Gravel bikes - what do you have and where did you buy it?

[Patchelicious]

So after I was forced to sell my steel gravel bike earlier in the year I was gutted being without a bike once again so i set about building myself a gravelbike with scraps and bits of what i had laying around that I accumalated over the years....

 

It started off with Campy 1x 10 using shifters i bought here on the Hub a long time ago and a long cage Record RD running 11- 40 flawlessly. Left shifter at this stage was stripped out to just be a brake lever. Then i got a bee in the bonnet to convert the frame even further to full internal routing and ended up with my shift cable housing being too short to run the Record Rd so being a self confessed cheapskate and not really having the means to even buy that i thought what the heck just try it and I fitted my XO 11speed Type 2 RD with and what do you know.... Campy 10speed shifter and XO 11 speed RD now works flawlessly together on my Frankenbike... I call it that as this frame started its life as a 26er Giant XTC frame....

 

So a couple of days ago the shifter that was actually giving problems from the beginning with sometimes not shifting down now desided it had enough so i desided one more mod probably wont be that bad and I went about it again, Stripped out the shifter to now just be a brake lever and fitted the matching XO 11speed thumb shifter to the drop bar with very little mods. Actually just needed to bend the clamp open a bit and use a longer bolt to clamp it down and voila no bucks spent and my bike is still fully operational. So all in all a moerse build from stuff I already had in my parts bin.

 

Its still not my steel bike but it gets me around so still pretty chuffed. So just some inspiration to anyone that is thinking of building a gravel bike, having a thumb shifter on the drop bar is also a option and still leaves you ample hand positions on the bar...

Dude, that bike suits you so much! Man it’s probably one of the coolest bikes on here!!

[brumby]

Giant Toughroad build. Continental Race kings 2.2

 

[Patchelicious]

Giant Toughroad build. Continental Race kings 2.2

 

tuffy road.jpg

Nice ????????????????

 

What’s that on the seat post?

[Butterbean]

Nice ????????????????

 

What’s that on the seat post?

Looks like that canned fix a flat stuff CWC sold for a while, a while back.

[mecheng89]

Anyone thinking of doing the Midvaal 100 miler in December?

Edited October 24, 2020 by mecheng89

[TyronLab]

Anyone thinking of doing the Midvaal 100 miler in December?

I considered it, but the entry seems a bit spendy considering its a route you can basically ride at any time, for free, with no road closures as far as I can tell. Can't see much value in it.

[NotSoBigBen]

Anyone thinking of doing the Midvaal 100 miler in December?

I am but probably not on my gravel bike

[Hairy]

Please tell me this is how you gravel riders roll about town and the trails!

[ChrisF]

Please tell me this is how you gravel riders roll about town and the trails!

 

https://youtu.be/clAnE2bP0Z0

Somebody that can ride like this could even do a road race on a BMX .... oooo, wait .....

[pietas]

Don't you role like that?

[Hairy]

Don't you role like that?

always ...............................................................................

[Wayne pudding Mol]

Please tell me this is how you gravel riders roll about town and the trails!

 

https://youtu.be/clAnE2bP0Z0

This is how I roll unless I’m showing off, then i up my game

[VirenB]

Hey guys

 

Anyone here riding the Titan switch elite?

 

Very keen on your opinions on this.

 

Any issues with mechanical disc brake setup?

 

Thanks

[Hamstring]

Have an look at Rondo www.rondobikes.co.za/bikes

 

 

Hi, I am looking getting a gravel bike and have been researching the interwebs for the last month or so.  There seems to be very little choice available in South Africa wrt Gravel bikes.  Also, most international sites (in fact ALL international sites I have looked at!) do not seem to ship full bikes, so sourcing from oversees also do not seem like an option.  Let me also say, I am looking for a Gravel bike and not a cyclocross bike as I want the slightly more relaxed geometry a gravel bike offers, and I definitely want Hydraulic discs not mechanical or anything cantilever...

 

I am looking to spend around R30k.

 

In terms of locally, the only ones I have been able to find are:

 

- Cannondale Slate (too expensive and I don't think its worth paying as much for only 30mm of travel)

 

- Cannondale CaadX and SuperX (really more Cyclocross bikes than gravel bikes I think, also most of the affordable models have mechanical discs, and I'm not a fan of mechanical disks)

 

- Scott Speedster 10 Gravel (looks like a nice option, comes with Hydro disk brakes for a really nice price)

 

- Spaz Diverge and Seqoia (expensive for what you get, SA also seems a bit limited in terms of the specific models we get.  Most of the affordable models also come with mechanical discs - meh)

 

- Trek Crockett 5 (also mechanical disks...)

 

- GT Grade various models (looks pretty good value, but usually out of stock everywhere!)

 

So my question, what gravel bikes does the Bikehub community own and where did you get it from?

[hayleyearth]

Trek Checkpoint, bought in NZ.

 

Edit: why I bought it:

Not a carbon frame (carbon fork though)

2x... Gearset

Disk brakes

Many many options on frame already to mount things. (For bike packing)

Edited November 11, 2020 by hayleyearth

[christovdw]

Great bike. If they had it in XL I would have bought one.

Awesome looking bike - components are fairly average for the price though. There may well be better value for money out there...