Blog

New Staffer At Real Cycles ;-)

Tue, 20 Jul 2010 21:04:13 +0100

Jack the shop dog today got a promotion. He’s now head of warranty. Nathan has been doing staff training with him today, it’s going reasonably well, although his tendency to poke his tongue out at customers on the phone is a little worrying.

Jack will start dealing with your calls and replying to your email as soon as he’s learnt to speak and read. This might seem like a tall order, but then, we managed to teach Nathan to do both these things, so we’re hopeful.

And yes, Nathan does have a microwave in his office. He’s a big lad, he needs food on demand.

New Shop & Test Track Update

Wed, 30 Jun 2010 22:11:49 +0100

I’m pleased to say the new shop is finally, completely, almost finished. All the bikes are now on display, a LOT of bikes. The workshop is up and running and almost every box of bits is unpacked. We still have a few corners that need sorting, but we’ve come a long way in the last month.

Best of all, the test track is complete. Now, the bermed corners, the ladders and the sewsaws are not done yet, but they (might) come, one day. But, you can call in, grab any bike and take it for a speed around the shop. We’ve plans for a time trail league soon.

Here’s a quick video of me, on a bike, with a camera in hand, riding around the shop trying to not run Jack the dog over. The video gives you an idea of what the shop looks like too.

2010 Saracen Ariel (Custom build) The perfect all day play bike?

Sun, 27 Jun 2010 20:33:15 +0100

About 2 years ago the much troubled saracen brand name was bought out, lock stock and barrel, by the UK’s biggest cycle distribution company, Madison. No strangers to bike production, they own the Ridgeback & Genesis brands as well as distribute the Commencal brand in the UK, it was obvious that Saracen potentially were going to once again become a force to be reckoned with in the UK MTB market.

I say once again because whilst new comers to our wonderful sport might not know this, any MTBer around in the early 90’s will tell you: Back then Saracen was a brand to lust after. Sadly in the last decade the name has been licensed to the highest bidder too many times, and more often than not the highest bidder stuck the name on any old piece of crap with the sole aim of making a quick buck.

All that has changed though. Madison made it clear from the off they wanted to re-develop it as a proper UK specific MTB brand, including not just hardtails, but full sussers too.

Now this is no easy thing. Fact is that anyone with the money can produce a hardtail range, even a good hardtail range. Just buy in some nice frames, spec them accordingly, and bobs your aunties lives in lover. But full sussers are different. Sure you can buy in an off the shelf suspension platform, but you’ll soon be found out and ripped apart in the press. To do full suspension properly you actually need to design, test and develop a system that not only works but brings something new to the market. And that is not easy, or cheap. Madison have never ranged a full suspension model before so when they announced they were going to include several in the new Saracen range, many were sceptical.

The first offering of this new platform (it’s even got a funky name: Tuned Ride Link, or TLR for short) has been in the shops for a few months now, and has started making waves within the UK MTB press. So, were the sceptics right to be, er, sceptical? Or has the UK distribution company managed to succeed where many fail: Launch a successful full suspension model into a VERY populated market place? We decided to get one and find out. In the usual Real Cycles style we thought we could spec one better than Saracen themselves, so we got in a bog standard entry level Ariel 1 (RRP £1599), stripped it down to the frame, and rebuilt it with some of our favourite bits. Then ripped it around our local forest trail.

The Bike

The Ariel comes in three flavours. 1, 2 & 3. Ranging in price from £1599.99 to £2499.99. ALL models sport Fox forks up front (QR15 on the 2 & 3 model) and an RP23 Hi-Vol air can on them all. Yes, that’s right, the base model Ariel 3 has Fox front and rear. And not a cheap RP2 out back either, a full on RP23, for £1600. This alone sets this bike miles apart the competition.

With 140mm travel in the rear you’ll be forgiven for assuming this is just another 5.5” trail bike. But look a little closer and you’ll see a bolt thru rear axle (on the 2 & 3), a taper headtube, ISCG05 mounts and a massively overbuilt swingarm. Hmmm, not your typical trail bike then! Not your typical trail bike weight either you’d be forgiven for assuming after hearing that spec list, but that’s where the Ariel turns things on it’s head. Thanks to the triple butted tubing the frame weights around 7lbs, bang on the money for your typical 5.5incher! The frame sports a tight rear end and a shorter than average top tube, similar in dimensions to your average short travel DHer, and to confuse things even further the taper headtube means the frame is good for your typical 160mm fork. So what the hell is this bike meant for?

Our Build

It would have been easier, and cheaper, to just take a stock bike and test that out. But where’s the fun in that? The mags are getting turned onto this bike and all testing stock models (and loving it) so we thought we’d mix things up a little. I mean, if a frame can take 160mm forks, why the hell not test it with them? So we immediately plugged in a set of Fox 36’s. we wanted to try out the climbing and trail riding abilities of the frame as well as it’s DH credentials too so we opted for some TALAS 36’s, which give you the option of 100, 130 and 160mm of travel at the flick of a switch. And cus we’re a bike shop and get everything at trade prices we went for the RC2 version. Wouldn’t you?

New Showroom update: "Test Track" video

Thu, 27 May 2010 19:22:47 +0100

The picture above was taken a long time ago. In fact since we started transforming this shell into the new Real Cycles showroom it seems like a lifetime! In the last two months there have been many a late night spent painting this, and building that, and putting together Ikea office furniture. But we’re nearly there.

When we planned this place we decided the one thing it MUST have was an indoor test ride area. We’re not talking a full on MTB trail (we’ve our eye on a plot of land round the back of the shop for that), but a simple pathway around the shop interior that peeps would be encouraged to ride our display bikes around. What can you find out about riding a bike in a figure of eight, on carpet? Not much. But it’s better than nothing. And the obvious option of timed laps rears it’s ugly head!

Well, the carpet is nearly down, and the “test track” is done. Weird bike riding shop regular BK called in last night to see how things were going, and being that he had one of his weird “SS, rigid, road bike” contraptions with him, well he had to try it out.

Jack the shop dog was also about, and try as we all did to make BK go fast, and hopefully fall off, he didn’t. Jack caught him with ease, and proceeded to eat his pedal. That’ll teach him.

Watch the video to see BK’s frankly pathetic effort at full on gnar on the new indoor Real Cycles “test track”.

Gamut Chain Ring Bolts: Simple but effective!

Wed, 21 Apr 2010 09:17:43 +0100

At Real Cycles we like Gamut. Their stuff is simple, well made and lightweight. 3 things you rarely find in the one package. We also like them cus if you want to chat to the guys behind the brand, you can. There is only a handful of them, 3 of them family, and only a couple of them full timers! Yes, I know, you think they’re some big company churning out these things, but no, the design is still done in the founders garage!

Real Cycles shop owner Steve B met the founder of Gamut at a trade show some time ago and started questioning him about why his (Steve B’s) bashguard broke. Now at well over 6 foot and 16 stone Steve tends to break stuff, but we wanted to know why the Gamut died after an encounter it’s predecessor, a e13 Supercharger, would have shrugged off. First and foremost the obvious answer is the e13 is stronger. It’s weighs 3 times as much so that’s pretty obvious. But it also seems the standard crank bolts used to attach the Gamut didn’t help matters.

You see, with standard bolts only the bolt heads physically connect with the bashguard, meaning a lot of stress goes thru a small area in the event of an impact. What the Gamut guys found was running the bolts back to front: So, the bolt goes on the inside and the sleeve faces out. Meant more of the bolts was in connect with the bashguard, and so the whole area was beefed up.

Simple. Or even, simples.

Gamut found that a lot didn’t like to run their chainring bolts round the wrong way, for cosmetic reasons, and cus it just felt wrong, so they’ve produced a new design of bolt, designed to be run back to front.

Check out the video below to see what we mean.