New bike thread... the Purple Peril.

[weeksy]

Hey, i had to think of a name for the thread.... that's the best i came up with.

After a random message via an old Pinkbike advert i got a WhatsApp to see if i was interested in swapping the Specialized Status for a DH bike...

Pics were exchanged, messages exchanged and I made the trek to Shropshire today to collect and swap for this.

2022-09-17_06-28-26 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

2022-09-17_06-28-17 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

Like the lads current race DH bike, it's a GT Fury. This is the 'expert' model. It's 2 years newer than his current bike and a little bigger. It's also got 10 gears which will help with some of the local rides.

The current plan is to use his first GT Fury as the race bike, but with a view to potentially moving to this by the end of the year, either way, one of them will be the Race bike and one will be the 'spare' and emergency bike just in case we have an issue on a race weekend. It's then just a case of jumping on the 2nd bike and it should be fairly familiar to him.

It's pretty much immaculate condition and feels pretty nice in the Close riding round, so much so that i think i'll be the first to test it on a ride tomorrow morning

It was going to be a surprise for the lad, but i had to call him and check he wanted to go all-in with non-trail bike and both his bikes being a DH. He was 100% on this plan.. Whether that's a 6 month plan or a 5 year plan, well, we'll see.... but it's the plan we've got for now

It'll get it's first proper run-out at 417 on Monday, i'm curious to see what he'll be racing on at the weekend..

[Le_Fromage_Grande]

Purple People Eater

[MingtheMerciless]

Purple Weeksy Eater

[Flux]

Looks good.

[weeksy]

Lightweight Fox SLS spring fitted at 350lb. Will check sag tonight but I think it'll be right.

2022-09-18_12-10-37 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[weeksy]

So, how was the day on the bike for the first time. Well technically the 2nd as we spent last night playing with some of the bouncy bits to get it in the right area.
Then today was 417 flyup, with both suspension testing and back to back testing on the GT Fury old 18. The conclusion was, he loves the new purple one, but was only fractionally quicker on it.
Throughout the day he tried a 300 spring, 350 and 450, settling on the 350.

On blue raccoon he was 1.5s quicker on the purple.

He also set a 2s PR on Dubby Skipper and it's 14th overall on Strava.

I think tomorrow we're removing the Magic Mary off the back of Barney the purple dinosaur and fitting a DHR.
Along with fitting a spare set of SRAM Guide Rs we have, he wasn't that keen on the TRP Slate, but could easily just be pads. But we'll keep things the same anyway and put Guides on.

Then it's a bit of testing and race next Sunday.

I also tried it and liked it, but with the fork springs I simply couldn't get it to work for me. Just too soft. But was to be expected

[weeksy]

As is often the case, this thread is as much for me as anyone else, just to keep track of things.

This morning i've fitted the DHR rear and removed the Big Betty.... Both the Schwalbes are decent rubber, but far from being what he likes, so gone back to the Minion for the rear and the Assegai on the front, should keep him happy.

The blue bike is running a Shorty on the front and a DHR on the back.

[weeksy]

New shock bushing installed, the other was loose as a wizards sleeve and you could feel the play in it.

Then onto the brakes and completely ballsed it up... the wheel spun and ripped off the end of the bleed tool in the caliper !!!! It's not the first time i've seen a stripped/broken one, but a bit of a pain as you can't buy the part on it's own.

So i've thrown some race/kevlar pads into the TRPs for now and that should give him better braking anyway.

2022-09-20_11-56-53 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

2022-09-20_11-57-04 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[weeksy]

2022-09-20_05-54-30 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[weeksy]

So the Purple Peril is booked in with RSR Bikeworks https://www.rsrbikeworks.co.uk/ for setup and telemetry. As you may recall, we had this done on the blue bouncer and the lad was very very happy with it. So it makes sense to get the gadgets on it for the new bike and sooner rather than later.

The best part is that we'll know if the XFusion kit is both sprung correctly and then the settings and dials twiddled correctly in time for the Pearce and Stile Cop races. It will also mean that if we need to we can throw the Boxxers in the new frame if we find the XFusions are too stiff.

[Mr Moofo]

At least it’s not pink …

[weeksy]

When going over the bike this morning i noticed 'Eagle' on the chain. Which confused me as i don't recall there ever being a 10sp Eagle setup, so i think someone has thrown the wrong chain on it. Which may explain why we dropped the chain at 417 as well.

Happily, the spares bin came good as usual and i had both a 10Sp chain and a quick-link in there too.

So both are now installed and good to go

Tuesday night is suspension setup night, so we'll see if any chain drops happen.

[weeksy]

his favourite SRAMs have now been migrated over to the purple bike... so he'll not be able to complain "oh i don't really like the brakes"

As always, he doesn't 'complain' but observes/notices, but i do press him for answers I want to make the bike as nice as possible for him, so i quiz him.

[weeksy]

So the Peril was setup by the WC Factory mechanic today... i don't have the spreadsheet yet but there were quite a few changes made both ends and all settings, the boy is really happy with how it's feeling and getting all giddy about the weekend now.

Rich at RSR Bikeworks was properly nice to chat with and really helpful in terms of advice, info and at the end of the conversation he didn't seem happy with our choices for race rubber in the potentially wet Hopton this weekend, so gave us some rubber from a well known factory rider and junior world cup champion used for 1 days testing and now will be fitted to the purple peril this weekend.

2022-09-27_07-46-37 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[weeksy]

2022-09-28_09-21-34 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

New rubber fitted, bike cleaned, lubed, checked, sorted... All ready to go for the weekend.

[Mr Moofo]

2022-09-28_09-21-34 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

New rubber fitted, bike cleaned, lubed, checked, sorted... All ready to go for the weekend.

When will you be tidying the rest of the garage ?

[weeksy]

LOL the garage is often 'fluid' in many ways with tonnes of riding kit scattered about... it's pretty tidy in honesty..

[Mr Moofo]

Looking at the tyres, I take it Weeksy Jr has no intention go every riding on the flat/ up hill every again.

Leave them long enough in dirt and they will fix in permanently

[weeksy]

Looking at the tyres, I take it Weeksy Jr has no intention go every riding on the flat/ up hill every again.

Leave them long enough in dirt and they will fix in permanently

Forecast is for rain on Fri and showers on Sat. So it's likely to be on the muddy side, grip will be more important than rolling speed really. I think we need to accept at this stage that tyres are a fluid/changing thing week by week and what we use this week, we won't necessarily use next week. As much as that's a bit of a pain in the backside, i guess that's how it will be.

This weekends race is uplifted, so it's simply (he says) a case of setting off and riding down.... the up bit doesn't even come into discussion.

I think we're leaving the Blue Bouncer as the 'play bike' with slightly easier rubber and due to the lack of high pivot, it makes it a bit more poppy and playful, so that will be the local bike if needed and the race bike will be more that, the race bike.

[weeksy]

Here's the changes made

2022-09-29_11-08-25 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

There's a load of other info but that's the basics. It was interesting that the boy didn't like it balanced, he's not the first and a few high level riders amongst them. But when they tried it that was the lad didn't approve, so they went back to the previous setting from the run before.