Paint job

Suspension and double-chain videos

To cut a long story short...

As you'll see it’s been quite a while since I last put up a post, and a lot has happened to the project in that time. My grand plans of documenting didn't quite happen, but I did take lots of photos along the way so I might yet write it all up.

Anyways, the frame has been finish (except paint) and the bike built up. Initial rides have been promising, the fundamentals seem to be right, and so far has held up ok. I haven’t ridden many down hill bikes so can't really compare against anything but feels good at speed and the suspension is pretty plush and soaks up the trail well. The single speed gearing is just about right if a little hard on the flatter sections, and other than the profile hub buzzing away it was pretty damn quite on the rough stuff, so its living up to it's name - s.v.b (silent but violent).

This being my first frame means that with every run there’s always that little though at the back of my head of will it / wont it fail? I’d love to have 100% confidence in it, as so far it’s been a blast to ride.

I had left the frame bare to be able to check the welds after each downhill run, but it’s becoming a bit of a pain having to keep it covered in WD40 to prevent it rusting.

As it’s survived the first few rides seemingly ok I'm going to take a chance and give it a simple rattle can paint job in yellow and black (like the image at the start of the blog). The paintwork should reduce maintenance and protect against rusting. Hopefully it'll stay in one piece once pimped up. I’d love to get it out to the Alps this summer for the Megavalanche week at Alpe D’Huez. Watch this space...