Furry's fat and long bikes

Cheers for the info, I'll consider the nuvinci if I manage to crunch the sturmey archer again. Expensive, but not quite rholoff expensive.

Cheers for the info, I'll consider the nuvinci if I manage to crunch the sturmey archer again. Expensive, but not quite rholoff expensive.

Well the ease of set-up, resiliance to abuse, gear range, and awesome functionality, more than offset the price.

The weight is the killer. Its a fecking brick. A lot of people have put them on heavy steel fatbikes, then taken them off because of the weight.

Like I say, on a cargo bike, they are brilliant. When riding heavily loaded normal bikes, I get into the habit of avoiding gear change. With the NuVinci you get into the habit of constantly tweeking the shifter according to the terrain. Keeping a nice comfortable constant cadence. Kinda fits with the comfortable cruising style you have to adopt to ride a cargo bike*.

(* I'm one of those middle aged twats, that usually feels the need to race every bike journey)

With my eldest child now at school, and the youngest still at nursery. One car really doesnt cover our needs. Car + cargo bike is proving more of a brilliant solution everyday.

Really need some bags now.

With the NuVinci you get into the habit of constantly tweeking the shifter according to the terrain. Keeping a nice comfortable constant cadence. Kinda fits with the comfortable cruising style you have to adopt to ride a cargo bike*.
.

I'm not sure I understand this bit. So how many gears does it have ? Or is it constantly variable between a range?

Ok. Done some reading. That is very clever.

The brick bit is not a worry, my current hub is also a brick, and when pushing a near 250kg load, who cares?

Need to have a look at it's exact range, currently have a wide 5 speed, which is very wide.

What about the Alfine 11? they're still working perfectly well on mine and take the load brilliantly.

The 11 speed ratios felt nice and close without feeling like you've went from a spinny to a mashy gear in one shift.

I'm mainly worried about the hub being able to take large amounts of torque which is what made me think of the nuvinci. The christiania do ship with alfine hubs, not the 11 if I remember correctly. But mainly I don't want to shred another hub, the sturmey archer was meant to be bomb proof. I'll see how it goes after a rebuild.

Sturmey Archer were bomb proof, until they've moved away from the UK.

I wouldn't really trust a Sturmey Archer hubs nowadays.

[strike]I believe it wasn't even a case of moving from the UK, but instead that the original company folded, and the name was bought by another company?[/strike]

lmost all English 3-speeds have Sturmey-Archer rear hubs, and there have been many different models since the company started in 1902. Sturmey-Archer was a division of Raleigh Industries until autumn, 2000, when the parent company ran into financial difficulties. Sturmey-Archer (U.K.) was rendered homeless by various corporate maneuvers. For a while it appeared that it would disappear entirely into bankruptcy. The land the factory stood on was sold, and Sturmey-Archer was nearly liquidated by a corporate raider. Fortunately, a Taiwanese company called SunRace came to the rescue, and bought the company assets more or less intact. The machinery and stock were moved to Taiwan. SunRace resumed production of Sturmey-Archer hubs -- some pre-existing models, many new ones.
AASHTA

http://sheldonbrown.com/sturmey-archer.html
Apparently the new Taiwanese stuff is better than the more recent >1970's stuff, but not earlier

That's what I meant by move, rather than every Tom Dick and Harry going to Taiwan.

I'm not sure I understand this bit. So how many gears does it have ? Or is it constantly variable between a range?

Ok. Done some reading. That is very clever.

Its very cool. I dont have much quality IGH experiance. But the lack of sudden gear jump, and ability to keep a hard pedal going, or so good, when pushing 200Kg up a 10% hill. Something I do alot. If you stop pedalling the bike stops near instantly, and its a bitch to get back up to speed.

The brick bit is not a worry, my current hub is also a brick, and when pushing a near 250kg load, who cares?

Need to have a look at it's exact range, currently have a wide 5 speed, which is very wide.

I have a 22t sprocket and a 28/45t crankset (well a virtual 45). Might swap to a 20t at some point.

18.5 - 66.6 GI for loaded
29.7 - 107 GI for unloaded

http://www.simpel.ch/fileadmin/speztooldata/download/N360_GearInchCard.pdf

My gear range is almost exactly the same as your loaded range so it might work fine. Got the new internals in the post today so I'll rebuild, regrease and see how it runs. In the meantime I'll save the pennies for a nuvinci plus one of these to stop the damned thing
http://www.sjscycles.co.uk/a2z-adaptor-retrofits-tabless-bike-with-current-disc-brake-system-dm-uni-prod17648/

Seen this?

AWD Fatbike:

Designed to cycle to the south pole. Video here
. Would be interested to see more about how the gearing works and how they built the frame/specced the parts.

Triton have their sandblasting sorted now. I've sent shipping details. So its not too long now.

Relating to the 36er on the last page. A Triton 36er.....

^ I'm assuming that's a Jones truss fork on there?

I wonder what size that frame is. It doesn't look as ridiculously small ( sorry ) as other 36ers I've seen.

Looks exactly like one. I would have guessed at Triton making their own. But that looks a bit too similar.

Needs fatter tyres too :-) Though I'm guessing those are 200mm discs on there.

I wonder how well proportioned a 36er in my size would be......

If I wanted to get low enough, I'd have to attach pegs to the front hub to steer.

In other news my wish has come true. I'm a long time fan of the Kenda small block 8. If you want to mix gravel paths, roads, and dry trails. Vee rubber are bringing out this fat tyre in June. Going to be my summer set-up.

Ha, you can then imagine that you're sticking two fingers up at anyone who crosses your path :-)

vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv

Well.. I would.

On suspension my friend Alex in Germany http://reiseradgabel.de/english/index.html has developed this form of suspension based on Alex Moulton type suspension it is designed to stop you going over the handlebars if you break too hard

With 4" tyres, you just roll over them.

Especially those with horribly set up FS bikes. Bobbing up and down, and unable control their bike.

Run them into the mud I say*.

(*secretly want a bouncey FS)

Already posted it on the 29er thread, but I like the look of this fat front Kona Honzo.

http://www.dirtragmag.com/webrag/how-we-roll-montana-millers-fat-front-kona-honzo

On suspension my friend Alex in Germany http://reiseradgabel.de/english/index.html has developed this form of suspension based on Alex Moulton type suspension it is designed to stop you going over the handlebars if you break too hard

He based his suspension on what he could salvage from a skip!

I love the fact the lowrider rack is used as a suspension.

I sincerely hope it's the steel one.

He has SPD flipflops too.

The seatpost looks nuts. Its a great bit of tinkering. Cant believe the forks are for stopping you go over the bars though.