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vpCogworks
Oddo
Another thing that is happening started with seeing a Uncle Rons Alumalith in real life at BITW this year.
I believe it belongs to Ben / bhughes808.
I do like the bike. It has a nice retro modern klunky vibe to it. What I am having a hard time with is that it's a 2K frame before import which literally looks like any raw 2000s cheap alu 26"hardtail.
I was almost a little bit angry. After Crusts nicely lugged elegant steel frames with nice paint jobs this felt like taking the piss. How much can we get away with and you idiot customer trend slaves will still buy it.
I know now these are hand-crafted by a beardy torch wizard in the mystical forests of Vermont and that they are built around 650b wheels and feature internal dropper routing.
But that's about all the difference. Right?
Okay, forks are cool too but they are also just a remix of Tange switchblade forks et al.
So kudos for making such a stupid product so cool.
I am really intrigued by the platform. A cool but able and fun bike, not too large (29ers), not too heavy, ready to ride some shit and throw it around and due to the lack of paint that can scratch and the overall rougher aesthetic you are just not too precious about it.
Just not for me at that price tag though and if you follow along here you can also tell that I have absolutely no need for it. However, if an opportunity came around, maybe ;).
I felt a bit cheeky. What If I am taking the piss at it. Since I already identified it as a 2000s alu mtb for myself, I could just keep an eye out for a cheap-ass suitable alu frame and built it up with some stuff from the parts bin. I even happen to have one of Ronnies favorite 9 speed XTR rear derailleurs lying around.
Maybe strip the paint off a frame if I have to. Maybe drill a hole for internal dropper routing. Fuck it, it's alu. Put some tape or a rubber grommet around, done.
So I went along at setting up alerts on eBay etc. and checked offers coming in. Nothing that really fancied me. Until a badly advertised full bike turned up in the search results.
Light Aluminum Bike - 220 Euro
Raw frame, no branding but quality components. Full XT 8speed group and something that used to be a fancy suspension fork.
I got curious. A full bike wouldn't be too bad. I was helping a friend to build up a retro MTB at that time and could utilise some of the parts.
Looking at the photos I got skeptical. Didn't look like alu. Skinny tubes and much finer welds. The photos were quite bad so I wondered if it was just a grey-painted steel frame mistaken for aluminium. Especially since there were some places around the cable guides that looked quite rusty. Zooming in on the dropouts it clicked.
PLOT TWIST: Could this be a titanium frame?
I messaged and met up with the seller at their place and got my hunch confirmed. This is indeed a ti frame. It belonged to the seller's father-in-law and has been gathering dust for quite some time. He was happy to pass it on and even went down in price by another 20€.
I rode it home, stripped and cleaned it.
I never owned or held a ti frame in my hands before. Felt like holding a can of Coke very light and thin in a way.