Mountain bikes

[hiro]

Lot of Fruita and Moab trips and a bunch of local high country riding here.

About a year and a half ago, I bit the bullet and bought a new bike. It was replacing a Santa Cruz Blur Classic I’d been on for a bunch of years. I settled on an Ibis Ripley LS as a new scoot. It's a mid-travel 29er and falls into the “trail bike” genre by today’s standards. I’ve been totally tickled with its versatility. It’s only 130mm/120mm but descending, even on bigger hit type stuff, it rides like a bike with another two inches of travel. And at the same time, it’s super nimble and flicky for a 29er; kinda like an adult sized BMX bike. On the other side of the coin, it’s one of the best technical climbing bikes I’ve ever owned and I consistently find myself cleaning difficult sections with way less effort/focus than in the past. As a “quiver-of-one”, do-everything trail bike, especially for a taller/larger rider, the new breed of 29ers are pretty impressive.

The 3rd gen Ripley is next on my list to take out (I am spoilt, can take the demo bikes out from a local shop at no charge).

Had fun with this a couple of weeks back

[jeep45238]

Geez....makes me glad I’m looking at aluminum instead of carbon!


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[jeep45238]

So who carries some sort of locator beacon/communication system outside of a cell phone when they're mountain biking (or hiking)? What are your preferences to look for in equipment, and what has an upfront cost vs. something that has monthly payments?

[JodyH]

So who carries some sort of locator beacon/communication system outside of a cell phone when they're mountain biking (or hiking)? What are your preferences to look for in equipment, and what has an upfront cost vs. something that has monthly payments?

I carry a Inmarsat 2 satellite phone and use Blue Cosmo pre-paid plan.
Up front is about $600 for the phone and it costs about $500 a year for more minutes than I've ever used.

Much more reliable and useful than just a SPOT.

[mtnbkr]

So who carries some sort of locator beacon/communication system outside of a cell phone when they're mountain biking (or hiking)? What are your preferences to look for in equipment, and what has an upfront cost vs. something that has monthly payments?

I don't. When I ride solo, it is normally in local regional parks where the trails are loops and well traveled. When I ride the "wilderness", I don't do so alone.

Chris

[jeep45238]

That’s the ideal, but I won’t know most of the trails next summer (out of state road trip), nor the frequency of rides. With how sketchy cell reception can be in areas, having a backup seems to be prudent, and for my situation smarter to have than not.

I’m not sure if a 600+ buck satphone will be an option either, so I’ll have to do some research on that.


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[SafetyFirst]

What happened?

Not quite sure. I have a few speculations.
1. Damage might have happened to the bike at the down hill bike park in big bear. The accident where I snapped my right ACL and other knee damage. That was 4 years ago. 2. I didn’t service the bolts connecting the rear triangle and one of those snapped and broke the carbon frame at that the same time. 3. Shit happens. Or 4. All the above.

Either way, at least Santa Cruz would help me out with a discount for a new bike from them. But I am going in a different direction and getting a cross bike in a couple of weeks. My favorite LBS should be receiving it and putting everything together next week, then shipping it to me!

[JodyH]

Not quite sure. I have a few speculations.
1. Damage might have happened to the bike at the down hill bike park in big bear. The accident where I snapped my right ACL and other knee damage. That was 4 years ago. 2. I didn’t service the bolts connecting the rear triangle and one of those snapped and broke the carbon frame at that the same time. 3. Shit happens. Or 4. All the above.

Either way, at least Santa Cruz would help me out with a discount for a new bike from them. But I am going in a different direction and getting a cross bike in a couple of weeks. My favorite LBS should be receiving it and putting everything together next week, then shipping it to me!

CF is not a good material for a beater bike IMO, great for racers though.
Even a fairly light crash can cause an internal fracture that manifests itself as a catastrophic failure at some random time in the future.
I've seen it too many times to ever trust CF as a hard use mountainbike component material.

[taadski]

Ibis just dropped the release of their new long travel (160/145) 29er, the Ripmo, last week. If it rides like all the pre-release reviews tout, I'm going to have a serious case of the wantsies and may have a Ripley LS for sale.

https://www.ibiscycles.com/bikes/ripmo/


Kendall-Weed getting it on the new bike...

[jeep45238]

Wow... meanwhile I’m working out between a 100/100 or a 120/130 bike.


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