Shuffling the Herd

I sold the Moth frame. I found that I just wasn't riding it much with the Box available to me, and I did not particularly like having two squish geared bikes. The Box is simply a more capable bike all around, and does not lose much on the XC side of things to the Moth except that the wheels/tires are much heavier. Wah, wah Enel...HTFU.

My original plan was to have the Moth built light for climby XC days, but who am I fooling, I am a slow climber no matter the weight. If I really want to ride something light and XC, I take the Milk Money anyway. The Moth was redundant, "bye bye." No regrets.

So....the Moth frame is gone, but I have all these parts sitting on the workbench. [I]Enough parts to build a bike.[/I] The question is: What kind?

I have been curious about the whole "AM" hardtail thing for a while. Being a tightwad, I didn't really want to commit the dough to a Hammerstickel, Foskey, or Aquahound. I had my hopes set on the Nimble 9, but had them dashed with the announcement that it does not have sliders, and I have next to no use for a geared hardtail. So...that leaves the Paradox with some dangly chain tensioner bits.

In the mean time, as I think about this, the parts are just sitting there taunting me. Finally, I couldn't take it any more, so yesterday I dug around the garage and found something beautiful: a too beat up to ever sell Rig frame. The Uber stiff HT-DT junction on this frame sucked for rigid riding, but might be just the ticket for a 120mm fork.

So I built it up using spacers and a borrowed 21 cog on the rear, found a front 32 SS chainring in the box, found a decent chain. Total outlay at this point: $0.

Stats: 69ish HTA, 13.1" BB 17.35" chainstay with this gearing. I could get it shorter, but that would require a 1/2 link or spending money.

I rode it this morning on my typical slow speed rock crawling and came away with a big smile.




I have not ridden a hardtail for nearly two years, and have never ridden one with this much fork. Honestly, I had forgotten how much fun it is to have a rigid aluminum frame transmitting the power. The stiff front end provides precision handling as the fork does its monkey motion.

I have been riding rigid a lot in this same period of time on a whippy steel bike, and I like it. However, the big fat fork adds a lot of capability, and lets one get away with [B]tons[/B] compared to rigid.

So anyway, there is something to this "AM" hardtail trend, and that something is fun.

I am fishing around for a Paradox frame, but the Rig will do until then...until it breaks.