BenGraham

Had you not resurrected this thread I would also never have seen it and I thoroughly enjoyed it. So thanks for that.

Guilty as charged. Except I sold my cotic soul frame. Steel (check, but now sold), Hope (check), 4 pot brakes (on my wish list), pike (also on the wishlist but I'm probably too poor). This bike completes me. I'm a little off form but frankly this bike makes me want to get out a lot more often. Hard tails aren't dead. 26 might be.

Lol. no.

Nailed it.

Bent hangers and RD cages are the reason I went single speed.

This is an excellent point.

First rule of business. A product is worth exactly what your customer is willing to pay for it. If this number is higher than the cost price you're running a business. If its lower then you're running a charity. 2nd rule of business bundle items to hide the individual costs and increase profits due to economies of scale. Select high perceived value items and bundle with low cost low perceived value items. Price according to high perceived value items. Figure out what your client is looking at and make that amazing; make everything they're not paying attention to ****. And this is why I buy my parts individually and build my own bikes.

Incase you're interested I just listed the cotic for sale.

This is what I'm looking at. Got some money for my birthday. I guess I know where its going now.

That escalated quickly. Honestly though I agree. Its why I'm not jumping straight back into novatec and rapide (a great company actually) are rebranding novatec hubs as I understand it.

Yeah so now the question becomes. Cheap and cheerful novatec or rapide or something a bit more premium and long lasting - dt Swiss or hope. I take issue with disposable parts, even if I decide to move on to something else I want the thing to last someone else can use it. Also getting super tired of not being able to go on a decent ride.

Probably should have said. This is aj mtb hub. Mtb fixie sounds like an easy way to end up in the emergency room.

I was worried this might be the case. Maybe someone has something better to say. I've had this hub for like 5 years or so maybe I just have to accept this as being the end. Super frustrating as I just bought the axle to convert it. I'm not quite ready to give up on it yet though. But my frustration levels are rising.

So I have searched in vain for an answer. Maybe you lot can help. My novatec d542sb hub has just recently started slipping under load. I'm running a single speed setup on vertical dropouts with a basic rapide tensioner. Basically if I push hard on my pedals by standing and hammering for instance I get a distinct clunk and the pedals slip about 15-20 degrees I think before reengaging. Its intermittent but its getting more regular. A few thing I recently changed that may have had some impact. I recently changed from a 135mm to 142mm width which require changing the internal axle. I'm now on a new frame. Everything else is identical and I don't remember getting this slippage before but I haven't been ridding much due to lockdown and trying to juggle parenting and my wife and myself both workign from home while my 4 year old son attempts to climb the walls (that's another story). I pulled the freehub out and gave it a thorough cleaning. Removed the circlip, pawls and springs but I didn't use de-greaser because I didn't want to damage the bearings which I wasn't able to remove. That said I cleaned the gunk of all surfaces with roller towel till everything appeared clean and nice. Then I used a little thin lube (green finish line wet lube) on each pawl and spring. Reassembled and tightened up. The slippage appeared worse like more regular. Instead of one clunk there was two or sometimes even three. Disassembled today and cleaned again but without pulling the circlip and extracting all pawl. I simply wiped the surfaces and bounced each pawl to make sure it was properly returning and cleaned off excess grease. Reassembled. Problem remains but seems slightly better. Can still make it slip by riding uphill with a bit of vigour (not what I would consider proper hammering at all). Can anyone offer me some insight I'm at a loss.

There's only one race I've never missed a year of and it's the one I'll mourn this year. And it's probably the most polarising race in the country. Its the Juma. Still hoping maybe it'll happen.

Actually I almost never watch pro sport. The last rugby game I watched was the world cup and before that I can't tell you. Occasionally I'll watch a downhill event. Rampage is fun to watch. But yes your assessment is correct I don't watch pro sport

Celebrity culture is toxic for all involved. Believing that the best in the sport are somehow superhuman is what keeps the rest of us plebs mediocre. Everything has a price. Lance paid a very high price for his success flew too close the sun and came crashing back to earth. I for one don't need to win **** to enjoy myself. Competitive sports only makes sense to me when it open up the playing field. I compete to experience new stuff. If that's what drives you then winning is incidental. The athletes I admire are the ones who love the sport even when they're losing. I guess that's why I'm a mid pack finisher but whatever sometimes finishing with your friends is better than winning alone.

This thread is great. This does sound suspicious to me too. This is why I do my own maintenance. I go to bike shops for tools and spares.

Good idea. Haven't done much frame protection yet.

Okay so took the hornet out for a little jaunt on the spruit. It will be taken to more exciting places in due course I promise. Here are my thoughts for anyone considering their own hornet. Compared to my cotic soul. I have literally only one complaint. The seat stays are enormous. You don't see it in all the side profile shots but when riding if you look down and back you can see they protrude wider than the chain stays and as a result I did bash my ankles a few times. I'm also used to tucking my heels back and inward from my previous frame which had very skinny seat stays. As an extension of this I found placing my feet on my pedals required a bit more thought than I'm used to but I suspect this is also just a function of new geometry that I'm getting used to. I ride flats btw so I reposition my feet fairly often unconsciously. The million dollar question compared to steel how does it feel. Is it real? Bare in mind I only have experience of my cotic soul so take this with a pinch of salt. But in my limited experience of steel frames I feel like this frame feels pretty good. I didn't ride any really rough stuff unfortunately but I didn't notice more chatter than I've noted on my cotic riding the same trails. If anything certain sections felt smoother. I think owing to the geometry differences. It does however sound different. Its hard to pin down but there is a difference in the way it transmits sound from the drivetrain. Its minor though and I'm sure I'll get over it. Took it down the delta downhill which has nice sweeping turns and a couple of small doubles and table tops. I took the wrong line which is more flowy than jumpy but I still caught a little bit of air here and there. The big thing I noticed as I've ridden this line a lot on my cotic is how much more confident this bike feels in the air. The cotic was twitchy in the air and generally you felt right on the edge of control the whole time. The hornet seems to love take offs and landings. Now I'm fairly sure this isn't due to my bike skills being any better than they were as I've been off the bike for like two months. I think this all comes down to the lower bb and slacker head angle. A slight negative I noticed is I was missing the apex on berms quite a bit. This might be down to being out of practice but I think its also a function of the wheel base being longer. Found myself having to do a last minute correction coming out of a few berms. But I think a lot of this will get better as I become more comfortable with the changes in geometry. On the whole it feels like this bike is faster and more confident on the downhills which is what I was expecting and I am pleased to say has been delivered. Climbing. Feels very similar to my cotic. No obvious differences here. So the overall experience. Very positive. I had a lot of apprehensions but pleased to find very little to complain about. Will be putting my cotic up for sale in a few days I expect. I'm never going back.

Finished. Managed to clean the threads with a stanley knife and a lot of patience. Threaded the bottom bracket by hand to be sure it wasn't cross threading. Everything went together perfect after that. So far I've only ridden it in the drive way but it feels really nice. Can't wait to get it out on some dirt. Are we allowed to ride the spruit at present? I haven't ridden since we went to stage 3 so I don't know what to expect?

So I love my Cotic Soul and I'm still super apprehensive about this but my cotic is like an old motherboard. Too many old standards preventing me from upgrading; 27.2 seat post, straight steerer headtube, 26er wheels only. Sadly we've reached the end of the line. So the new squeeze is this Dartmoor hornet I'm building up. I bought this frame or rather paid a deposit before lockdown and then everything went mad but yesterday I got to rolling chassis state. Today will be installing the drivetrain (which being single speed should be simple) if I can get the BB shell clean of the paint currently in there. I remain a little nervous as I've ridden my steel frame exclusively for years now and I'm hoping the supposed harsh ride of al doesn't fill me with regrets but I'm also excited about the new longer slacker geometry more in line with my fork (I was kind of breaking the rules putting a 150mm fork on my Cotic - it was great though). Eventually I'll be moving over to 27.5 wheels and fork but, for now, to avoid spending more money (the frame was a stretch in itself) I'll be sticking with things as they are. A couple other things. Yes I'm riding single speed on a decidedly non gravel bike. I got tired of deraileur issues and the cost involved. I may yet purchase an rd and a cassette again but I'm going to ride single speed as much as possible. Sure you suffer on the way up but the downs are the same and that's the fun part anyway. I'd rather put the money into a dropper right now. My previous dropper snapped clean through on a ride (that's a story for another day). The frame is from trailtech.co.za Craig was great to deal with and I'd wholeheartedly recommend them. I'm also using a rapide sadle and chainring. Rapide.co.za is great too. Something you can't see but was needed is I had to replace the axle in my rear novatech hub with a 142X12 (it was 135 qr) that I got from evobikes.co.za Seat post from linden cycles is somewhat temporary but I feel even a bike that absolutely deserves a dropper needs a fixed post for if the dropper is in the shop. Yes I know my garage is a mess stop judging me. That's it for now. Off to the garage.

Its all I have at the moment and I've done more kms this month the the prior 6 before it combined. And my average speeds have stayed around the same.

What the heck that's a ton of stretch. I can see why they'd stretch though its inherent in the design the little bend in the plate just slowly straightens out presumably. Mine at present is a 10 speed kmc. Yes overpriced for a single speed chain but when I bought it I was trying to get my RD back up and running hadn't yet considered getting rid of it entirely.

Interesting looking setup. If mine gives me trouble I'll look into this. So far it hasn't given me a moment of trouble. Might be helped by the small chainring.