An After-Dinner Mint from Sin City
SRAM bits, Turner and a host of other tasty morsels
Words by Ed Snyder. Photos by Fergs.
It is still coming, like being trapped in the middle of the table for a seven course meal that is running three courses too long. Pure gluttony, nearing overload at this point, but we know you love it. So we will keep shoveling all the bike goodness from the desert down your throat until the cupboard runs dry.
We have some especially tasty dishes today. We'll begin with a new tart or two from SRAM, move on to a Turner that has found some new spice and continue right on through until you are so full of bike goodness that the workday will seem a welcome relief by comparison. Dig in...
The new great white hope from RockShox, the 2009 Boxxer WC. Check the graphics on the left stanchion. They used the same process to put a "sag meter" marking on the back of the fork leg. Very swanky. || Photo courtesy of SRAM
The SRAM booth at Interbike is like a really big toy factory. You know they have the capital and the people to make some of the coolest things in cycling, and then they go and do it, wrap it in a big red bow and show it off. Always a worthy stop.
This year we got shown the crown jewel of the DH lineup in a hands-on fashion. The new Boxxer World Cup was spending it's life in glass case like an animal at the zoo. When they produced a key and freed it for our show and tell the masses began to gather. It was uncanny. There was no announcement that it was out of the case but a lot of whispering and pointing from a distance got the job done. Pretty soon we were encircled by onlookers as Jeremiah (the lead designer for the new Boxxer) led us through the nitty gritty on the new dual-crown race course tamer.
The new direct-mount stem for the 2009 Boxxer series is a burly little beast. You'll never have to worry about straightening out your bars again; and if you do, you can do it after your trip to the hospital.
Jeremiah led off his walkthrough of the new Boxxer with a little history. The Boxxer has been on board DH rigs for 58 World Cup wins and 347 top-5 finishes, far and away the largest total for any fork. Despite that SRAM went back to the drawing board to make it better from the ground up. It has a new 35mm stanchions and a superlight steerer. A forged truss crown contributes rigidity and creates its ability to stay on track through the tricky bits. The Mission Control valving system was so completely reworked it got a new name, "Mission Control DH". It now has independent rebound control, and on, and on and on. Suffice it to say this thing is packed with enough technology to make an F1 car blush.
The new forged crown for 2009, drilled and ready to accept the stem shown above. || Photo courtesy of SRAM
So how much will this miracle of modern suspension set you back? Undetermined as of yet; SRAM has not settled on final pricing. However both crowns will come with the fork this year as well as two extra spring sets, one above and one below the stiffness of the springs included with the fork. So while the cost will rise, so will the value.
The bottom line? Tremendous adjustability to suit any conditions, wickedly strong chassis wrapped in sexy new graphics all for under six pounds (5.94 pounds was the average weight of three random production models with both crowns and the Maxle included). Get in line. This one is gonna sell. Trust me.
So where did all this fork wizardry get its real world torture testing you ask? How about strapped to the front of Peaty's Santa Cruz World Cup rig. Good enough for you? I thought so.
The other big news from the Big Red SRAM machine is of course Hammerschmidt. Planetary front drive gears come to mountain biking. Lose the derailleurs and keep the shifting. Forget about tossing chains off the front and add some ground clearance at the same time. Shift anytime, anywhere and have it work. This one is a game-changer.
This is the cut-away view of the Hammerschmidt internals. The working example was hooked to shifter and had a hand crank where the pedal would go. It could be turned and shifted at the same time; allowing the user to see the movements inside.
SRAM had 2 bikes equipped with the system on trainers in the both. Both Cam and I took turns trying to break them, err... I mean "examining the shifting qualities" and came away impressed. Not matter what you did (spinning as fast as you could, grinding away with the rear brake on, etc.) the system shifted directly and fairly easily. The only unpleasant thing about the whole system is that due to the force need to shift the system it works in reverse of a regular front derailleur. If you push the big paddle you get a lower gear, and tripping the smaller paddle gives you the equivalent of the larger cog in front. Other than this small hitch (that is mechanically necessary) the whole thing works like a charm.
Cam dropping the hammer(s) on the Hammerschmidt. The Lyrik fork made the carpet feel super-plush too.
It is a forward thinking product that will show its real dividends when people start to grasp what it is capable of. Don't need a front derailleur anymore? Your suspension pivots can go in some pretty interesting configurations now. We have yet to even scratch the surface with this hammer. Look for more in the coming months as we get our hands on one for real.
The team at Turner worked frantically to get their new DW-Link equipped DHR built and to the show in Vegas. The deadline was so tight they didn't even have a chance to heat-treat this show-only frame. But they did find a can of bright green paint lying around somewhere...
Turner created a little buzz earlier this summer when they announced they would be using the DW-Link suspension on all their frames this year. Ironhorse had been the major manufacturer using the DW-Link designs but they discontinued that relationship this year and opted to use Ellsworth's ICT suspension instead. Once Dave Weagle (the "DW" of the DW-Link) made the leap to Turner he and the other Dave (Turner) set to work burning the midnight oil and bringing all the benefits of the DW-Link to Turner's complete line.
The new linkage on the DHR is incredibly compact. Getting everything to fit and flow is a masterwork of engineering... a by-product of two of the best minds in the suspension business coming together.
The DHR has always been known as a fast bike and with the addition of a proven world championship suspension design the signs are good that it will be even better this year. The tolerances on the rear end are very tight but Turner is confident that the FEA (finite element analysis) modeling that they have done is more than sufficient to guarantee stability in all three planes of movement. Strangely, for such a complete overhaul, the bike still resembles an old DHR. I have a feeling riders will notice the difference right away, even if onlookers don't.
This guy has definitely not been getting enough sleep. He is the engineer who was responsible for turning what two suspension gurus ("the two Daves" as he calls them) imagined into a mechanical reality. Read: he didn't sleep much in the weeks leading up to the show.
Lots of folks on the bulletin boards have been clamoring for details about Santa Cruz. While they had a full tent at the dirt Demo that included all the models they have reworked over the past couple of years (Heckler, Bullit, Blur LT) they did not have announcement that I heard about regarding a prototype that has been floating around. Some people are calling that a "V8" as they say looks like shorter travel version of the V10 DH frame. Santa Cruz did not have a booth inside the Sands Convention Center, so while we do not have anything earth-shattering we do have a photo to make Santa Cruz lovers salivate.
Pimpin': no other word adequately describes this high-bling version of the V10 at the Crank Bros. booth. Complete with their very sweet wheels, pedals and a set of serious white wall tires by Continental. Don't forget the carbon fiber rear "fender" sitting there like a cherry on a sundae.
Thompson components, manufacturer of all things unbreakable, has a new BMX stem that was making a few waves. Thompson does not come out with new products very often and when they do you can be sure they have been tested very, very thoroughly.
MRP has all kinds of products to keep your chain where it should be and their latest offering for single ring setups is this G2 Mini. The good folks at the show saw fit to send us home with one, so look for it in an upcoming Gear Shots article... just as soon as I can quit writing about the show and carve out a little time in the garage to get it mounted up.
MRP was sharing their booth with White Brothers Suspension. These three offerings are their dual crown forks for 26" wheels. L to R: the 180mm, 5.2 pound "Groove Race", the heavier duty "Groove 180" and finally the big boy on the right, the "Groove 200". Guess how much travel that has.
Do you run single speed or an internally geared hub? Wanna save a bunch of weight, have a drivetrain that last virtually forever (up to three times as long as a chain-drive system) and is uber-quiet? Carbon belt drive might be the way to go. Trek already has one model in their lineup using it this year. The drawback? Unless your bike has an elevated chainstay you have to cut the frame to get it on, as the belt is an unbroken loop. Kinda of a big negative that I have a feeling they are working on.
This is the top of the line Sortie Black from Diamondback. It uses their Knucklebone rear suspension design to deliver 5" of travel and has a boutique parts spec that brings the whole bike in at about 26 pounds.
You might have seen the Diamondback Mission frame running around Whistler, as that is where they did a majority of their testing. But this is no regular 6" Mission frame: Diamondback is making 50 up-gunned versions of the Mission called the Scapegoat. It features a parts kit that would be tough to improve on, including a Hammerschmidt front transmission.
One of my favorite bikes of the whole show; the Pashley Guv'nor. While this thing wouldn't really hack it on the shore trails you could absolutely rule the pub crawl afterward. It is a three speed English racer copy with style to burn. This one has a special Interbike-only finish with gold painted lugs. Luscious, right down to the wing-nut front quick releases.
Velocity had a whole slew of coatings applied to their wheels at the show. This is the digital camo version but the designs really ran the gamut, from crazy floral patterns to company logos.
So there it is, just like army food; hot, brown and lots of it. The scary thing is we aren't done yet. Goodies from Chris King, Cane Creek, Marzocchi and plenty of others are still on the menu in the coming days. So go belch, take a Tums and find somewhere to sleep it off... and save room for dessert next time.
Got a food coma coming on? Can't stand another bite of Vegas? Need a bucket? Spill it here...
