September 16, 2007

We're buying lots of Testors paints to see which are near matches for current and past bikes. Testors has an OEM program and can mix to match ours, but the mins are higher and I think close enough is close enough. By December or so we'll have our semi-official guide, and may even stock them and include them with a frame/bike purchase.

Bombadil the mountain bike prototype no.2 should be here mid October.  It is exciting to me, and I'm happy with how it is in my head, but I know what the critics will say, if they say anything: "Too heavy, shouldn't be 650B if it's a true 'expedition-style'  bike, shoulda been threadless and oversized, and shoulda been set up for disc brake, and it's an ugly color and overpriced."

Well...I BET most of the critics would benefit more by losing a pound or two than the Bombadil will, and it's not a race bike. The down tube (the most critical, I think) will be about 20 to 30 percent thicker-in-the-wall than an Atlantis down tube, but the same dimensions as the downtube on an original Stumpjumper, an early Richey mountain bike, and a 1984 MB-1. So it's not like we're going nuts with it. I like the idea of a moderate diameter downtube with a thicker wall. The thick wall gives it toughness and dent-resistance. A bigger diameter would provide more torsional stiffness, but this bike will have plenty of that anyway, and frame stiffness (of any kind, torsional or otherwise) is not important on a bike designed to be ridden with big softies.

Superlight non-racing modern mountain bike frames have a lot more to answer to, I'd say. In the weight department. They're more pop-can like than they should be.

The 650B wheel size is an odd choice, but a good case can be made that it is the best choice for most sizes of mtn bikes. Yes, wheel and tire selection isn't great now, but we're not part of the problem, and if that gives anybody pause, there are 99 million other mountainbikes to pick from. There will be a better selection of fat 650Bs in the next year or two, and it will continue to grow. Right this minute you can buy four fat Schwalbes for $100 total, and they'll be good for 90 percent of the trail riding you'll do, and will last probably six years. It's not like you need a tire cellar next to your wine cellar. A wider selection will be good, but  I know I could do  all of the riding I've ever done or ever will do in all seasons and terrain and conditions on just five tires, so I think (in general), that having tons of tire choices is slightly overrated.

We may make it disc-brake compaitble in the rear. I'm not sure about that. Disc brakes on the front require super stout forks, even stouter than the Atlantis fork--which is UP THERE in stoutness.  I know all of the bragged-about advantages of disc brakes, but I don't like the scare-tactics used to sell them. "What if" this? and "what if" that?

A rim IS a disc, and a strong rim ably serves as a tire holder and a disc, and well-built wheels with big puffy tires stay true under super hard use, and even discs get warped. The strongest pro-disc argument is  No Hot Rims, and that counts for something, but by itself may not tip the scales. 

 The Bombadil may look plain and may be a bland color, but it won't be ugly. It will cost about the same as our other Japanese-made bikes, which cost more to make than 95% of the world's bikes, so there's no way around that. On the other hand, when you compare the price and quality to any customs and all carbon frames of the world, they are a steal.

I like the idea of Bullmoose bars on it, bit I also like Albatross and Moustache H'bars. We'll offer options, but at some point the design will favor one or two but probably not three of those, and I don't know which way it'll go.

 My arm ailment stll keeps me typing lefty or with pencils, but I'm getting used to it, & faster. A new catalogue will be out in a month--by MID OCTOBER--and RR40, hard to say. I just can't work on it the way I need to, so it may have some stories rerun from other issues. Since the benefits of membership are the rebate and not the Reader anymore, I suppose there can't be much squawking about that. In any case, I am more concerned with getting fixed.

Grant