The 29er revolution (or is it uprising?)

[wesley_r]

I was at my LBS yesterday, chatting away (as I love to do) and we got onto the topic of 29ers. Now, a 29er appeals to me in a big way -I still haven't figured out why, and I'm not even sure it would suit my riding, but damn, I'd love to own one.

 

When I first discovered 29ers (admittedly, only recently) I turned to the interwebs for information - and one point I stumbled upon was that there's a feeling out there that 29ers don't handle as well as traditional 26ers, but there's also the notion that as development continues on the bigger wheeled bikes the geometry, and handling, will improve

 

Back to the LBS - I raised the point that everywhere you look, more and more manufacturers are turning to adding 29ers to their model lineup... to which LBS guy replied "yes, but - only a handful of manufacturers have experience in that area" (e.g. Gary Fisher, Niner Bikes, etc).

 

Perhaps he has a point - is this new trend simply going to lead to every other manufacturer adding poorly thought out niners to their lineup for the sake of jumping on the bandwagon? Or do we simply sit back for a year or two and watch as everyone, through trial and error, refines their 29" offerings?

 

What I'm saying is - do you think this "29er uprising" is a good thing - are we perhaps heading towards for a market where 29ers are commonplace, and the drive to improve and be better pushes rapid development? And are we going to have to wade through a multitude of poorly designed "for the sake of doing it" bikes before we get there?

 

And of course, the question I still haven't been able to find a clear answer to: what style of riding is a 29er suited to?

 

What are your thoughts?

[AfricaMike]

Burry rides a 29'er, Conrad rides a 29'er, the mouse rides a 29'er, .....and so do I

[Wyatt Earp]

Burry rides a 29'er, Conrad rides a 29'er, the mouse rides a 29'er, .....and so do I

And just because you have one, I must have one too

[Tieffels]

I have a kneejerk reaction against ANYTHING a bike shop says, as the BS in LBS does not stand for Bike shop.

 

So here goes my very honest question/observation: So this salesperson implies that a bike company that has years of bike design experience has no idea how the geometry of a bike affects the handling of a bike? I mean, that is all they have to do, all day, every day, and they are just guessing away, hoping for the best.

 

I mean really.

[Bike Mob]

I have a nicer one than Burry

 

They are definately the way forward, I think there is still some merit to 26ers but for me the 29er is working perfectly.

 

Bear in mind that although most big name manufacturers are only now bring the 29ers to our shores, they have been making them for a few years already but not importing them... Guys like Specialized, Orbea, ...

 

Even if Gary fisher spent 10 years perfecting their geometry..it would be easy for a new kid on the block manufacturer to buy one, dissect it and make their own in no time at all.

 

I have not experienced any of the so called negatives people associate with 29ers. Slow acceleration, slow turning... just not true. It's just setup. and ride.

 

The benefits - rolling ease, traction, bump compliance and better over terrain like sand - all true! reap the benefits now.

 

There are also already plenty of choices out there for building your bike, ranges of tires from Spesh, conti, bontrager, etc and wheelsets from just about everyone too...

 

Forks may still be a bit limited but Fox and RS both are already going forth so who needs anyone else?

 

Races like Epic have already got backup at tech zones for 29er tubes and tires so what are the drawbacks?

 

If you want one, buy one now, then get a new one when they evolve more. If the caveman waited for the pneumatic tire we would never have had one.

 

Vive le 29er Velo B)

[wesley_r]

interesting points so far, keep em coming

[Slowbee]

I remember TitusTi posting a pic - but a Titus 29 er what a dream

[Bike Mob]

slowbee check the rockstar thread... that is a Titus 29er. and also made in ti.

[Li Mu Bai]

tested it, and there was resulting no burning desire that I had to have one...

 

I wonder what the next fad will be...

[vanniri]

See below:

 

Dave Harris' 26 vs. 29 inch challenge

By Steve Medcroft

 

 

Dave Harris contemplates the 26in vs 29in conundrum

 

 

Twenty six or twenty nine inch wheels - which is the better format for cross country mountain biking? Endurance racer Dave Harris (Team HealthFX) decided to settle the question for himself by putting two of his own bikes to the test at the 24 Hours in the Old Pueblo (February 18 and 19, 2006). Armed with a Trek Top Fuel and a Salsa Dos Niner, Harris used a Power Tap integrated hub system to gather data about his performance on the mostly rolling desert course in Oracle, Arizona (about thirty miles Northwest of Tucson).

He got the idea to do the comparisons two years ago. "I'm a competitive racer and I take it seriously," he says. "Once I turned to racing endurance events, you can't help but notice the popularity of two-niner bikes; the Fisher team (Nat Ross and Cameron Chambers) do really well with them. I got intrigued. I looked around for some research to see if the claims I heard about their performance was true but all I found was an abstract from a study which provides no information about the conditions under which the study was performed and ravings on two-niner forums. But it's like going to the Catholic Church and asking if God exists so I bought two last year to figure it out for myself."

Harris says that after several months of riding he worried that he wasn't gaining in performance. "As an engineer [Harris works for a Virginia-based engineering consulting firm], I needed objective evidence to support what I was feeling" Which was? "I just didn't feel that my two-niners were as fast as my Fuel. They're more fun to ride but I was getting the sense that I was going slower." Which was a paradox. "Since that went against everything everyone said, I knew I couldn't just trust my perception. Since I've been training by power for a long time, I set up a 29in inch wheel with a Power Tap hub and decided to test my bikes side by side."

Harris says that although his was not a fully-funded scientific test, he took the experiment seriously enough to set the bikes up in similar ways. "Both bikes weigh 25.5 pounds," he says. "They both have Specialized Fast Trak tires." Because a two-niner wheel has a ten percent larger circumference than a two-sixer and front and rear cogset combinations would have produced different gear-inch measurements, Harris even tried to normalize the drivetrains. "I put a smaller middle ring on the Dos Niner."

The 24 hours in the Old Pueblo wasn't the first time Harris had done side-by-side comparisons of power measurements from his two bikes. In the first test - on a relatively smooth forest service road (a constant climb) in January - he gave the Fuel a slight edge. In early February, on a 3.2-mile competitive mountain bike loop at McDowell Mountain park in Fountain Hills, Arizona, he declared the competition a tie After careful analysis of some minor differences in the power meter readings between the two bikes (recorded five days apart) after the second test, he chalked up the better readings from the Fuel as his just 'feeling' better during the Fuel test run. Old Pueblo, with its constant conditions and multiple laps of data to analyze, seemed like a better laboratory for his experiment.

The day after he finished the Arizona 24-hour epic, Harris sat down with the power data from his daytime race laps (although he traded the lead with ultimate winner Tinker Juarez into the night, vision problems caused Harris to sit out the early morning hours so he dismissed night laps from the test) and created some scenarios on his computer.

"There were a lot of different ways to look at the data," Harris said about how he broke down the results. "But people have enough difficulty understanding power in general so I kept it simple and looked at lap time versus average power." Simply put, he wanted to kow how much power was required to drive each bike around the course and if there was a difference between the bikes.

Based on that data, Harris concluded that his Salsa required more average power to achieve the same lap times over the same terrain in the same conditions as his Trek (175 watts for the Fuel, 188 for the Dos Niner). He says that by his measure, if he rode both bikes at the same power output (presumably a limitation of his physique and fitness), Harris calculates that his two-niner lap times would be about two minutes slower. "I think I can attribute some of the difference to the power required to accelerate each bike," he says. But adds, "I can only base this on impressions. And my impression, my sensation, is that Dos Niner does not accelerate as fast as the Fuel."

Harris says he realizes that his test was about his performance on his bikes and not in indictment of the two-niner format. "I haven't tested the bikes on descents and technical, rocky terrain," he adds. "I think that if I do, the Dos Niner will shine on rocky terrain." But for now, the experiement at the 24 Hours of Old Pueblo has him wondering if anyone's looking to buy a Salsa Dos Niner with a Power Tap hub.

Forty year old Dave Harris is an ultra-endurance mountian-bike racer based in Durango, Colorado. He won the West-coast based Endurance 100 endurance series last year and plans to mount a serious challenge for the Trans-Rockies co-ed title with teammate Lynda Wallenfels. He writes a blog on his team's Web site at teamhealthfx.com.

[vanniri]

I have some limited experience with 29ers. Did not find it much different performance wise - but it felt awkward. Also looks silly in smaller sizes, especially duelies.

 

Designing a 29er seems to require more consideration - check out the chainstay modifications required to fit larger tires (2,25 and more). This requires an increase in bb shell size (to ensure larger chainring clears the chainstay), which in turn affects the chainline.

 

Building a 29er frame or upgrading your existing parts will take some doing in SA where options are sometime limited.

[ridr]

Interesting to finally see a different perspective!

Spoke to someone at a bikeshop who said to me 26ers will become redundant!

[AndreZA]

No imagine a 29er with Q-rings and 10spd and tubeless. All the latest "make-me-fast" gadgets of the past 5 years. No one will stop you.

 

BTW, I think I just described Burry's bike.

[GTRacing]

I have been on a niner, and personaly I prefer a 26". To me it felt slow and slugish, almost like a cruzer type. Went ront the bendies,some jumps. Nope,not my first wepon of choice. I would like one in the arsenal, but second choice.

 

Maybe as a SS.

[AndreZA]

Interesting to finally see a different perspective!

Spoke to someone at a bikeshop who said to me 26ers will become redundant!

 

How will that happen? Redundants are those bikes you ride while lying in your back.

[Brian Fantana]

I have 2 29ers, a steel single speed and a geared aluminium On-One Scandal. I have managed to build my geared bike the same weight my GT Zaskar pro was, and it really feels awesome. I still see lots of 26" wheels for the future, but for myself who rides for enjoyment alone, a 29er hardtail is the ultimate compromise between weight, comfortability, maintainability and handling.