456 Summer Season

neil_sheehan2000

Sooo... I got a bit drunk on Thursday night, and this morning a Ketchup Red summer season frame was delivered to my office! I'd wanted a hardtail again for a while, and this seems like a good frame for the money; it only took a wee bit of Dutch courage to tip me over the edge.

Anyway, the immediate plan is to strip my Meta 5.5 (mostly XT gear, with a splash of SLX, Sun Ringle Equalizer rims, Fox Float RL 140mm fork), plus getting it it's own headset, and using some spares I've got lying around, with the more long-term goal of building it up as cheaply as possible- probably to the point where I can just swap the wheels, fork and front brake between the two bikes (a 10 minute job, really) depending on what I feel like riding at the time. Of course, if it turns out that I love this bike as much as some people seem to, then there could be a Meta frame on ebay before too long.

I must say I'm quite excited. It looks small and chuckable, and the colour of the frame is better in real life than it is on the website- a rather rich metallic red. I think the seat and chainstays look awesome too. The yellow decals on the frame stand out more than I thought they would, which is giving me ideas...

Pictures to follow as soon as possible, but in the meantime, imagine this:



...crossed with this:


(except it's a slightly darker red).

The Northern Monkey

Well I hope everything fits...

If it were me, I'd keep the Meta as it is and build the 456SS as an ongoing project!

neil_sheehan2000

The Northern Monkey wrote:

Well I hope everything fits...

If it were me, I'd keep the Meta as it is and build the 456SS as an ongoing project!

Yeah, but I'm really impatient to ride it so the Meta-stripping just has to happen!

With regards to things not fitting, I knew the seatpost wouldn't (but I've got one I can use), and I was prepared to get a new headset, and probably a bottom bracket (hellooo Superstar), but it wasn't until you said that that I thought ay further about it.

Hmmm... this might be harder than I thought. The cable routing on this frame is quite different from the Meta. And the rear brake cable routing (although I envisage that just looking messy, rather than causing real problems) too. Anything else?

The Northern Monkey

neil_sheehan2000 wrote:

The Northern Monkey wrote:

Well I hope everything fits...

If it were me, I'd keep the Meta as it is and build the 456SS as an ongoing project!

Yeah, but I'm really impatient to ride it so the Meta-stripping just has to happen!

With regards to things not fitting, I knew the seatpost wouldn't (but I've got one I can use), and I was prepared to get a new headset, and probably a bottom bracket (hellooo Superstar), but it wasn't until you said that that I thought ay further about it.

Hmmm... this might be harder than I thought. The cable routing on this frame is quite different from the Meta. And the rear brake cable routing (although I envisage that just looking messy, rather than causing real problems) too. Anything else?

Hahahahaha, I'm exactly the same tbh!

tom_howard

if you do decide that the Meta is surplus to requirements, let me know before it goes to the vultur....sorry, Ebay. Could be interested

neil_sheehan2000

So, a quick update:

For some reason it didn't occur to me that there are a lot of things on a bike that need to be an exact size. Front mechs, for example. The one from my Meta requires the cable to be pulling from the bottom, but the 456 needs one that pulls from the top. Fortunately, I had one on another bike. Unfortunately, the clamp was far too large for the 456's skinny tubes. So I made a sort of shim for it by wrapping an old inner tube around the frame. It's also an 8-speed mech, whereas the the rest of the drive-train is 9 speed. It works, but shifting is a bit... agricultural, shall we say?

For similar reasons, the spare seat clamp that I had kicking around didn't fit, so I had to buy a new one of those (some cheap CRC job, can't even remember who it's made by).

The 456 appears to be designed for full-length gear cable outers- which is a neat touch, but not too handy if you're just trying to swap stuff over from another bike in a rush.

And the reason I was rushing? Well, I had agreed to cycle the Great Glen Way (Inverness to Fort William, off road, wild camping) at the start of November, and the only bike I had that could take a rack and travel off road was the 456!

So this is what it looked like on it's maiden voyage:



I know, I know. This is not what the bike was intended for. Rest assured though that I was punished suitably; I was in such a rush to get this bike finished that I didn't even give it a test ride before I loaded it up with all the junk you can see above. I discovered fairly quickly though that I had done something seriously wrong when installing the headset, and that basically I had the option of:

a) being able to steer quite easily but having the steerer rattling around loose in the headset; or

b) not having it loose, but not really being able to steer either.

For safety's sake I went for option B but, man, it was like trying trying to steer through treacle. For 79 miles. On a bike that now weighed somewhere in region of 30 kilos.

I've basically damaged the top headset cup whilst installing it, which was a silly thing to do.

jay12

that is a lot of fail right there! building a bike is a slow process which should be taken with care

ilovedirt

lol, coulda told you all that and saved you a load of hassle mate! Having also had a meta and transferred the parts to a 456

neil_sheehan2000

Okay, another wee update. Having had the bike for a few months now I'm really quite pleased with it, and really enjoying being on a hardtail again. It's really nice to be able to put the power down and instantly feel it- as opposed to the Meta which can bob quite horrendously when I'm out of the saddle. The bike climbs fairly well despite the very slack head angle. And down-hill it's an absolute riot; I feel a lot more connected to the ground that I'm riding over (which is a bit ironic considering how much more I get rattled around), and it's made the trails feel new again. Except on really rough down-hills (like the last bit of Traquair) I've not noticed any difference the 456 and the Meta speed-wise; I'm still keeping up with my riding buddies anyway.

My rear hub basically imploded; possibly a combination of it being 3 years old, fitted to a hardtail, dragged over the Great Glen Way with a lot of weight on it, not being looked after through the winter months, and being made by Shimano. So I got a new rear wheel from Superstar. Stupidly, I accidentally ordered white spokes instead of black, but I think it actually looks okay. Obviously, when the front wheel goes I'll have to get one to match.

Also, I got a new headset. It was only the top cup that was damaged, and the bottom cup was an absolute swine to get in the frame and I couldn't be bothered wrestling with it again, so I now have a white On-one bottom, and a black Superstar top. I can't decide if it looks stupid and ugly or if it sort of goes with the colour scheme. Here's a pic anyway:



The rear tyre in the photo is a Maxxis Larssen TT- a ridiculous choice for a hardtail in Scotland. On the Meta it was fine, but on the 456 I've had a couple of pinch flats and just no grip whatsoever. I've changed it now for a 2.1 Panaracer XC Fire Pro, which is much better, but I'm thinking about just putting an old 2.35 Maxxis High Roller on it for a bit more suspension.

I realise that having a lot of spacers on top of the steerer looks a bit naff, but I'm not going to chop the steerer down whilst I still need to be abe to swap the fork between bikes. Also the saddle looks oddly far forward, but it feels fine riding it. (The post is at my preferred 'down hill' height in the photo too)

New grips are next on the list, and the front brake cable has a bit of a kink in it so I'm looking to replace that. I've still got the rather bodged front mech, so a new one of those would be nice, and the Ragley seat clamp I've got on it at the minute is just pants, so that's getting replaced. I also keep on looking covetously at adjustable seatposts...

styxd

It looks fucking awful. The forks are too long, the stem is too long, the saddle is too far forward (because the forks are too long), the BB is too high etc. etc.

IT66T

I'm not keen on the white spokes sorry as i just think it looks odd but all in all it looks good .

neil_sheehan2000

styxd wrote:

It looks ******* awful. The forks are too long, the stem is too long, the saddle is too far forward (because the forks are too long), the BB is too high etc. etc.

Haha! But what do you really think? The head angle is very slack, but that's not even the longest fork that the frame's designed for. It does make the steering quite relaxed, certainly.

The stem's only 70mm though. I was toying with putting a 50mm one on there, but wouldn't that make the front end more prone to popping up on climbs?

With regards to saddle position, I'm not sure how that relates to fork length. I put it that far forward because it felt better like that. The top tube on the frame is quite long, so it was more compensating for that than for the forks, I think.

Unless you mean that the forks are too long, which makes the seat angle too slack, which means that I have to put the saddle too far forwards in order to compensate?

rockmonkeysc

Those forks aren't too long, I run 160mm domains on my summer season and it handles great. I have done quite a few downhill races on mine with some great results. The BB height should make it steer badly but for some reason it works. I dropped my forks down to 115mm and its ok but for allroud use 140mm is pretty nice.
I do think my glow in the dark green summer season looks nicer.