In today’s feature I will discuss a small bike (amount of travel) with small wheels (27.5”/650b), how it disrupted my initial plunge into the big wheel (29er) world and a Dirtbag Digression-worthy hack.
Music Selection: Taking a shot at choosing something even noisier and maybe more obscure than the ear hole torment provided weekly over at Revolting with DC’s Circus Lupus; Super Genius. Listening to this will make you incredibly cool, smart and good-looking; a super genius so to speak.
Marketing can be genius especially when it comes from the “why” level. Evil bikes efforts at their onset were just that. They dropped into a crowded market with a level of irreverence that had not been seen. They grabbed top riders both racers and others to ride for them. They used word of mouth to spread the gospel. Evil exclusively employs Dave Weagle’s DELTA system which took a familiar idea in bike suspension (link-driven single pivot) and turned the volume up to eleven. There were hiccups with frame failure runs early on that they had to sort through, but their concept and style captured the fast-moving zeitgeist of the aggressive short travel 29er better than anybody when they dropped the original Following.
It was at this point that my 29er riding pals began to take notice. My pal MasterP (not the rapper) after having purchased a Following was so blown away, he scored the first Evil dealership in Georgia. Quickly all our group were riding them especially after the Wreckoning came out. I had ridden the Following and thought it was fun but was still enamored with the idea of a longer travel bike. Now that Evil had a longer travel 29er that had great reviews and was a great deal I was finally in.
I sold my Banshee and was bereft of anything to ride other than an old beat to hell Surly Instigator*. It was right at this same time when Evil dropped their short travel 27.5 bike The Calling**. MasterP picked up one as a demo in a size large. As things take longer than they do, my Wreckoning was a solid several months away. In the interim, MasterP let me borrow the Calling demo. I figured it being a size large it would be way too big for my medium entrenched self. Wrong! I put a 35mm stem on it and lowered the seat post as far down as it would go. This bike absolutely blew my mind. It had less travel than anything I’d ridden in forever, yet was a riot taking anything I could throw at it. The default most have is that shorter travel equals better climbing and more cross-country mountain bike-ness in nature. The Calling climbed better than my previous bike and still could take all the big hits with aplomb. However, what really stuck with me was how much it encouraged nonstop play. You might say it encouraged riding like a jerk. Every ride became a thrash session. Every pebble became a launch and even the most sedate corners begged you to get sideways. In less than a week, I told MasterP that I wanted one of these in a size large and to cancel my Wreckoning order. However, it was too late; the money had been paid and I was getting a Wreckoning. He said worst case, you hate it, we’ll figure something out. I could have likely simply bought the demo Calling, but having to deal with the extra money and the mishigas of selling the Wreckoning seemed silly. Plus, maybe I’d love the Wreckoning (spoiler alert, I mostly did). The only thing about that Calling demo I did not like was the bright blue color, the cheekily named “Angry Dolphin” as I just do not like blue. Nevertheless, the playful chaotic nature of the Calling stuck with me. It called to me. Sorry.
*I’ve always had a soft spot for Surly bikes having first come across them in Mpls in the late 90s. The original Rat Ride 1×1 was dope, but the extra burliness of the ‘Gator spoke to me. I traded some dental work for a frame and built it up as do-it-all beater/basher/spare bike. However, it became my main ride many times over the ensuing years, and I built it up a zillion different ways. I still have the frame and had it repaired for some beer. I will resurrect it at some point.
**The music in this edit is from Freedom Hawk from my hometown of VB so that added an extra degree of stoke.
Eventually my new Wreckoning arrived, and it was everything my pals had said it would it be. They did not say it was as kooky jerky as The Calling, but it excelled at smashing anything in its path and was hella fun in the process. Not long after I got it, we did the Whole Enchilada, and it really shined on that monster of a ride. Curiously its head angle was slightly steeper than where I’ve landed today. We’ll get into more geometry weirdness in a future episode, but I digress.
About a year into my time with the Wrecker I discovered the cheap thrills of angle adjust headsets. Here is where the Dirtbag Digression begins. These headsets will fit nearly any bike and reduce (slacken) or increase (steepen, if you’re an XC weirdo, jk!) the head angle. Unlike just putting a longer travel fork where your head angle becomes one degree slacker for every 20mm increase in fork height, an angle headset does not raise the frame up including not making the bottom bracket height higher. It in fact does the opposite and lowers the BB height which tbh, rules with a minor caveat*. However, another super dope thing an angle headset does is steepen the seat angle. These changes can take a bike with “older” geometry and notably modernize it. The best part is that it is easy to do and inexpensive. Yes, it may void your warranty** but do your homework, crunch the numbers and see if it could work for you. In my case, it worked amazingly well. The Wrecker now not only descended better with a slacker front end and a lower BB for that locked in ride feel but was more comfortable to climb with. I love messing around with bike possibilities and this is really one of the better and most cost-effective options. Angle adjust headsets will continue to be featured in this on-going saga. Ride on, y’all!
*The lower BB does warrant consideration regarding crank length. The Wreckoning has a two-position geometry adjustment of “Low” and “X-Low” the latter being where I liked mine. I could have circumvented acquiring shorter cranks by utilizing the “Low” (higher) setting, but I liked everything else about the geometry, so I scored some 165 mm cranks and that minimized my pedal strikes. FWIW, I ride 155mm cranks now on all my bikes, but that’s a tale for another day.
**I’ve always thought warranties were kinda dumb especially on stuff that you are going to use with vigor (beat the crap out of). I think crash-replacement policies make more sense. YRMV.