[CBaron]

I had hoped to give a more in depth account for the construction of this bike. However, there has been just too much going on for me to do it justice. We are very pleased with how it turned out and the owner is super-stoked (and that makes me very pleased). I always hold my breath on these kinds of things until I hear some feedback after a few rides. So far its been everything he's asked for.

We got the rear end from Ventana and then made some tweaks on the design with some help from Walt. He's (always) been a great resource for us with new projects and things. I think the framebuilder community is lucky to have him around. The owner wanted a longer travel 29er and there are very few to purchase. Since he has been thru the custom process with is on a SS, he was willing to be the first for a FS 29er.

We shortened the stays a bit, slackened the STA, lowered the BB and slightly steepened the HTA. We also built it pretty beefy. Its has a supertherm DT and a sleaved ST that covers more than 2/3 of the tube. At the time Matt was nearly 225 lbs and wanted to be able to ride it like he stole it. Good thing for me is that we can ride the same size bike so maybe soon, I'll steal it away from him and ride it accordingly. Oh and we also made an ISCG mount for his Hammerschmidt.

Below are some pics.

Thanks,
CJB

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[CBaron]

Complete build up pics

 

[themanmonkey]

Looks good. I've built a few softtails in the past, but not a full FS frame, and am thinking that that might be my next personal project. Walt's recent build got me really thinking about it.

How did you do the fixturing of the pivots and mounts if you don't mind me asking?

 

[jay_ntwr]

Awesome, Cody. That'll be a fun Hill Country machine.

 

[problematiks]

Did you guys actually grind some material off the fork bridge to make room for the tire?Is doesnt' sound as such a good idea to me to be honest.And it still hasn't got adequate clearance for riding in the mud.
The frame turned out really nice though.

Marko

 

[CBaron]

How did you do the fixturing of the pivots and mounts if you don't mind me asking?

We always start our frames with the ST/BB weld. From there we essentially mocked the frame up in our jig with the Ventana rear end attached to it. We could set the angles we desired and then made sure we got full travel with no interference. Since its a lever actuated single pivot, the pivot locations where not as critical. Ventana gives a spec sheet and we just used it as a basic guide...flavored with Walt's advice.

Did you guys actually grind some material off the fork bridge to make room for the tire?Is doesnt' sound as such a good idea to me to be honest.And it still hasn't got adequate clearance for riding in the mud.
The frame turned out really nice though.
Marko

Eh, I'm not too worried about it. It wasn't modded by us but even still I think its plenty strong. Its a 36mm stancioned, 20mm TA fork with a minimal amount of material machined out of the brace. I don't think it could be done to any other flavor of fork but 36mm/20mmTA seems like a good choice. I'd be willing to bet if the brace broke completely thru you could still safely ride the bike back to the car. Look at a Maverick SU32 upside down fork...I bet this is alot stiffer than that.

Thanks for the compliments.
CJB

 

[themanmonkey]

We always start our frames with the ST/BB weld. From there we essentially mocked the frame up in our jig with the Ventana rear end attached to it. We could set the angles we desired and then made sure we got full travel with no interference. Since its a lever actuated single pivot, the pivot locations where not as critical. Ventana gives a spec sheet and we just used it as a basic guide...flavored with Walt's advice.

Cool, that's what I figured but always like to make sure. I'm building with a Nortac right now and one of the things I really like about it is it's so adaptable to various frame configurations, the BB and dropout beams could easily hold pivot bits, but if just mocking it up works that's much easier.

 

[Vlad]

Looks good! I don't think I've seen anything Ventana that I didn't like.

 

[shirk]

Great looking bike. I am really digging the steel front end fs bikes lately.