Mountain Biking
 

So Saturday was my birthday (turned 19) and my gift this year was a mountain bike. So today I went out to Laguna Nigel with a couple buddies and we did a 12-13 mile ride and had a total blast.

Anyone else here Mountain Bike?

One thing that was pretty crazy was that I somehow got my rear brakes to fade on the descent! It has hydraulic brakes front and rear with a 7" rotor front and 6" rotor rear and 2 piston calipers. And somehow, I managed to heat up my rear brakes so much that a full, hard grab of the rear brake would only mildly slow my speed. I didn't touch em for a bit and once they cooled they worked perfectly again. (I think the reason they faded was they were new so they weren't bedded and therefore didn't grab as hard and I was romping on them to keep me from going 80mph down this 40* downhill slope).

Anyway, a new (from what I can tell, expensive) hobby that I found to go with this one. Figured I'd share.

Obviously you were using your brakes too much. Try abusing the front brake more but only when you have too.

I currently have 5 bikes. 3 are mountain and 2 are commuter (main source or transportation). It is also my other passion besides RC. I don't even own a car, but my fiance does... Here's a list of my current rides.

Mountain:
1. Santa Cruz Chameleon Single-Speed (I built it in 1998-still a fav).
2. Santa Cruz Heckler (My 5 inch bike for normal to gnarly trails)
3. Giant Reign X (My chairlift - freeride 7inch bike)

Road:
1. On One fix gear (main commuter bike - fast, had it since 2001)
2. Giant Tran Sport (it has industrial front and rear racks that I use in the summer to hail my rc and tacklebox to the track)

Well, you know who has done some biking in the past and wishes to do more in the future? Me! Some time this summer I really want to head out to Big Bear and descend some mountain. When are you (or are you already) out of school?

Happy (late) birthday, BTW!

Man, that is so weird. My birthday was friday and I bought a '07 Kona Coiler. I haven't had a chance to really ride it yet but I'm still pretty stoked. I might go today but my rear brakes need to be bled and I should replace my grips and seat soon. Glad to see we have a few mtn bikers here :mdr:

i used to do a bit of mountain biking but i have gone to road bikes now and i have just bought a scott s40 with full 105 ultegra and dura ace setup
happy belated birthday :lol:

i've been riding singletrack for about 10 years... and 5 years ago, i custom built my end-all-be-all $5k freeride bike. trek liquid full suspension frame, mavic tubeless wheelset, FOX front and rear air shock, full XTR, blah blah blah. :lol:

http://pic20.picturetrail.com/VOL127.../171579291.jpg

ive been into moutain biking for a while, though i havent been able to do much of it lately due to school. But it is another one of my passions, right next to RC and Car Audio. Here's my steed, im actually trying to sell her to get a newer model since i work in a bike shop and get pretty good deals on bikes.

Its a great bike and rides awesome, to date i have $5,500+ invested.

http://i582.photobucket.com/albums/s...n_01/BIKE1.jpg

oh, and on the brakes issue, its fairly common with brakes in general. Though hydraulic brakes are good, there are great differences in the quality of available brakes on the market, just like anything else, you get what you pay for. There are sets of mechanical Disc brakes that i would run instead of the lower end hydraulic sets, For instance the Avid BB7's perform as good or better in my opinion than many entry level hydraulic brake setups. If i were to keep my bike instead of sell it The next thing i would do is put a set of Avid Code DH/FR 4 piston hydraulic brakes on it because the Hayes that are on my rig fade a bit when ridden hard and they lack the tuning and power the higher end brakes have.

Well, I have an 04 Norco 250 sitting in my basement. I fubar'd the cranks a couple years ago and havn't touched it since.

Kind of got out of it, I am only 19 now but I realized that I am kind of a workoholic and that if I eat er' hard on the bike I'd be off work for a while (oh hey, I am off work for a while! thanks economy).

I used to ride a kona x-country bike(forget the damn name of it) and one day the cranks had apparently had enough, one broke in half and stabbed me right in the calf muscle. 13 stitches later (and now a pretty wicked looking shark-bite type scar LOL) I was patched up. Did I mention this happened when I bunny hopped off a curb?

The bike I got is a Mongoose Amasa Super. It has a 27 speed Deore drivetrain with a Shimano Rear derailer (I beleive it is an "XT" derailer - no idea what that's supposed to mean - that just stuck with me cause the guy helping us mentioned it like 30 times).

The brakes are Hayes Stroker Hydraulics both front and rear with 180mm disc front and 160 in the rear.

The forks are Rock Shox with 85-130mm on-the-fly adjustable travel spring shocks with lockout and on-the-fly adjustable rebound rates.

It's an awesome bike considering my skill level, and I hope to abuse it for a while.

I am already looking to increase the size of the rear rotor to help resist fading. While out there I saw a couple of hardcore down-hill guys and they had crazy 10" rotors front and rear (same calipers as me though).

Thanks for all the happy b-day wishes. This birthday was probably my best yet. My girlfriend planned with all my friends and parents to throw me a surprise birthday party.

Still rockin' my 95' Schwinn s9six .20, and my 01' norco VPS...

Only one not pictured is my Santa Cruz Heckler.
I also put a new Lyric fork and chainguide on the Giant Reign X (the freeride setup).

http://i255.photobucket.com/albums/h...g?t=1243888055

Is this the bike you got?
http://www.performancebike.com/bikes...05_20000_20500
I was considering that model when I was in the market, but settled on its GT competitor instead:
http://www.performancebike.com/bikes...00_20000_28504
Except mine is the previous year model and a different color. Did you get yours from Performance Bike, by chance?

So next time, instead of a RC bash, we gotta do a MTN bike bash :lol:

Wow MetalMan, that is a total coincidence. I almost got the previous GT Avalanche 1.0 (the gray colored one which is probably the one you actually have), but settled on the Mongoose instead (yes, that is the exact bike I got).

The BS part is that when I bought it last week it was 850 but we managed to get it discounted to 630 before tax, so we still made out better even with the price drop.

But now my dad is going to order one too.

Another fellow mountain biker here... I definitely spend more time and money on my bikes than with rc's, but I race, so practice comes in handy. :wink: Currently ride a Ironhorse 7point for my race bike... already spent about 6K on it. Next season, I'll be moving up to the Semi-Pro/expert class, so I'm pretty stoked about that. My other bike is a commuter/cross country bike.

BP - If you get really into mountain biking, you should go to some of the local races. Many of them are in Fontana and they have 4-cross, downhill, super-d, and cross country events. Something to consider... or maybe just go to take a look and watch just to see what its like at the races.

It's a great bike, I just need to ride it more :whistle: I got it for about $770 out the door with new pedals thanks to some promotional thing they had going.

But you still gotta answer my questions from my first post!

I really miss biking. I had an old school gt mountain bike. It was rigid with the "triple triangle" frame. And a schwinn predator for flatland.

On a side note: My manual wheelchair has actual rear suspension. It's a swingarm style with a single rock shok. It's an actual rock shok(sp?) Gives a nice ride. The front casters have a scissor type pivot and poly bushing for front suspension action, they call them "frog legs".

"I had an old school gt mountain bike. It was rigid with the "triple triangle" frame"

Karakoram or the orginal Avalanche?

Man I wanted that orange/black crackle paint Karakoram!

I had a Raleigh Elkhorn, was one of the first actual 'mountain' bikes on the market after Fisher had his breakthrough bike.

I remember everyone would say, "what the hell is a mountain bike?" like it was an otherworldly creation..... well now they are- nice rides guys!

@ MetalMan

This week is my last instructional week, then it's finals next week. Cal Poly is on the the same schedule as UCI, as far as I know. I have a friend from high school who goes there and we have always have identical days off.

Well that's good, we'll have to plan something then.

Im not into downhill, I do dirt jumping and street riding. Like bad azz gaps and drops and all that. But my dad has a sweet down hill bike he built a few years ago. Id like to build a free ride bike though!

I ride a Specialized 09 P1, so far I have odyssey plastic pedals, Bandanned seat, ditched the front brake, and a few little things. Got the weight down to 29 pounds, so not bad. I can bunny hop 3 feet up with it:yipi: So im happy with the weight, for now:oops:


And also, if you want to get on some sweet forums, http://www.ridemonkey.com/forums/index.php


Crappy cell pics, in my buddies messyyyyyy backyard lol. The black one is my buddies mirraco 24.

http://i453.photobucket.com/albums/q...456710a372.jpg

http://i453.photobucket.com/albums/q...674d0c22ec.jpg

Nice bikes guys! My daily rider is a 2008 Giant Rincon and my downhill bike is a 2004 santa cruz.

04? Specialized Hardrock Lots of upgrades, haha. Can't wait to get my Transition Bottle rocket next year, Diablo, here i come!

http://is.pinkbike.com/photo/3440/pbpic3440824.jpg
http://is.pinkbike.com/photo/3462/pbpic3462831.jpg

My friends 08 Glory, sickest bike i've ever rode.
http://is.pinkbike.com/photo/3333/pbpic3333517.jpg

I'll need to upgrade my rear disc before doing any serious downhill stuff. The rear brakes faded out and that was when I was going slow. Had I been going fast the rotor would have heated up waaaay more.

I found a kit that allows a 9" rotor using the same calipers (made by the same company that makes my brake setup). Its about 50 bucks. I have to see if it will fit my rear, as it is actually designed for the front. However, from what I could tell, my front and rear mounting brackets on my bike are identical, so it may just fit the rear.

I figure with a 9" rotor vs the 6 that is on there, I'll have a lot more heat dissipation, as well as more mass, which will heat up slower.

you may need to buy a adapter to make a front kit work with the rear as the spacing is usually different for the fork and the frame, even when using the same size rotor. It might be different on yours, but most that i have seen including mine are different front and rear. I actually had to make spacers to get mine to work with my new fork.

Are you sure you weren't using the rear brake too much? My front is pretty powerful and I use it whenever I can since it's the more controlled of the two. I learned this the hard way a long time ago on my dirtbikes.

Jnev, you got an exact location in Fontana or a website that I can get more info on the local races. Sounds like something I would like to check out.

I'm not sure about using a brake too much.

Maybe it's just me and having super crazy requirements, but I feel that I should be able to use the brakes as much as I want without fade.

This was my VERY first time doing this kind of riding and I already got it to fade. What if I start doing crazy downhill stuff at 30mph? I'd be screwed.

Wow, after seeing some of these bikes, I feel ashamed of my ride. It's a ~10 year old Trek. No shocks, and the brakes are the old caliper-against-the-rim deal. I still use it a lot though, but it needs some work because when I pedal heavily, the chain tends to skip. Now, if these bikes came with some sort of CVD tranny, I'd be all over that!

Another MTB fan here, I live in Scotland which has loads of briliant bike trails and mountains! Anyway here's some of my bikes:


http://i332.photobucket.com/albums/m...83/hustler.jpg
http://i332.photobucket.com/albums/m...3/IMG_0574.jpg

My Coiler-

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...0602091754.jpg

There is some more information about the races here:
http://www.southridgeusa.com/

And you can find directions on the left side of the website. Basically just take 15 north up to freeway 60 east and exit Country Village Road. :wink:

Just picked up a trek fuel ex8. I got it for the woods, but find myself on the street more than anything.

I have some old school bikes, but they work great!!..
http://www.geocities.com/aqwut/RCM/B...629_resize.JPGhttp://www.geocities.com/aqwut/RCM/B...630_resize.JPG