The Banshee family... the rampant in review

Kevin was nice enough to send pics of his bikes cause he knows that we love to see how people build them up and he was kind enough to write a review as well which I wanted to share.
Here his email to me in its entirety.

Well on the Morphine, she's had it for a few years now, it's just a super fun little bike. The frame is a small and has a 24" rear wheel. That thing will bunny hop like nothing I've ever ridden. Both of us use it riding local with my son or just doing some round town urban. You're probably not looking for a review of the Morphine though so here's my review of the Rampant, also a small. Feel free to post the pic on the blog with it if you wish:First off my build:
Small Rampant frame with a Fox RP2 shock
Rock Shox Revelation Air U-Turn fork 100-130
Hone cranks, e13 LG-1, FSA 34t ring
XTR 8-spd RD/12-32 cassette with XT shifter
CK headset, Thomson X4 70mm stem, FSA 31.8 kforce DH risers cut down to 26"
Mavic 819 laced to Hope Pro2 hubs
Barracuda 2.1 Tubeless tires, rear I cut the center knobs for fast rolling/like the Piranha tread
AtomLab Aircorps pedals
Thomson Post and WTB saddle

Final weight is approximately 28.5 lbs.Now the ride, I've only had the Rampant a couple of months but have been lucky enough to ride it on most my local trails (including Vietnam or NAM in Milford, MA), Durango Horse Gulch trails, Telluride (including the DH Ridge trail), Moab on SlickRock and Porcupine Rim and Fruita Colorado at the Bookcliffs. I have to say that the Rampant has been exceptional on everything with the possible exception of the Ridge trail at Telluride which is sort of like riding a jack hammer, the Rampant handled the terrain it just wasn't as much fun to ride but that's what real DH bikes are for anyways.
The Rampant does accelerate just like Banshee claims, flip the blue lever on the Fox RP2 and it becomes a hardtail, other than riding on the roads or the Kessel trail in Fruita (hardest /smoothest singletrack I've ever ridden) I keep the lever in the "plush" position which is still very firm for pedaling and accelerating.
I chose the Rampant not because I wished to race 4X rather I wanted a true all around bike that could climb yet did not weigh 35 lbs like my 6x6 RFX, I also wanted a bike that could jump and double sections of trail and the Rampant is perfect for that.
First couple of rides I noticed immediately how quick it felt and this bike climbs like a mountain goat for those interested in using it for more than DS or 4X. The Rampant is the bike I've been looking for the past 5 years but didn't exist until now. The Rampant handles everything except Downhilling better than my RFX.
The Rampant is capable of DH and if I only had one bike this would be the bike. At Porcupine Rim in MOAB the Rampant truly shined as I was able to ride the entire trail non-stop and did the 15 miles in just over 2 hours, there was not a single section of Porcupine that wasn't a complete blast on the Rampant, including the first 5 miles of climbing!As far as the Rune I don't have much time on it other than a couple runs down the Kessel trail in Fruita. In that time all I can say is it climbs amazing and feels like my RFX minus 7 or 8 lbs. The Rune jumps great but it's really my wife's bike and she hasn't had enough time on it yet to write a decent review yet.

Kevin

What to do with your new viento frame

So you have a sweet hot new viento frame, and you ask "what the heck do i do with this thing?" Well obviously a rippin' multi geared mountain ripper would be the first answer. however, if you love bikes, and hate gas, you can build up a sweet xtra cycle.

Don't be afraid though... you can put 200+ lbs on this rig, thats pounds baby! Bashees are a great option for an xtra cycle because of the extremely stiff rear end.

If you have questions or concerns on options hit up the Gear Exchange out of Glenwood Springs CO. We are a Banshee and an Xtra dealer and will get you lined up super sick.


I know... it is sexy. I have Jay and Keith to thank for that. If only they could help me out now. That is a 12ft and 3 8ft 2x4ers on there. Thats a lot of wood yo. HA!

Toby's new Scythe

Toby Fenner is the youngest member of the Esher Shore trail crew, and has great promise as an up and coming rider who likes both dirt jumping and "bigger jobs" that require a proper freeride bike

He also joins the ranks of riders who have broken their "trusty" Kona Stinkys and joined the enlightened search for a higher quality, performance rig

I hooked Toby up with a Scythe frame, on a great deal, and I finished building it up yesterday afternoon

His Scythe is running a Totem Coil fork, Cane Creek Double Xc headset, Hope Pro II hubs on Sun MTX rims, some big 'old Maxxis DH tires and Hayes HFX-9 brakes, with Saint cranks and E13 chain device and SRAM transmission

He wasn't expecting his Scythe until the weekend, so let's just say he was pretty damn stoked when i called his home and let him know it was all good to go

Despite the torrential rain we've been having all week here at Esher, Toby was off straight round the car park bouncing up and down

He's off to France at the end of the month, where he can give the Scythe a proper work-out and get to grips with the grin factor of riding such a sick rig ;)

Great choice Toby! Welcome to the family - PRIDE 22

cheers!

Rob C

Running a Pivotal setup on a Wildcard

2 cool things showed up at work today....my Rockshox Lyric 2-step back from the nice warranty people at Fisher Leisure (UK Rockshox Distributor), and a DMR "Lockjaw" seatpost

The Domain 318 fork I've been running the past 2 months has been great on the dirt jumps and in Esher slopestyle park, but as i found out last weekend at Woburn Sands, its not so great on the faster twisting downhills where the simpler Motion Control damper lacks the subtle feel and traction that the Mission Control damper on the Lyric and Totem forks provides, the Domain cannot be faulted at the pricepoint it sells at (almost half that of the Lyric and Totem) but its hard to be happy with a simpler fork once you've had a top of the range fork!

It didn't take long to figure out running the Lyric makes the Wildcard a better all rounder for climbing, descending and jumping, and drops a full 1lb of weight off the bike, which is always nice....and being a lazy sod its nice to go from 115mm to 160mm just by flicking a switch rather than the labourious U-Turn wind...down....



The DMR Lockjaw seatpost is something i've been wanting for a while, thanks to the guys at DMR bikes (Upgrade Distribution) for sending one over to me!

In the BMX world, pretty much everyone is now using Macneil's Pivotal system for the seat and seatpost, which has taken the BMX world by storm (as well as making Macneil a big bag of $$ cash in the process)

Pivotal is so simple its genius - by ditching the traditional saddle rails and engineering a saddle with a pivoting-bolt in a reinforced, "toothed" nylon hull and matching seatpost head, you drop a load of weight, simplify your setup and most importantly make a very heavy duty system that resists "offs" alot better than the traditional railed saddle ever can.

The bolt is accessed using an allen key inserted into a "Pivotal branded" rubber flap on top of the saddle hull, you set the angle by rotating the saddle against the toothed seatpost head and then lock the allen key bolt down...

The I-Beam made by SDG was flawed, in my opinion, because it still used a rail, albeit a single nylon central rail rather than the conventional tubular steel or titanium rails that have been used on saddles for years, I have seen several broken I-Beam saddles over the years, and its not cheap to boot either

Macneil were very smart and had their people in Taiwan license the Pivotal system, which has resulted in every BMX company large and small starting to produce both Pivotal saddles and Pivotal seatpost, both in regular and "stub" (about 100mm long for slammed setups); you can get the Pivotal compatible saddles in 5 or 6 variants (different hull shapes) as well as with different amounts of padding, and a huge range of colours, graphics and embroidery



To run the Pivotal setup on a MTB you will need to get a shim to reduce the internal diameter of the seat tube from 30.0mm (on the Wildcard) to 26.8mm or 27.2mm to fit the DMR "Lockjaw" Pivotal compatible seatpost - I have not seen shims that will take the diameter down to 25.4mm (bmx standard) and you are better off anyhow using a DMR or Alien Nation MTB post (Keith runs one of these on his AMP) to enjoy the extra strength of the larger diameter posts

Here in England, USE make a fine selection of shims, so all i added was the DMR Lockjaw post in 26.8mm and a Macneil Pivotal SL saddle left over from my BMX spares

the end result fits the Wildcard perfectly, its lighter, feels great when dirt jumping, there is no chance of it ever slipping (the clamp) and its very hard to break as i have found out during numerous slams on my BMX over the past 2 years

The DMR seatpost costs just GBP£25, the Pivotal BMX saddles usually GBP£20 and the USE shim is GBP £5-6, its shaved 150gm off my previous Thomson / SDG Bel Air Ti setup

I wouldn't recommend it for XC or All-MTN as the saddle is not designed for pedalling (its small, short and hard) but for DJ, Slopestyle and shuttling its ideal - I never sit down on my Wildcard so its a great way to save weight, toughen up the saddle setup and looks damn cool too ;)

cheers!

Rob C

Dave Hetherington (AUS) news

Sunday July 6th saw the running of round two of the ‘King of Ballarat’
downhill race series. Fine but cold weather conditions greeted the strong
field of elite riders, which featured both the current Victorian State and
Victorian series champions, and the previous two times King of Ballarat
champion, as well as other top riders.

The three race run format proved popular with both riders and fans who had
lined the tracks to cheer their favorite riders down.

Local Banshee rider Dave Hetherington won by 3.6 seconds (despite snapping a
chain on his final run) saying after the race that his Scythe had worked
well on the technically difficult tracks. "The bike was set up perfectly and
seemed to float over the rough and root ridden sections," he said.

Dave has now won the first and second rounds of the series and is looking
forward to the third round to be held next month.'

Great work Dave! It's good to see that your shredding, and beating the big boys on their pure DH race bikes on your Scythe. Just wait til you get your legend!

Bike Review: The Banshee Pyre

Bike Review: The Banshee Pyre

Written by Joe Adnan

As mentioned in an earlier post, I had the occasion to borrow the Fakawibikes demo Banshee Pyre, which I rode during the last hash . The conclusion: it’s a very efficient suspension design, with little or no bobbing during climbing. Banshee describes the suspension system as a “virtual floating 4 bar pivot”. To my untrained eye, it looks very much like a DW-link. Whatever the genesis of the design, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. Not only does it climb well, the bike is also very neutral under braking, with no stiffening of the suspension under hard braking. Standing up on the bike or getting off the saddle in descents also does not appear to affect the activeness of the suspension. With 4.5 inches of travel, it’s more than adequate for everything short of “freeriding”. (I’ve only just become accustomed to the schisms between the various forms of the sport. For an old fart like me, the spectrum goes a little like this: roadbiking >> mountainbiking >> fallingdown >> goingtohospital.) In fact, it’s described by the designers as tending towards a “trailbiking” rather than “all-mountain”. However, seeing as how the designers of the bike hail from the British Columbia, you can safely assume that the bike is more than adequately burly for its intended application. One similarity that Malaysia has with BC is rain, which when mixed with dirt gives us mud. This small coincidence makes the Pyre particularly suited for Malaysian trails, as the frame has gobs of mud clearance and is designed for full-length gear cable housing. Gobs of clearance on the frame. It can fit 2.5" tyres, if you were so inclined. The pivots of the bike also use bushings rather than bearings. I must say that I’ve always thought that bushings are low-cost alternatives to bearings, but having read the reasons why Banshee have gone for bushings, I concede that the arguments appear well made. Best of all, there are grease ports in the pivots, which allow you to inject fresh grease every now and then into the pivots. The argument for bushings goes something along these lines: bearings are great for rotational movement, but a suspension pivot faces angular movements, rather than high speed rotations. With bearings, the force will be borne by 3 or so balls at any one time. Bushings allow the load to spread more evenly, due to the larger contact area. I would thought that bushings, for the same reason, would also bear torsional loads better. Needless to say the suspension was squeak-free during the whole ride, despite the various dunkings the bike took in the streams that we crossed. This is I suppose unsurprising, given that it’s a new bike, but I’ve heard of many bikes that squeaked right out of the box. So, will I buy one? I’ve not decided yet, but it’s certainly on the short list of the stuff to get, if I can get the budget approved by the Minister of Finance, Home Affairs and Matrimonial Harmony. The problem is several fold: Nikon has just released my next camera. Ricoh, with its incredibly customer-centric photo division, has just released the GX200 *, which has fixed whatever shortcomings the GX100 had (RAW buffer, flash exposure compensation, manual flash, rear curtain flash, mercury switch for automatic orientation of photos etc.). And to top it all off, there is the small issue of an impending world recession. I installed a vintage Syncros post (with a proper 30.9mm shim of course) as a nod to the founder of Syncros and Banshee, Pippin Osbourne. In my formative years of mountain biking, every other bike component brand was simply something you used until you could afford Syncros. Oh, and if you had to test a full-suspension bike, what better saddle to use than a Flite without the unnecessary leather cover and padding? *Possibly the best thing about the GX200 is that it is virtually identical to the GX100 in appearance, leading to the possibility of an upgrade that flies under the radar of the missus. -Joe Adnan (check out Joe's blog )

Markolf Berchtold Travels and Results.

A report by our friend Marcel Balog from Brasil.

'June was a real marathon for Banshee rider Markolf Berchtold.




Markolf went to Europe in the end of May, the destiny was Andorra, a little country, neighbor of France, where the 2nd WC round would occur.

In Andorra, Markolf was not so lucky and fell in the seeding run. He lost precious seconds and did not qualify for the finals.

In the following week the 3rd WC round would take place in Fort William, Scotland. Markolf knows that track for a long time and was really confident for the competition.



Because of a failure in the time equipment, Markolf´s time was not registered during the seeding run. Based on his partial time he knew he could qualify, he came with an appeal for the organization and got the classification.

Unfortunately the authorization to race the finals came very late and the rider had to be the first to go down the track. With no time to prepare his self properly, Markolf did his best and was the 46th, in the middle of the best riders in the world.

Thinking of his preparation for the Worlds, that would happen 2 weeks latter in Val Di Sole, Italy, Markolf went to Vigo, Spain, where he raced the 3rd Round of the Maxxis Cup, one of the most important downhill cups in Europe.

With great determination, Markolf pedaled hard and was the 5th guy on the podium, showing the world he can be one of the fastest riders around the globe.

After this great result was time to fly to Italy and meet the best riders of the whole world.



The seeding run was not the best, the rider fell down, got up quickly and got the 54th position. Knowing he could do better, Markolf went to the finals with more determination than ever, ending the competition as the 30th fastest downhiller in the world.



The arrival in Brazil could be a stop to rest, but the Brazilian DH and 4X championship occurred in the same week, in Três Coroas, South Brazil.



After great results in Europe and with all the cheers, Markolf made his best in the muddy tracks and won the championship in both DH (on his Banshee Legend) and 4X disciplines (on his Banshee Rampant).



Follows all Banshee riders results in the Brazilian Championship.

Downhill:
Markolf Berchtold - 1st
Doron Cattoni - 4th
Volkmar Berchtold - 14th
Diogo Gonçalves - 18th

4X
Markolf Berchtold - 1st
Volkmar Berchtold - 5th

Click in the link bellow to watch a vídeo of the Brazilian Chapionship.
http://www.rootrider.com.br/mtb2008.asp?VideoCod=23

There were 5 weeks of hard work, with amazing rewards.'

Congratulations Markolf and all the Banshee riders. We Are very proud of you all!

Keith and Rob go Dirt Jumping

The nasty people at Evans would not let John "Jesus" Holme out to play, but Keith (Banshee designer) was good to go and joined me on a trip down to Woburn Sands in Milton Keynes for some 'biking action

There was even a rumour that Esher local legend (and star of pinkbike videos) "Hot Carl" would join us, but more of that later

First of all, we caught a train out of London Euston down to Bletchley, and had to contend with this monster spider which came crawling out of a dustbin looking for some snacks



After arriving at Bletchley (a miserable post-industrial town next to Milton Keynes), we caught a local train for the 10 minute trip to Woburn Sands

Woburn Sands is a very pretty English village, and holds one of UK freeride's best kept secrets - Aspley Woods

Run by a local trust, the woods are open for mountain biking in a huge bowled out area, with steep cliffs above - an old sand quarry at one point in the past



I took my Wildcard and Keith took his AMP, but there was a fair bit of bike swapping going on, as we both wanted to try the bikes out on all the various short course downhill runs, freeride stunts and dirt jumps

Woburn's dirt jumps are something of a legend in the South-East DJ scene - originally built by Elliot Eveson (who now lives in Cornwall and writes the "Dead Sailor" column for Dirt mag) , Sam Johnson, Div (ex-DMR team) and a bunch of renegades, the DJs have been taken over by a new group of locals and were in fine shape



The main line starts small, and gets big pretty quick, with each pack having its own quirk, and the 4 in particular having a very thin take off and landing tip which makes it important to be accurate

The hip line, as seen above, is very tricky with a small technical step down into a bombhole followed by some roller bumps and then the first hip, it took us quite alot of attempts to get this dialled



To the right of the main line is the "Jam" line which is absolutely huge, and we left it well alone for good reason ha ha



Well both the AMP and the Wildcard rode very well, with both bikes withstanding numerous lip casings due to our rusty DJ skills, but we both started getting through the lines and having a proper blast through the jumps



Keith stepped up to the challenge of riding a hip to the right, his opposite way, as seen above, and got the job done despite a few runs into the greenery



I did my best to plough through the main line with style, and got through half of the hip line but left the third alone which was basically, a huge hole and a sheer face...scary!



We both had a great ride, and Hot Carl showed up about 4pm and had a session on the numerous DH tracks above the DJ area, and after getting his head around the loose sandy riding surface and pinecones, started enjoying himself and even pinned a cool gap jump into a long chute

Keith is returning 'up North next week, and then off to Whistler in a few weeks, but has promised to return and next time we will try Chicksands and take more of our motley crew along for the fun

cheers!

Rob C

Matej Charvat Update

'Czech national series No. 3 – Velke Karlovice

Third race of Czech national series took place on east border of Czech republic. In small ski resort called Razula.

The track, which was changed little bit compared to last year is really short (about 1:30min), fast and not too technical, but funny. These things made the race more dramatic, because all the riders were in couple of seconds. Every small mistake was punished by relentless time.

My semifinal run was really smooth, fast...but I was saving power for finals. I was 2nd fastest. 1,5sec behind 1st and 2sec in front of 3rd.

Final as always were more challenging. I was too fast and made a few mistakes. In the middle of the course I nearly crashed over the bars, but I stayed on and finished the run in smooth style.

My time was less than a second behind the winner. I am not satisfied by 2nd place. But I’m happy because I became 3rd overall after I fell from 1st place to 4th in the overall national standings when I had a flat tire three weeks ago in Spindleruv Mlyn.

Special thanks to all my sponsors. '

Esher Shore 2008 Jam video

great turn out for the Shore Showdown 2008 esher shore riding Jam on Sunday 29th June...over 100+ riders and loads of spectators



Despite working my ar*e off all day..I managed to squeeze in some runs in both bike park and went a little too sideways on this shot above, nearly ripping my tire off and covering my back wheel in tubeless sealent ha ha



here's a low resolution version of Crazy Jey's Jam footage...should be a higher res. version on pinkbike soon and also a DVD which will be play in-store and perhaps make available for a small fee...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ry3v2zGViBM

thanks to Rob "look at the butterflies" Bigwood for the still photos

cheers!

rob c