Tim/Trialsin USA

You saw another bike stickered with Mrazek stickers. The bike pictured on Biketrials.com was one of the protos I had built (from a rider in Czech, and posted a couple years after it was built). The review was placed by someone who had never ridden one (like that is a shock). Ah....good reminder! Actually Jeep never made one, they sponsored US National Champ of the early/mid 90s Mark Brooks. They were actually made by Ross. Ross made an aluminum and cromo mod bike....sold quite a few actually. Not too many stock bikes made/sold though.

Mrazek never made a trials frame. They made some frames that people used for trials years ago...but not specifically for trials. I did have them make a couple prototype mod frames for me eight or nine years ago...but nothing came of the effort. Cannondale did indeed make a production trials specific stock frame/bike in the '80s....

VIZ also makes a 120x17, and ZHI makes a 120x20......... those and afore mentioned stem go well with the return of reasonable (i.e. not zillion mm up BBs) geometry stock frames.

Production frame is about 4.75lbs. Its not light....it is not disposable... it is overbuilt strong for a reason.

As stated, the pics were proto and preproduction.... I think we can manage some cable guides Yeah, the tan color was not too popular. No color (colour?... ha, ha, ha) will make everyone happy, however we felt more than silver/polished or something looking akin to a garage spray can paint job was required. The disc mount was designed with Hope 8" rotor in mind. The larger the rotor the more power (more stopping leverage the further you get from the axle). Only a change of rotor size should allow you to use any existing brake that you might have.

It must be Christmas season! Frank the Welder is building VIRIS WTF frames as we speak. 17 are in mid construction with an anticipated total of 25 to be built. If you are (unlikely) not aware of Frank or the frame, here is (pre approved by site administrator) the low down. Frank the Welder (***) has been welding up frames for a few decades. His skill heralded, and finally fully recognized ('07 Mtn Bike Hall of Fame inductee). Frank approaches all cycling frame projects from a stand point of improvment/innovation, not marketing. Having been the torch behind Spooky trials frames a decade ago, he understands trials. He is known industry wide for designs thats beauty eminates from principles of engineering, not latest fashion. Earlier this year, partly due to nagging and partly due to personal curiosity, Frank decided to re-enter the trials world. Having witnessed what dramatic changes have happened in trials frame design, he knew there was something positive he could contribute. He quickly saw that somethings that had changed were advances in the sport, and others were merely good marketing. OK, so you know who Frank is now. Want to know more? Google his name, because the rest of us want to know about the frame. If you want to know more about the frame, read on: 1. Highest grade of 6K series aluminum. There are many grades of aluminum tubing on the market, even if the nomenclature is the same.....not all are the same. The WTF frame only has one grade, the best. 2. Stiffest frame on the market, period. It requires energy to flex a frame......your energy. This energy you will not get back, thus it is wasted. There are a reason you see huge tubes that extend forward from seatstays to the middle of the downtube, elimination of that flex..... you should keep your energy for further flight. 3. Simple, clean and durable chain tensioning system. I used to think horizontal dropouts were a good idea, until I had to change a number of peoples tires at events and make sure the disc was re-aligned.....all while in a rush. Vertical dropouts allow for the same alignment, everytime. The current offering of tensioners for vertical dropouts (for the most part) hang off the derailleur hanger. For the obvious reasons, of smashing etc.., is not satisfactory either. There have been recent additions to the market of rear hubs having the tensioner built in.....this, however straps you to one hub and its exclusiveness of cog. The tensioner mounting system used here on the *** frame is protected and simple and functional....hall mark of a well thought out design in trials. Recognizing that because of different chains/cogs/freewheel combinations not all chain wrap is the same, this tensioner may be set to pull up OR push down on the chain. By simple means of washers, it is also adjustable in and out. 4. Durability/Quality. What is trials, but repeatedly smashing your bike on rocks/rails/cement?! Design, tube selection and the quality of weld are what make create durabilty. This is trials, breakage is always a possibility, but with the WTF the odds are dramatically shifted to being on the side of longevity. 5. Geometry. Mabey this should have been number 1?! If the bike/frame is not rideable all else is becomes moot. There is something a designer/rider told me once a decade+ ago: "if you change the geometry of a frame too far to help one type of move.....five other moves get harder". It is true for chainstay length, BB height, headtube angle (in my opinion, headtube angle is the most ignored) etc.... . WTF frame dials the numbers to best serve the widest variety of riders, and as importantly, the widest variety of moves. If all you want to do is front wheel hooks all day..........or front wheel hops (a'la Hans Rey), this might not be the frame for you. However, if you want a frame that approaches trials as a whole sport it will be to your liking. The critical numbers are: Wheelbase (approx. number because all forks are different. For our purposes we used a common 400mm Pulo type fork): 1080mm Bottom Bracket Height: +15mm Chainstay length: 380mm Headtube angle: 72 degrees BB shell width: 68mm Following are questions that I anticipate will come up, so I will try and answer them: A. How much? US$900 in North America. Obviously other locations, due to shipping and exchange rates will vary. B. Brake mounts? Has brake mounts for both Magura HS-33s as well as 203mm (8") rotored disc brake. C. That tan color is nasty!.... what color are they going to be? Raspberry Red. RAL color chart #3027 (link to RAL color chart: http://www.mailboxesgb.co.uk/ralcolourchart.php ). OK, so lipstick fashion entered one aspect of the frame. But what the hell, this is Ferrari not Yugo..... do you really want silver or rattle can black?! D. When are they going to be ready? ~Christmas/New Year. Afther that, I do not know when another run might be scheduled. I can tell you that those who get one will be a very small population of people, as Frank is not going mass production. E. Where do I get one? Crack open your wallet/checkbood and get ahold of one of these authorized dealers (subject to change/EDIT): USA: Webcyclery (www.webcyclery.com) Trialsin (www.trialsin.com) Canada: HB Trials (www.hbtrials.com) UK: NSE/Trialsman (www.trialsman.co.uk) Europe: Bike Trial Sport (www.trialmarkt.de/) Asia: GoldRush (www.goldrush.jp webpage under re-construction) F. Where is the derailleur hanger? Versitility is the name of the game. This bike can be run single speed or with gears. Should you want to go gears, standard/common type hanger will be supplied with every frame. OK, that's enough blatant marketing for you all to absorb today. Here are some pics from protos and pre production:

Maybe we are talking past each other. I do not argue that flex can not be a positive thing. My road bike is a Look carbon because the roads here suck, and something super stiff would beat my tender butt up. However, I do know that a frame needs some sort of energy to flex it....and that energy is me. The energy put into the flex does not return to help propel the bike forward. Therefore the energy put into making it flex is wasted (in the sense that it is not being used to move me and the bike forward). I am OK with this trade off of some loss of energy. Point? Flex is not inherently bad...... I agree, its just that flex does not return in a rebound that will actually ad to the energy you put in. It may make you "feel" more stable when winding up for a sidehop.....but does not actually help fling you and the bike ....... Long winded way of saying..... yeah, guess we were talking about two different things!

If a material is not capable of rebounding at a certain rate, there is no other "real world" explanation that changes physics. Any gain is purely psychological. Just because it is a trials frame, does not enable it to defy the laws of science that no other type of bike can. If a rider likes some give/flex, that is personal preference. Personal prefernce/comfort can effect riding, as in more efficient use of your muscles. But it should not be confused with turning tubes into springs.

If we were talking about a suspension frame, with proper valving a very good arguement could be made in favor of adding something to bounce/performance. At the end of the day you have to get as much (and fast) energy out of a frame as is put in. Even with Ti, the tubing available now does not come close to providing anything close to that type of performance enhancement. If it is not the type of enhancement suspension could theoretically provide, then I guess I am missing something. However, if you are suggesting that some give in the frame is something some riders like.....sure, personal preference is something I would never argue (hey, look at Vincos 80mm up BB!).

A. Materials used in frames do not snap back fast enough to actually ad height/distance to a hop. B. If you did have the right material to accomplish this (like spring steel tubing!...that would be weird eh?!), whos weight would it work best for? That is to say, if the spring rate (rebound) is optimum for someone 10 stone (140 pounds), it will be too hard for someone 9 stone (125 pounds) or too squishy for someone 14 stone (almost 200 pounds). Unless you are suggesting there is some adjustment than can be made to the tubings spring rate, I'm finding it hard to figure out how flexing frames helps.

Because the incredible latteral rigidity would be lost. The seat stay tubes extend to the downtube for a reason.

Q1. There are a couple people who have extensively tested protos, and pre production samples. If you are asking about a TEAM, no the run is going to be way too small to afford that. Q2. Accelerated fatigue/stress is a result of what kind of aluminum, not how stiff. Q3. I think my may be hearing more about this from Fred in not too long. ....a couple more pics just to keep you drooling:

You have to do what will be in budget. Just remember, the more bolts/adapters/shims you put between the caliper and the frame..... your odds of failures of some sort dramatically increase.

No reason, was just pointing out it was something you did not have to spend too much time on. Matt is absolutly right, you get water on tar or Monty spray and you have no brakes at all. While riders here get more than 15 minites of riding by application of Monty spray by my suggested method... it does not last hour after hour. Tar and rim spray are bandaids. So is grinding in my opinion. Rims are aluminum....not exactly the hardest of metals....... to get truely consistent braking with grinding you have to remove the wheel, tire, tube and grind fairly often. Completely agree Matt (and bench testing totally bears it out)...... well set up brakes and clean rims will result in great braking. Just have to make sure rims stay clean (seems to me, alot easier/faster than pulling wheels to grind). The only (expensive) answer was the original Plazmatic coated rims. A couple people have been working on something similar for a while, hope they succeed....because all other methods of increasing braking are NEANDERTHAL.

Monty rim spray is nothing like hair spray. It is pine pitch based (kind of like the stuff that baseball players put on grip area of bat). If you pads are sticking to the rim.... you used too much! If it is attracting every thing from logs to rocks....you used too much. Trick of application: Clean rim quickly with damp cloth, dry. Spin wheel. Holding spray can at least 12 inches away, give three or four quick bursts. Put bike on ground, roll forward with brakes dragging to even it out. That is it, takes only a couple minites to do it properly.

You are correct about the manufacturer. However the selection of spindle material (hardness), cups and bearings were an upgrade. We have limited options in some componentry for trials. It is incumbent upon the supplier (us) to make sure the options picked best suit trials rather than just profit margin.

You are correct. The frame does come back. The question is at what rate. That is to say if the "spring" effect is slow, you would not necessarily be gaining anything.... in fact wasting muscle energy. Havine said that, I remember watching Ot Pi use the "spring" effect of the frame with not too crappy a result! The trick is that if a person weighing 140 pounds find the weight of his body perfect to gain extra help from the frames spring effect....... a person 120 pounds or 180 pounds will not. Thus, unless you are able to "tune" the elasticity of the frame for each rider.......... most riders will not gain from it.

What?.... just engaging in equality in depth of commentary....ha, ha, ha

There were a few problems I ran into with the Plazmatic coating. 1. Cost. Though to be honest to get ultimate (and no variance in grip wet or dry or even oil on the rim!) braking, have your rim last years and never have to bust out a grinding set up. The problem it does not look cool! That is to say, I see people spending like drunken sailors on bling for their bike with dubious, at best, actual improvments to riding......but braking, arguably the most important performance item on the bike, doesn't deserve the money....don't get it. 2. The medium texture coating is the one we did the most often. The texture was waaaaaaaay gnarny first couple sets of pads, after that it bedded into something most could live with. Still faster wear than a grind...but not the 15 minites excessive of harsh texture. Coating is the way to go, but I could not get the numbers to ad up. The profit margin was so thin, and volume so that it really became not worth doing. I still can't believe people find grinding a good option........ rims are aluminum (not the hardest metal on earth), so a grind never lasts all that long (if riding alot), therefore there is no such thing as consistent braking.......seems like an aweful lot of work for inconsistent results. I do understand it is expensive. But the rider that whines about it being to expensive is very often the one with an I-POD, trick anodized lever adjuster knobs for their HS-33s or rolling up in a nice car. Priorities....... Steve, I really hope you get the coating ball rolling........ the sport really does need it.

Thanks for the offer, but we actually put it through its paces before bringing it to market (novel idea, eh?!... ha, ha, ha).

Uh, no. The CRM pads have always been the same compound.

OK, how not too keep this from turning into russian novel length............ha, ha, ha... Plazmatic rim coating ceased to be done about 4 or 5 years ago. It was actually very hard to chip (as the base metal used was maliable). It did not wear hardly at all once broken in because of the nickel and other harder metals also contained in it. Could it be chipped?...yes, but it was pretty hard to do. The benefit? Consistent braking......no matter what.....wet, dry, slimy....made no difference. Downside? yes, it was quite expensive (even at the high price it was my profit margin barely covered the paperwork!). Ceramic is a different coating entirely. While it is applied with the same machine (plasma jet machines....starting at close to $1M a peice these days!), the material used in the Mavic type coating is aluminum oxide based (we did a similar one that was 10% titanium oxide as well). While not quite as effective as the textured coating of Plazmatic Trials coating...... there are benefits to ceremic over others. Ceramic is very hard, and in that nothing sticks to it (dust, dirt etc...)... and wather just rolls off (while aluminum is a comparitively porous material and so the water stays the in little pocktets until a few turns of the pads sqeegying the water off). Anyway, point is......ceremic is excellent for trials. The down side beside expense? It is reletively brittle and does tend to chip when directly impacted on (not that that ever happens in trials....ha, ha, ha).

I guess here would be a good place to better elaborate my take on BBs. First let us look at material strength. It is really in the eye of the beholder (or marketer, so some extent). Softer materials tend to bend, straight forward enough. Harder materials (in general, not looking for advanced lessons in metalurgy here) tend to snap. The difference is that the point at which the harder material fails (snaps) in most cases requires a bit more force. You could make an arguement that a bending spindle would be safer than a snapping one......but the cases of snapping spindles are reletively few, so in my eyes do not make the case. Bearings. Again, the harder the material the better. The smoother the races the better. The real trick here is trying to get as many bearings (of descent quality) into the BB so as to spread the load as far as possible. There are external cup BBs. While these do resolve issues of tiny/few bearings by increasing the area to house them, the cups themselves (where they thread into BB shell) become the stress point with the bearings being external providing further (unwanted) leverage on the threaded portion of cups. And there is the all too familiar issue too little space to install freewheel crank set ups. Weight. This is one part that going silly light is definatly not to you advantage. At the end of the day, BBs on trials bikes are squeezed into a 68mm BB shell. This means, no matter what we do (given that this is a sport that you smash your bike on rocks.....and the BB in particular takes the brunt of that impact) there is no such thing as the "perfect" BB. What it really comes to is how long can you make it last. It is a matter of when, not if, the device in question will be subdued by repeated impacts (particularly by those less smooth in landing). The MOE BB was an attempt to address as many issues as possible while keeping it in the realm of affordability. Keeping reletive balance between durability/quality and price is always the test of a good part. Someday there needs to be another system to specifically address out sport. Years ago there was a frame builder in Hungary called Yasec that made a frame with a custom BB/crank set up. It really looked to be the answer. Large diameter BB shell so it could house very large tube type spindle (light and strong) and alot of bearings. It was one off...............maybe I will see if I can dig up the pics off my old computer!

I think the same exists here as well. Just every now and then I feel there is a product truely worth the higher asking price, and try to elicit understanding from the market. Aston Martins are not for everyone, for most a Nissan 300z will do........ but there is a difference.

Ha, is that reletive of Eleanor Roosevelt or Margret Thatcher....ha, ha, ha While I am sure stiffness testing of a part going onto space vehicle requires advanced university degrees and tools only aquireable by MI5 or CIA..... I am quite sure bicycle frames do not require any such efforts to determine stiffness. Beyond a certain point, minutia merely becomes a marketing tool. Price is reletive to ones perception of the product. If indeed, there is no value seen in higher grade of tubing, construction by the engineer, production methods in ahearance to decent level of attention to enviroment and labor laws and some real engineering behind the product..........then yes indeed, I would advise purchasing like a commoditiy......solely on price. As for the looks, there is not one bike that every single rider thinks is the best looking. Indeed, there might be some untangible value in knowing your not one of the sheep.