Gravel Bikes

[kennethsime]

Is it an aluminum fork?

Thats kinda crazy. If you dont care about weight you could always go with a steel fork. Plus you could get one intended for bikepacking and get triple brazons on each side. You could carry so many water bottles.

Edit.
I just looked at their website and answered my own question. Also I guess your original fork already had triple brazeons.

I went down the steel vs aluminum vs composite vs titanium rabit hole a few years back.
I personally prefer steel. Although aluminum does have some merits.

Yeah, honestly I like the stock fork plenty, but they weren't available for individual purchase and I'm kind of stoked to try out the carbon. It's a very close fit to the stock fork, so shouldn't shakeup the geometry much, and also has triple brazeons.

I think that at some point, I'm going to transition away from the Poseidon and buy a steel frame from Crust or Surly. But for now, I'm just going to lighten it up piece by piece as stuff breaks.

[awa54]

....

I also got a new bottom bracket delivered, since I've been unable to get rid of a particular creaking sound. Fingers crossed that this solves it, and also that I'm able to figure it out tonight.

....

Press-in BBs are one of the WORST "innovations" in recent bike tech!
If your frame and crank set allow, switching to a screw-together BB, which uses two opposing flanged sleeves that thread together and are tensioned into the frame, will usually kill the creak or click that all press-fit BBs seem to acquire.

I shopped for my current bike with three major must-have criteria: NO carbon frame (broke one already, not going there again), through axle front and rear, threaded BB.

[kennethsime]

....

I also got a new bottom bracket delivered, since I've been unable to get rid of a particular creaking sound. Fingers crossed that this solves it, and also that I'm able to figure it out tonight.

....

Press-in BBs are one of the WORST "innovations" in recent bike tech!
If your frame and crank set allow, switching to a screw-together BB, which uses two opposing flanged sleeves that thread together and are tensioned into the frame, will usually kill the creak or click that all press-fit BBs seem to acquire.

I shopped for my current bike with three major must-have criteria: NO carbon frame (broke one already, not going there again), through axle front and rear, threaded BB.

It’s an English threaded BB (Shimano UN300) but I’m not sure the two sides actually thread into each other - just the frame. I think sooner or later I’m going to switch to one of the cheaper DUB of Hollowtech BB+cranksets. My stock cranks are reals heavy.

[awa54]

ahh, if it's a 3 piece crank set, then the click or creak is likely the square taper of the crank to axle interface.
I've been running 2 piece cranks for as long as I could afford them, they're another indispensable item of modern technology, IMO.
Even forged crank arms will be significantly lighter, since the axle is hollow, just stay away from the FSA Omegas, they're solid as all get out, but also almost as heavy as a 3 piece crankset.

[kennethsime]

Well, the Whisky fork came in, and I found a great new LBS to install it for me.



They also did a tuneup for me, and i installed a new Deckas oval chainring and a new Ergon saddle. Took it for a short out+back on the local gravel trail with a buddy, and I think the bike is riding even better than new now. Still want to upgrade the wheelset, crankset, and seatpost, but I think I need to have a bit more fun with it as-is - and give my wallet a break.

Here’s my buddy’s 1994 Rock Hopper, which is very popular on r/xbiking. Believe it or not, I think he’s put more $$ into it than I have my Redwood, by a good margin.

[Wandering_About]

I did a thing today, and now I'm very tires.

[kennethsime]

I did a thing today, and now I'm very tires.

Woah, way to go! Pretty good speed over that distance, too!

I would love to work up to that kind of distance.

[abbazaba]

....

I also got a new bottom bracket delivered, since I've been unable to get rid of a particular creaking sound. Fingers crossed that this solves it, and also that I'm able to figure it out tonight.

....

Press-in BBs are one of the WORST "innovations" in recent bike tech!
If your frame and crank set allow, switching to a screw-together BB, which uses two opposing flanged sleeves that thread together and are tensioned into the frame, will usually kill the creak or click that all press-fit BBs seem to acquire.

I shopped for my current bike with three major must-have criteria: NO carbon frame (broke one already, not going there again), through axle front and rear, threaded BB.

It’s an English threaded BB (Shimano UN300) but I’m not sure the two sides actually thread into each other - just the frame. I think sooner or later I’m going to switch to one of the cheaper DUB of Hollowtech BB+cranksets. My stock cranks are reals heavy.

Disassembly, cleaning meticulously, and covering every single part and interface in tons of marine grease has worked for all the mystery creaking in my BB/Crank over the years. Also be sure to properly torque crank bolts as they can be a factor if over tightened.

[kennethsime]

The more I ride the Redwood, and really the more I replace parts on it, the more I find myself thinking I'd really like to have a hardtail XC bike. Maybe even something with a bit more travel, like the Rocky Mountain Growler 50.

That said, Saturday's ride proved to me that there are a lot of other crazy folks out there just like me. We only rode 11.5miles, but did 2,128' of elevation in the Marin Headlands. I honestly would've done more, but my buddy is still getting back in shape and was pretty pooped halfway through our planned route. We mostly rode firetrail, with a bit or single track and a fair amount of 6" trail obstacles.

We saw 2 full-squish mountain bikes, but the rest were gravel bikes. Mostly "monster gravel," if you will, similar to my Redwood. Lots of hikers asked "are you really going up that hill?"

I downsized my chainring a few weeks back, so now I'm running 34x11-48. I felt ok on this ride, but could almost see myself downsizing again to a 32 if I was going to ride this kind of elevation all of the time.

I managed to crack the hub on my rear wheel a month or two back, which is why you see the new 700c G1800s from DT Swiss. I needed new tires for the new wheelset, so picked up some chonkier Travail Rutlands in 700x2.2". Man, do I love the Rutlands. They may be a touch slower on pavement, but boy howdy do they bite into loose dirt, sand, and gravel better - especially while cornering. Poseidon did send me a new rear wheel under warranty, but I've yet to even open the box.

My "creaking under heavy load" issue turned out to be the pedals. I swapped in the Crank Brothers Candy pedals from my track bike, and BOOM, no more creaking. I guess I replaced my bottom bracket for nothing. I'm going to try to rebuild the Mallets, as I do enjoy the bigger platform for downhill stuff.

Man, gravel bikes are great. I just love getting out there, exploring fresh dirt, and seeing all that I can on two wheels.

[VooDooChild]

Theres a ton of hardtail xc/trail bike options out there.

That growler has a fairly slack headtube angle and long wheelbase, I would call it more of a trail bike.

I would also say consider a steel frame.

[Wandering_About]

Not gonna lie, after Gravel Worlds my motivation for riding tanked to almost zero. I was pretty burned out, having done a lot of riding this year, and a lot of (for me) challenging riding. But in the last couple weeks I've gotten back to it a bit, and every ride does remind me why I love it. Today's ride was a peaceful 20ish mile loop with one big hill and plenty of fall colors (about as good as we get here). Very refreshing.







Months ago I posted a picture of my bike here, but it was facing the wrong way according to quite a few people on various platforms. Finally got around to taking a picture with the bike facing the correct direction.

[kennethsime]

Well, no doubt about it: this was my hardest ride yet.

Link to reddit post.

[Wandering_About]

That looks like an awesome ride. Great scenery. We are having great weather bit I've been stuck working for much of it unfortunately. Hoping to do some riding once I get some time off if the weather continues to be favorable.

[Surfingringo]

Finally got back out on gravel yesterday.

Looks like a gorgeous ride. I'm jealous of the rolling hills, and the long distance. I've been doing a whole lot of climbing, and I'd really like to try out some longer-distance, less-steep routes.

I tried out a new single track park last week and ended up in my first wipeout.



At first I thought I had just destroyed my saddle, but after a thorough workup at home this weekend, I discovered I had actually bent my fork.



I have a Whisky No. 9 carbon fork on order to replace it, which should be nice. About an hour after ordering that, Poseidon actually offered to send me a replacement folk on warrant, which I thought was really excellent of them.

I still haven't reached out to Selle Anatomica about the saddle, but I think I will. It might have just been my fault for crashing, but I'd like to see what they think of the rails bending like that.

I'm probably out of the saddle for a week, maybe two - we'll see when parts come in. Luckily, I have the fixed gear to keep me busy.

How do you like that Selle Anatomica? I tried one of those in my search for a seat that would make 50+ mile trips bearable. It was ok but nothing spectacular for my backside. I ended up trying an a saddle from Infinity Seat and it was a complete game changer. Ridiculously expensive but I’d buy it again. The concept might not work for every rider but for guys with skinny butts and prominent sit bones its a total game changer. Surprised it took so many decades for someone to come up with such a simple idea.

[Wandering_About]

FINALLY back on the bike outside! Time to dig up this thread!

Intended to do a decent ride this afternoon, but the wind was ripping until evening and I was not feeling it with post night shift funk. But I did get out for a quick 5ish miles to check this bike for function. Built it over the winter. Seems good, although I'm not sure I actually indexed the derailleur, shifting was atrocious when I first tried to ride. Quick check in the stand and all was well. Hoping to do some bikepacking with this rig.