29 Inch Mountain Bike Tech Feature
Originally posted on October 1, 2000 at 10:40 amAfter extensive product testing on Vicious Cycles’ 29" Motivator mountain bike, I decided that I wanted to know more. I wanted to know what was up with this whole 29" mountain bike thang. Time to round up the people behind
By Karl Rosengarth
After extensive product testing on Vicious Cycles’ 29" Motivator mountain bike (review online here), I decided that I wanted to know more. I wanted to know what was up with this whole 29" mountain bike thang. Time to round up the known 29" perpetrators and get their stories. Here’s the lineup: Wes Williams of Crested Butte Bikes-the first guy to make a "big wheeled" mountain bike, and a strong crusader for the 29" movement. Mark Slate of WTB-without WTB1s 29×2.1" Nanoraptor mountain tire, the 29" mountain bike movement might never have gotten off the ground. Carl Schlemowitz of Vicious Cycles-he’s been cranking out 29" mountain bike frames from his digs in beautiful New Paltz, New York. Butch Boucher of Moots-yes, Moots has tossed their hat into the 29" ring. Ross Shafer-the founder of Salsa Cycles is not in the 29" bike business, but he’s a sharp guy, so he qualifies as an impartial expert.
And just to complete the cycle, I had a conversation I with Gary Fisher. WTB built Gary a custom 29 incher that he has been riding, and even racing, around the world (jet setter that the is). During our brief phone conversation, what struck me was the enthusiasm that Gary had for the 29" mountain bike movement. If any guy in the industry has a right to be jaded, it would be Gary Fisher. But no, he was gushing like a newbie about how he loves to ride his 29 incher, how he hopes the movement catches on and the exciting new design challenges that 29" mountain bikes create.
In fact, before I started talking to the 29" experts, I had summed up the ride of the 29" Motivator in one word: fun. Upon completing the interviews, I realized that each and every one of the 29" experts that I’d contacted had one thing in common-incredible enthusiasm for big wheeled mountain bikes. They were all into it because it was fun. This 29" mountain bike movement is not some corporate-hatched-freeride sell-more-bikes ploy, in my humble opinion. The 29" mountain bike represents a valid questioning of the legitimacy of the 26" wheeled de-facto standard. The people building and riding 29" mountain bikes are on a quest for more fun. My advice is to check out a 29 incher for yourself. I1m happy that I did-it was fun. -Karl Rosengarth
Wes Williams of Willets Cycles
DR: What motivated you to start making 29" wheeled mountain bikes?
WW: Well when I started making them they weren’t called that. It’s only been a 29" wheel for one year. Before that it was a 28" wheel. They’re both 700c rims. I thought the 26" wheel was mundane, it was boring to me. I wanted something more challenging so I went to a drop bar, rigid forked, 700c bike and made it for the biggest tire I could. That was in 1989. The tire was a 45c Specialized touring tire. It was like an expedition touring bike that I rode offroad. It was strictly my offroad bike for four and a half yearsS
At that point in time, I acquired a Bruce Gordon Rock ‘n Road titanium hybrid with a shock. So I rode that bike for six years. Even with my Willets brand, I rode the Bruce Gordon because I liked the 28 inch wheels. I never made myself one, but I made them for my customers ever since I started my own business in 1994, under the name "28 Incher."
DR: How long have you been at it, and how many have you made? WW: Well, under the Willets brand, I’ve probably made 60 of these bikes that are 700c rims that fit that tire [WTB Nanoraptor]. I do them strictly. I don’t make 26" wheeled bikes anymore-you’re wasting your money.
DR: What are the advantages of 29" versus 26" wheels?
WW: OK, a real simple list is: obviously the wheel is bigger so you have more angular momentum, which is more mass at a bigger radius, spinning faster. That’s the heart of it, and what that gives you is gyroscopic stability. It gives you twice the tire footprint on the ground. You have more momentum, more stability, more traction. You have a bigger gear on the high end, and the low end is just the tiniest bit harder. It’s more fun to ride, it feels better, it rolls faster. It goes over logs and bumps and divots easier. It smoothes out the washboards.
It’s more proportionate, believe it or not. It’s the original idea. The main thing is that this was the original idea. If you have any pictures of antique bikes and you look back at those old rims, they are the exact same size as what we call a 700c rim. So that rim diameter has been around for 110 years. I’m not doing anything "new," I’m just re-introducing something that was forgotten. I have a fixed gear bike that I’ve been riding offroad for 18 years and it has larger wheels too.
DR: Are there disadvantages of 29" versus 26" wheels?
WW: The disadvantage is that it’s heavier. The main problem with this wheel is that people "perceive" there is a problem. They think "Oh, you can’t fit frames around those. Oh, you can’t find tires. Oh, you can’t find a shock." No, my customers are riding these bikes. I’m delivering these bikes and have been for six years. There are no problems. It’s a "perceived" problem by the industry that there are no rims. It’s a "perceived" problem that there are no tires. Yeah, there aren’t many choices, but what did the whole industry start out with? Nothing! We started with Uniroyal knobbies that were made in the ’60s and steel rims and Schwinn frames that were designed for children. So, you gotta start somewhere with the rims and tires and stuff.
I was the guy at the trade show (Interbike) last year in the cowboy outfit running around making a big stink about this, because the industry has it’s head up it’s ass. They don’t see the potential, because they won’t try it. Most guys will poo-poo it before they try it. They’ll trash it verbally before they try it
DR: Who do you see as potential customers?
WW: I think the potential customers are the more intellectual ones. In other words, smarter people are going to be buying these bikes. Older, smarter people. Because it is a more intelligent concept-it works better. It’s the stubborn, dumb guys that won’t get it.
DR: What frame geometry is required produce a good-handling 29" mountain bike? WW: Well, they kind of evolved over that last 10 or 12 years that I’ve been making them. It basically started out as a hybrid touring geometry, with a mountain bike angle and then it’s modified for a shock. Today it’s basically standard mountain bike geometry, modified for the bigger wheel and a shock. And it depends on who the rider is. I make bikes, per order, so I don’t have a generic bike.
DR: What about tires, front suspension, inner tubes-what’s available?
WW: WTB is making this 2" wide tire. I definitely guarantee there’s gonna be more available soon because the industry is just buzzing with this scuttlebutt. Someone’s got to come up with something soon. They can’t just let it sit there. And again, these WTB tires (29" Nanoraptor) exist because I ordered them. Not because Gary Fisher ordered them. I1m the one who placed the order. And the same with the White Brothers shock (CX-1). I said, "I want this," and I ordered 25 shocks and I sold them all already.
DR: What’s the future of 29" wheeled mountain bikes?
WW: Basically this is the future of mountain bikes. In my opinion, when this tire was created, no matter what I’d done before really was moot. People didn’t want to see little tires on the big wheel. As soon as that big tire was made for these big wheels-boom-everyone’s lining up. The 26" wheel is a dead thing. I think it’s obsolete.
Willets Brand Bike Availability
All the frames that Wes makes under his Willets brand are custom, made to order. His steel frames start at $1000 and titanium alloy frames start at $2500. Rigid chromoly forks go for $300, but he recommends going with a suspension fork. Contact: Willets Brand/Crested Butte Bicycles, PO Box 1106, Crested Butte CO, 81224; 970.349.0130.
Mark Slate of Wilderness Trail Bikes
DR: What motivated you to start making 29" wheeled mountain bikes?
MS: The tire came first. Gary Fisher was leaning on me to do 29" VelociRaptors in March ’98. At Eurobike Sept. ’98, I showed Gary and Joe Vadeboncouer the new Nano 26" and told them I felt better about using it to make the 29" rather than a pair of (heavy) VelociRaptors. Wes Williams left a "28 Incher" at WTB for all to ride in October ’98 and I spent enough time on it to know that the ride was truly different. Wes had been onto the benefits of the big wheel for years. I think it is especially well suited for Crested Butte terrain.
DR: How long have you been at it, and how many have you made?
MS: WTB has only made a few prototypes (frames), starting in late ’98.
DR: What are the advantages of 29" versus 26" wheels?
MS: The angle of attack for the tread in driving and braking (more like a conveyor belt, less like a scoop) and the longer contact patch which decreases psi (rolling resistance) are both advantages. Inertia can be an advantage or a detriment depending on where and how you are riding.
Better lateral traction, easier to ride over choppy ground, fast rolling, more forgiving at speed, but takes time to "hardwire" into your consciousness, so be careful at speed in the tight stuff. (It’s the INERTIA.)
DR: Are there disadvantages of 29" versus 26" wheels?
MS: Valid negatives that I agree with are as follows: big wheeled bikes accelerate more slowly. (I don’t find braking with rim brakes changed.) Steering response is not as nimble. Bigger wheels add weight and size to the bike. There is more air resistance in bigger wheels. The bike frame needs to have more tubing in a bigwheel bike. The bigger wheels are less stiff and strong laterally.
DR: Who do you see as potential customers?
MS: People that want one bike to do everything, people that have a lot of bikes and want to experience something different, people that are tall (but not limited to those folks only-see below).
DR: What frame geometry is required produce a good-handling 29" mountain bike?
MS: The 41.75" wheelbase with the 17.25" chainstay we have chosen makes a bike that steers nimbly and the front tire sticks to the ground well. A 71 degree head tube and 73 degree seat tube angle with a bottom bracket height of 298mm (11.75") are the result of using a 475mm (18.7") fork with 38mm (1.5") offset.
A 41.75" wheelbase with the 17.25" chainstay is pretty extreme, however my 26" rigid that I still ride frequently is exactly that, and I like it a lot. I think that a bike more people would find suitable for more types of terrain would be better at: 42.25" wheelbase, 17" chainstay, 72 degree head tube, 73 degree seat tube, BB 11.875", with a 475mm (18.7") fork with a 45mm (1.75") offset. (Dropping to a 2" travel fork would create a 73/74, BB 11.562" which would be more to my liking for a "be anywhere, do anything" bike with 29" tires.)
DR: What’s the future of 29" wheeled mountain bikes?
MS: That depends on journalistic content and frequency, bike companies, the economy, fork makers, racing venues and rules, and proper categorization. I believe that the 29" wheel mountain bike can be outfitted to do more types of riding better than any embodiment of a 26" wheel mountain bike. Road racing tires would drop the BB height into the ideal zone (29" > 27" = 11.75" > 10.75" BB height), a good 3" travel fork, perhaps a soft tail …
In short, the 29" mountain bike is a bike worth having. Don’t prejudge it and don’t assume that it is for tall people only. Bob Poor’s wife is 5’3" and she says she’ll never ride 26" again. WTB will continue to experiment with the larger diameter wheel, both front and rear as well as front only. We believe that the 29" tire size mountain bike is here to stay.
Carl Schlemowitz of Vicious Cycles
DR: What motivated you to start making 29" wheeled mountain bikes?
CS: It sounded like a really fun bike to ride. Riding a bicycle is a fun experience. I want to instill this basic feeling in all of my products, and I feel that is my main contribution to the industry.
DR: How long have you been at it, and how many have you made?
CS: I made my first 29" wheel mountain bike around the first of September 1999 (two weeks before the Vegas trade show). I’ve made 17 total to date, including the world’s first 29" wheel tandem (the Jeepster).
DR: What are the advantages of 29" versus 26" wheels?
CS: Let me start by saying that on the Motivator’s maiden mud voyage I rode it to a decisive victory at the 1999 Pedro’s festival’s epic mud bog challenge. (Since press time Dirt Rag has gotten word that Carl is now a two time winner of the Pedro’s mud bog pulling off another win this past August.)
Of course there are also a lot of other handling advantages such as: higher overall speeds and rolling momentum, very stable handling at high speeds (due to both bigger wheel base and also wheel size, i.e., more knobs touch the ground through turns), there is a larger contact patch with the ground so traction is not a problem. Big smile!!! Also the advantage which may be appreciated most of all is the increased rollover ability, which smoothes out bumps and other obstacles. Bigger wheels means a higher gear ratio, which also adds to speed.
DR: Are there disadvantages of 29" versus 26" wheels?
CS: Definitely the acceleration is sluggish. But once you get going you are flying, which lets you crash at higher speeds. You crash less often but when you go over the bars, you go down hard. Also, there is the potential of the wheels being weaker, which has not been a problem for me personally.
DR: Who do you see as potential customers?
CS: First of all, people who want a fun ride. This bike can put the biggest smile on your face since you owned a bike with coaster brakes and a banana seat! Secondly, it makes a great weekend warrior bike. The increased speeds that this bike is capable of allow you to ride only on the weekend but still keep up with your friends who ride all week!! And lastly, I would say this is a great type of bike for a "jaded" mountain biker who has lost their all-terrain enthusiasm and needs a new thrill.
Oh yeah, did I mention that this is the everywhere bike? Take it through life with you-from a fun time in the mountains (on the big tires), to zipping along on fire roads and the occasional trail (with 45mm wide tires), to a safe commute to work in foul or snowy weather (with cross tires), to that fully loaded (it’s got rear rack eyelets) and yet totally comfortable stable touring epic trip (with road tires).
DR: What frame geometry is required to produce a good-handling 29" mountain bike?
CS: Other than the longer chainstays and longer wheelbase, the geometry is identical to that of a conventional mountain bike. This is because a 29" wheel bike is borrowing the great ride qualities of 26" mountain bikes and adding herbs and spices to zest it up a bit.
DR: What about tires, front suspension, inner tubes-what’s available?
CS: There are a lot of tire options available. Of course the WTB Nanoraptors 29×2.1" (52mm) wide (note that the WTB tires also use special WTB inner tubes). Nokian and Panaracer both have 45mm wide tires, Ritchey and Kenda make 38mm wide tires, and there are of course dozens of options as far as thinner cross and road tires.
DR: What’s the future of 29" wheeled mountain bikes?
CS: I really regard 29" wheel mountain bikes as a stand-alone type of bike, not as a replacement for a mountain bike. I really think that both bikes (26" & 29") have enough excellent qualities that they can’t really be classified together.
Butch Boucher of Moots
DR: What motivated you to start making 29" wheeled mountain bikes?
BB: The motivation to build these big wheeled bikes came in the form of a visit to Kent (the company) from his good friend Don Cook, the head of the Mountain Bike Hall of Fame in Crested Butte. Don had received a pair of the 29" WTB tires and wanted us to build a frame around them, which Kent and Moots did.
DR: How long have you been at it, and how many have you made?
BB: This all happened early last summer. That is how long we have been at it. The number we have built is only a couple, with another 10 or so ready to be built in the next couple of weeks. The reason we have not done more is that we spent a long time working on the White Brothers fork with Dan White and didn’t see them until May.
DR: What are the advantages of 29" versus 26" wheels?
BB: Advantages of the larger wheel is mostly the way they roll over things. If you go into a hole, it takes a bigger hole to upset the speed and feel because of the longer footprint. On rolling terrain they maintain their speed very well and on dirt road descents you will never run out of gears because of the increased gear inches.
DR: Are there disadvantages of 29" versus 26" wheels?
BB: Disadvantages are the lack of selection of tires, forks and frames. Also the wheels are heavier than 26", weaker than 26", and the frames are best for larger riders because of toe overlap on smaller frames because of the tire’s large diameter. Also, the chainstay length has to be fairly long to make room for the huge diameter tire.
DR: Who do you see as potential customers?
BB: Who is our potential customer is hard to answer because it could replace someone’s mountain bike or cross bike. Depending on the bar set up it can go both ways. For the most part I think people looking for something different in a riding experience will be our customer.
DR: What frame geometry is required to produce a good-handling 29" mountain bike?
BB: Because of the long fork, which changes the trail compared to a 26" mountain bike, and the large contact patch of the front tire, a steeper head angle comes in handy to make the bike steer better. This works out to around 72 degrees on frames large enough not to have severe toe overlap. Keep in mind that the actual geometry depends on the size of the frame and top tube length.
DR: What about tires, front suspension, inner tubes-what’s available?
BB: If you want to run the big tires (29") there is only the WTB and the WTB tubes. Both are very good but they are heavy. The old Manitou forks that were available, of which we have a couple, had very little travel and old technology. The White Brothers forks are very nice. Dan White spent a considerable amount of energy dialing this fork in. The finished product is sweet but expensive.
DR: What’s the future of 29" wheeled mountain bikes?
BB: The future really lies with the big companies in order to create a wider variety of parts available. There are so many hurdles to overcome with the smaller frames, I don’t see this being a huge mass appeal product. Maybe shops will have a "Big and Tall" section of the store.
DR: What’s the scoop on the Moots 29" bike.
BB: Because these are custom frames only, everything varies. The standover suffers because of the fork length and with the YBB we keep the top tube as high as possible. We build the smaller frames with a strut between the top tube and the seat tube. Generally the seat angle is steeper than on a mountain bike in order to improve the front center dimension because of the large tire.
Model Name: Mooto-X YBB
Material: Titanium alloy
Frame size: Custom
Standover height: High (because they are custom they vary, and because of the long fork length they are high).
Head angle: 71 – 72 degrees depending on size ( steeper than the same size mtb)
Seat angle: 73 – 74 degrees (steeper than same size mtb)
Top tube length (effective): similar to but slightly longer than mountain frames.
Chainstay length: as short as possible (Because of the huge tire and the 7/8" diameter stays the length is 17.5").
BB height: custom ( approx. 11.75")
Wheelbase: again custom (approx. 42.5")
Price: $2699.
Contact: Moots Cycles, PO Box 774651, Steamboat Springs, CO 80477; 970.879.1676; www.moots.com.
Ross Shafer
DR: There are a handful of frame builders making 29 inch mountain bikes (that utilize WTB’s 29 inch Nanoraptor tires mounted to 700c rims). So, what’s up with that? Are 29 inchers a passing fad or are they here to stay?
RS: Back when I worked at the Bicycle Trip in Santa Cruz, we had a great old DBS shop bike. "Deebers" as we called her (it had a ladies frame) had great big fat tires and large diameter wheels (I think we called ’em 28" back then). Riding Deebers around town on errands was always a blast. Once you got those big wheels spinning, they wanted to keep spinning, making Deebers a joy to ride. A lot of stability was provided by those big wheels. And the rollover capability of such a large radius wheel allowed us to plow through and over the roughest road conditions with ease. Many an armload of badly needed beverages were successfully negotiated over Santa Cruz1s beat up streets on Deebers.
Bikes using wheels this size are generally very easy and enjoyable to ride. Stable, smooth rolling and easy to ride! No wonder so many zillions of transportation bikes throughout the world have utilized wheels more or less this size for so long.
Yeah, yeah, so what about the question. Big wheels for serious offroading, passing fad or what? Let1s look at the facts. That smooth stable ride these wheels give comes at a price. Just look at them as flywheels, the bigger they are the more effort it takes to get ’em rolling. It takes more braking power to slow ’em down as well (bravo modern brakes!).
So that means if they1re not up to speed (where these wheels really shine), more effort is going to be expended every time the rider tries to accelerate (or decelerate) the bike than would be expended with a smaller wheel. Think of those tough steep climbs when you1re focusing your strength on each pedal stroke. How ’bout a tight twisty singletrack where you1re constantly braking and accelerating. Pretty common conditions in offroad riding.
But all that rollover capability and stability is surely an advantage offroadS
Within the less than hyper speed parameters found in most our offroad riding, properly functioning suspension with a 26" wheel pretty much washes out the rollover advantages of these bigger wheels. Ok, if you1re riding full rigid (RIGHT ON! There1s so many of us nowadays), big hoops can really smooth things out when the going gets rough. Another technical consideration is wheel strength. When comparing larger and smaller diameter wheels with a given rim cross-section and spoke pattern, the smaller wheel will have the highest overall strength and resistance to flat spots and bending. Between today1s suspension and a well-built set of wheels (regardless of size) this consideration is largely just splitting hairs. But the chances of your 26" wheel surviving a big bottomed out hit against a big rock without damage are just plain better than with the bigger wheel.
I think we can compare the popularity of these bikes to that of singlespeeds. They are BIG fun to ride! They offer something different to those who like variation in their cycling. Like singlespeeds, the bulk of these bikes, I think, will be owned by folks who have a stable of bikes from which to choose for whatever type of ride strikes their fancy. Will they take over as the wheel of choice for mountain bikes? I think not…I just don1t see enough distinct advantages. But what do I know?