
I love tight twisty narrow singletrack. The trails that would rip 800mm bars right off a bike. My wheels never leave the ground and it suits me. So I did a lot to adapt the Rise to me.

First I stripped off all the parts except the rear shock. I built a new set of wheels using carbon rims and Spank Hex lock hubs with WTB 29x2.6 Rangers. I ride nothing but dry hard packed trails and I want fast rolling tires. I got spoiled with i9 instant engagement hubs and I could not afford i9 with the cost of the bike so the Spank have turned out to be a good value replacement with high engagment. Next the dropper went because the stock one was not long enough for me plus the Fox transfer has the Kashima coating. I have no idea if the Kashima coat does anything but I like the color  I purged everything made by E13. I had a crank arm come off years ago and I do not want a replay. I wanted a smaller chainring than Shimano offers and I did not want to be locked to the proprietary system so I installed a FSA 104bcd spyder with a Funn 30t ring. I got 160mm Shimano arms from Italy. The drivetrain is Sram because I have been riding gripshift for 25 years and I can't imagine riding anything else. The front end was modified to have a taller stack. I always have to fight the modern designers. My custom fit Carver has a 160mm headtube but most production bikes have much shorter headtubes for large size bikes. Then most production bike companies pre-cut their steerer tubes and I often have to discard the stock fork and buy new with an uncut steerer. To improve the stack and steepen the HA I used a 9point8 Slack-R in reverse. So I gained 20mm stack and reduced the headtube angle by .5deg. I added to that a SQLabs riser bar and grips. Added 203mm rotors by Jagwire.
I then got rid of the hydro brakes because I don't like more maintenance instead of less. The TRP mechanical Spykes have stopped me just fine on all my bikes for years and I weigh 250lbs. There is no oil to leak or complex bleeding required. I use superlight tubolito tubes and never have to put goo in my tires. Simple and reliable. I rode in Tucson ( honeybee, sweetwater, TMP, Fantasy Island) , last winter for 60 days straight and never got a flat using tubes. I know your experience might be different but this is my experience.
Last I installed my trusty Selle Italia 1990 TI gel flite. I lost a few pounds in the build so the current weight is 43lbs.
I'm now a happy camper indeed.


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## wallydog (May 18, 2017)

Nice job. Do you have plenty of clearance for those WTB Rangers in the rear?
That tire I believe is a "full size" 2.6. Also which model Rise did you start with?


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## mike_kelly (Jul 18, 2016)

I have plenty of clearance. 
The Rangers on my i30 rims have a casing width of 2.45" and the knob to knob width is 2.58". 
Unfortunately the WTB Ranger 29x2.6 seems to be unavailable now. I started with an H30.
Cheers


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## Tickle (Dec 11, 2013)

Looks good, how do like the 160 crank arms? I have 170's now and get a fair bit of pedal strikes was thinking ditching the E13's and getting some 165 Shimano cranks, I couldn't tell any diff(175 to 170) so figured another 5mm wouldn't be noticed.


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## mike_kelly (Jul 18, 2016)

Tickle said:


> Looks good, how do like the 160 crank arms? I have 170's now and get a fair bit of pedal strikes was thinking ditching the E13's and getting some 165 Shimano cranks, I couldn't tell any diff(175 to 170) so figured another 5mm wouldn't be noticed.


I have ridden 170-180 and I still don't notice a difference with 160mm. I got them to reduce pedal strikes even tho with the 29ers I did not expect to get many and I probably adjust my cadence or gearing automatically to make up any difference but it is working for me.
But it is hard to find the crankarms in the US. I had to order them from Italy.


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