Fatbiking and Other Junk

More Equipment Woes.

I recently swapped out a drivetrain on a bike going from SRAM 2x9 to a SRAM GX 2x11 setup.  I have a GX 2x11 setup on another bike and loved it so much I put it on another bike.  And there problems began.  The shifting, both front and rear, have been wonky and I had to tweak it a lot.  I think I finally got the front derailleur set and the cable is now stopped stretching but the rear derailleur is still having some problems, especially when cranking up a hill.  I think I may have bent my derailleur hanger.  Damn.

Equipment Blues.

I rode the snot out of my Skookum this summer and loved it (to a point).  It was a great bike for the first part of the summer when I was still getting in shape since the crank was set up with a 24 tooth chainring and with an 11-42 cassette in rear I could climb anything.  As the summer progressed, I switched to riding my regular 29ers and it was great until about mid-July.  We had a very dry summer so by the middle of the summer a lot of our singletrack had turned to moondust and rocks, and spots/sections of trail I could easily clean earlier in the summer became difficult with normal width tires.  I went back to my Skookum with a massive footprint of a set of 45North tires, the Flowbeist up front and the Dunderbeist in rear.  Both are 4.6" wide so plenty wide for the looser conditions.  I actually rode some things I would have never attempted and had fun.  And then the mechanical issues started.  Several times while climbing my rear would stutter and a loud crack would be heard from my drivetrain.  I thought I broke a chain.  Nope.  Then the rear hub seized up and I walked home.  Our shope mechanic fiddled with it and the rear hub acted fine but two weeks later the same thing: rear hub completely seized up and so bad I had to remove my chain to get home.  I called Fatback and they thought the rear axle may have been broken so they sent a new one.  I asked my mechanic to take a look at the hub and he said my freewheel driver was cooked.  The pawls had been completely broken off.  I didn't think I was abusing my bike that bad.  Thankfully Fatback sent a warranty replacement hub so hopefully this solves the issue.  Otherwise, I love my Skookum bike.

Borealis Carbon Rims.

Just found out today that Borealis is coming out with a carbon fiber fatbike rim for the low, low price of $1600 a pair (suggested retail price).  And that is without spokes, hubs, or nipples or the labor to build up a pair.   Crimeny.  I may think about a pair.

Fatback Carbon Fork Review.

The new Fatback carbon fork on my Surly Moonlander has definitely lightened the entire bike, and rides quite well.  I can't really say what vibration reduction it plays since all I have ridden it on is firm packed snow and I have 4.7 ballon tires on the bike so any vibration is probably being absorbed by those huge tires.  If nothing else, it has lightened the bike by a good two pounds.  I cut the steerer tube a bit higher than I normally would have assuming I could cut it even more in the future if I wanted, or leave it the way it is and this would give me a lot of room for moving my stem up or down to suit my preferences.  Cutting the steerer tube was easy (assuming you have access to a Park Tools steerer tube cutting guide and a new 32 tooth hacksaw blade).  A bit of duct tape around the cut area assured no fraying or strings were made during the cut.  Because the steerer tube is carbon, you can't use the normal star nut in it for your headset (the star nut would tear the shit out of the carbon) so have to use a compression plug type nut for your heatset.  Two issues I did find with the new setup:  the Problem Solvers compression plug didn't give me as much compression tightness up front and I had some play in the headset until I gave the entire setup a small tap with a hammer.  The plug then worked well in sucking up some of that sloppiness.  I can see I will have to watch this setup in the future and check for sloppiness.  The second issue is the stem cap that came with the Problem Solvers is intergral and you can't swap it out so there goes my nice gold Thomson stem cap.  Crap.  I will probably continue to monkey with this to come up with a better solution.

Another issue with the Fatback fork is the disc brake attachment is about 3 mm outside so my brake rotor would rub badly on the inside of the brake body.  Shimming the brake rotor out from the hub by about 3 mm and then adjusting the brake body allowing for a relatively rub free front brake.  Again, some monkeying around will probably need to be done.  I used some spare tube stem nuts as spacer washers to shim the rotor out.  The bolts that come with the brake rotor are too short with the spacers in place so you will probably have to go to the hardware store to get six new bolts.  As I ride the bike more, expect more imput.

The last issue is pulling the front wheel off and putting it on with the front disc brake is sometimes tricky.  Depending on your front brake setup on the fork, it can be a tight fit to pull the front wheel off.  I have Avid BB7 brakes (I like the adjustability factor) and once I was trying to put the front wheel on and put a little too much force into it.  The bolt head that adjusts the inner brake pad put a tear into the outer casing of my tire.  Whoops.  To prevent this, letting some air out of the front tire so it is a bit more pliable as well as holding the front wheel between your lets and using both hands to move the fork into place both seem to work well.  Once the front wheel is back in place, you can add more air if necessary.

Some photos of the bike setup thus far:

I may add gold cable housing for the brake at the end of the season.

The fork does look real nice.

Carbon Fork On the Way!!

Carver was out of their snowbike/fatbike carbon forks and wouldn't have stock in hand until March so no go with them but my biking boss was able to score a deal with Fatback bikes out of Alaska for two of their carbon forks so back in the game.  They should be here next week so back to riding soon.  Yay!

Waaaahhh! No Carbon Fork!!!!

The carbon fork I wanted for my fatbike isn't available from the maker.  Not only are they running out of stock, their manufacturer in China decided to change things on the forks (imagine that) and so the forks won't be available until late March.  Screw that.  The bummer is the local bike shop already rebuilt my front wheel so I can't use the fork which came with the bike.  However, Aaron at the Hub said he would sell me a 9 zero 7 fork for about $150.  This fork will work will non-offset front wheels, has the clearance for 4.7 tires, and only weighs about 200 grams more than the carbon fork.   Sometime this summer I'll decide if I want to upgrade to the carbon fork.  Shiete.