Nashar Cross frames any good?

Nashabr has some great deals on cross frames and carbon
forks

Anyone build up a bike form this?

In article ,
wrote:

Nashabr has some great deals on cross frames and carbon forks

Anyone build up a bike form this?

Not specifically the 'cross frame, but a friend built up one of the
Nashbar road frames as a travel and bad weather race bike and ended up
liking it quite a bit.

The way these things work, those frames could be built in the same
factories that build the major label frames.

On Oct 3, 10:36*am, Tim McNamara wrote:
In article ,
wrote:

Nashabr has some great deals on cross frames and carbon forks

Anyone build up a bike form this?

Not specifically the 'cross frame, but a friend built up one of the
Nashbar road frames as a travel and bad weather race bike and ended up
liking it quite a bit.

The way these things work, those frames could be built in the same
factories that build the major label frames.

I had a Nashbar cross frame I built up and rode on dirt roads, paved
roads, and a little light single track. Nice enough bike. It was
reasonably light, and had plenty of clearance for big tires/fenders,
though it wasn't quite 29'er clearance. The slack head tube made the
bike handle a little more like a MTB than a road bike, but it did
eliminate the TCO I had on other cross/touring frames. Check the
geometry info closely, it can be a little confusing the first time you
look at it. The TT was a little long for my tastes, but that's all a
matter of preference. If you're looking for a decent frame for a
cheap price, it's not a bad way to go.

Jason

On Oct 3, 7:08*am, wrote:
Nashabr has some great deals on cross frames and carbon
forks

Anyone build up a bike form this?

I've got one of the X-Frame cross frames that I built up this spring,
mostly as a rain-safe commuter.

http://www.bikejournal.com/images/hankamanianashbike[1].jpg

It's unspectacular, but pretty fun to ride. Mounting fenders is kind
of rough, because there is barely room for a nut between the chainstay
bridge and bottom bracket, and no room at all to get a wrench on it. I
wound up using a zip-tie down there. The seatstay bridge is drilled
vertically, so you can just drill the fender and bolt it on, rather
than using a bracket.

I like the under-BB cable guide, which has the RD track elevated half
an inch above (below, actually) the FD guide. This means that you can
more easily cross the cables under the DT so the housing is cleaner
and doesn't rub the head tube.

I didn't get the Nashbar fork, though. I got one of the Bontragers
that Wheel & Sprocket had for $70-ish on ebay, before Trek made them
take them down.

On Oct 3, 7:56*am, Jason wrote:
On Oct 3, 10:36*am, Tim McNamara wrote:

In article ,
wrote:

Nashabr has some great deals on cross frames and carbon forks

Anyone build up a bike form this?

Not specifically the 'cross frame, but a friend built up one of the
Nashbar road frames as a travel and bad weather race bike and ended up
liking it quite a bit.

The way these things work, those frames could be built in the same
factories that build the major label frames.

I had a Nashbar cross frame I built up and rode on dirt roads, paved
roads, and a little light single track. *Nice enough bike. *It was
reasonably light, and had plenty of clearance for big tires/fenders,
though it wasn't quite 29'er clearance. *The slack head tube made the
bike handle a little more like a MTB than a road bike, but it did
eliminate the TCO I had on other cross/touring frames. *Check the
geometry info closely, it can be a little confusing the first time you
look at it. *The TT was a little long for my tastes, but that's all a
matter of preference. *If you're looking for a decent frame for a
cheap price, it's not a bad way to go.

Jason

Agreeance on the long TT. I've got a 9cm stem to compensate.

In article ,
wrote:

Nashabr has some great deals on cross frames and carbon
forks

Anyone build up a bike form this?

Yes. I have a CX bike built from their frame and fork. I race it every
weekend at this time of year, and am largely satisfied with it. Here's
what they did right and wrong:

Right:
-price
-not too heavy. It's aluminum, and the weight seems within reasonable
parameters
-cables all routed in the proper way (you think this is a joke, but for
a while Fetish Cycles was heavily discounting its first-gen CX frames on
eBay because the brake cable was routed along the underside of the top
tube).
-bitchin' matte-black finish with only one "X" head tube decal.
-fork has a metal steer tube and carbon legs and metal dropouts,
including the disc mount. That means it doesn't commit the fussier sins
of all-carbon construction.

Wrong:
-135 mm rear dropout spacing, which is odd for a CX bike, since you
usually want to borrow wheels from your road bike, not your MTB. There
are arguments that 135 is a good choice because the wheels build up
slightly stronger, but I didn't want this "feature." In practice, I just
put my 130 mm wheels into the back, use the QR skewer to squeeze it
together, and nothing has broken.
-chainstay bridge is a weird thing on a CX bike. There's still lots of
tire clearance, but mud will get caught there.
-this is a compact-ish geometry frame. The top tube on my 50 (or 52 or
whatever it is) is definitely sloped, though I have had no problems
shouldering the bike in practice. OTOH, I also tend to carry my bike
off-the-shoulder a lot in races, and I also don't ride a very large
frame size. The compact geometry may make bike-carrying very annoying in
larger sizes.
-The fork is not terribly heavy, but in retrospect it would probably be
possible to make it lighter and cheaper if it was all aluminum. There's
some pretty good deals on forks out there, so you may be able to do
better elsewhere.

Hmm:
-disc mounts, mounts for 2 bottle cages, and fender/rack mounts
(including threaded mounts on the sides of the seat stays) which are
great for versatility.
-under-the-BB derailer cable routing; in practice this doesn't cause me
problems, but a lot of CX bikes use a down-the-seat-tube routing for the
fder, with a pulley mounted on the back of the seattube just below the
fder to U-turn the cable back up.
-The frame includes nothing but itself, the derailer hanger, and a few
bolts for the bottle cages and rack mounts. You'll need a seatpost
collar and a rear brake cable stop (if you use canti brakes). Nashbar
sells one that attaches to the seatpost collar. It works.

As an aside, I envision a glorious future in which some component
company or another offers a CX-specific derailer: designed for top-entry
of the cable, but pulling road-correct amounts of cable. Shimano makes
top-entry (top-swing?) fders, but MTB-only. As another aside, I can't
believe the UCI banned disc brakes. That's lame.

Conclusion:
I'm happy. If you want to build up a new CX frame from parts you have on
hand, this is probably still the cheapest decent entry point. The other
super-cheap CX frames out there are the Redline Conquest, the Planet X
whatever, and the NYC Bikes Crosspeed II (some versions of the
Crossspeed I have under-top-tube rear brake routing; if that doesn't
matter for your purposes, they have 'em for $39 in their clearance
section).

As a racing bike, the "X" has been most satisfactory, especially for the
price. As always, building a bike from parts is very close to a mug's
game: if you actually value your time at a non-negative per-hour rate,
you may not be able to justify the process. The small bits and pieces on
these projects (cables, pedals, bar tape, whatever else you forgot to
buy) always seem to add up remarkably fast.

--
Ryan Cousineau http://www.wiredcola.com/
"In other newsgroups, they killfile trolls."
"In rec.bicycles.racing, we coach them."

On Oct 3, 10:14*am, Ryan Cousineau wrote:
In article ,
wrote:

Nashabr has some great deals on cross frames and carbon
forks

Anyone build up a bike form this?

Yes. I have a CX bike built from their frame and fork. I race it every
weekend at this time of year, and am largely satisfied with it. Here's
what they did right and wrong:

Right:
-price
-not too heavy. It's aluminum, and the weight seems within reasonable
parameters
-cables all routed in the proper way (you think this is a joke, but for
a while Fetish Cycles was heavily discounting its first-gen CX frames on
eBay because the brake cable was routed along the underside of the top
tube).
-bitchin' matte-black finish with only one "X" head tube decal.
-fork has a metal steer tube and carbon legs and metal dropouts,
including the disc mount. That means it doesn't commit the fussier sins
of all-carbon construction.

Wrong:
-135 mm rear dropout spacing, which is odd for a CX bike, since you
usually want to borrow wheels from your road bike, not your MTB. There
are arguments that 135 is a good choice because the wheels build up
slightly stronger, but I didn't want this "feature." In practice, I just
put my 130 mm wheels into the back, use the QR skewer to squeeze it
together, and nothing has broken.
-chainstay bridge is a weird thing on a CX bike. There's still lots of
tire clearance, but mud will get caught there.
-this is a compact-ish geometry frame. The top tube on my 50 (or 52 or
whatever it is) is definitely sloped, though I have had no problems
shouldering the bike in practice. OTOH, I also tend to carry my bike
off-the-shoulder a lot in races, and I also don't ride a very large
frame size. The compact geometry may make bike-carrying very annoying in
larger sizes.
-The fork is not terribly heavy, but in retrospect it would probably be
possible to make it lighter and cheaper if it was all aluminum. There's
some pretty good deals on forks out there, so you may be able to do
better elsewhere.

Hmm:
-disc mounts, mounts for 2 bottle cages, and fender/rack mounts
(including threaded mounts on the sides of the seat stays) which are
great for versatility.
-under-the-BB derailer cable routing; in practice this doesn't cause me
problems, but a lot of CX bikes use a down-the-seat-tube routing for the
fder, with a pulley mounted on the back of the seattube just below the
fder to U-turn the cable back up.
-The frame includes nothing but itself, the derailer hanger, and a few
bolts for the bottle cages and rack mounts. You'll need a seatpost
collar and a rear brake cable stop (if you use canti brakes). Nashbar
sells one that attaches to the seatpost collar. It works.

As an aside, I envision a glorious future in which some component
company or another offers a CX-specific derailer: designed for top-entry
of the cable, but pulling road-correct amounts of cable. Shimano makes
top-entry (top-swing?) fders, but MTB-only. As another aside, I can't
believe the UCI banned disc brakes. That's lame.

Conclusion:
I'm happy. If you want to build up a new CX frame from parts you have on
hand, this is probably still the cheapest decent entry point. The other
super-cheap CX frames out there are the Redline Conquest, the Planet X
whatever, and the NYC Bikes Crosspeed II (some versions of the
Crossspeed I have under-top-tube rear brake routing; if that doesn't
matter for your purposes, they have 'em for $39 in their clearance
section).

As a racing bike, the "X" has been most satisfactory, especially for the
price. As always, building a bike from parts is very close to a mug's
game: if you actually value your time at a non-negative per-hour rate,
you may not be able to justify the process. The small bits and pieces on
these projects (cables, pedals, bar tape, whatever else you forgot to
buy) always seem to add up remarkably fast.

--
Ryan Cousineau /
"In other newsgroups, they killfile trolls."
"In rec.bicycles.racing, we coach them."

135mm spacing is good given the presence of disc mounts. There is a
dearth of disc-compatible 130mm hubs. FWIW, I stole wheels from my
touring bike. Then aagain, you're racing with yours and I'm commuting
with mine.

Maybe go with 132.5, like Surly does?

As for shouldering it, get a WTB PureV saddle. Its hooked nose will
rest nicely on your shoulder.

Ryan Cousineau wrote:


Wrong:
-135 mm rear dropout spacing, which is odd for a CX bike, since you
usually want to borrow wheels from your road bike, not your MTB. There
are arguments that 135 is a good choice because the wheels build up
slightly stronger, but I didn't want this "feature." In practice, I just
put my 130 mm wheels into the back, use the QR skewer to squeeze it
together, and nothing has broken.
-chainstay bridge is a weird thing on a CX bike. There's still lots of
tire clearance, but mud will get caught there.
-this is a compact-ish geometry frame. The top tube on my 50 (or 52 or




Nashbar description now says
130mm rear hub spacing

I want 135, ha. I am now trying to decide between the X frame and a
motobecane,(for on and off road commuting) the motobecane already has
the seat clamp, fork and headset installed for $200 shipped. The X is
$129, then I have to add fork, seat clamp, headset plus shipping. I do
like that the X says less toe overlap. Off for more measurements.
dan

Tim McNamara
wrote:

The way these things work, those frames could be built in the same
factories that build the major label frames.

Agree

That's why I'm attracted to the low
prices of the Nashbar frame and fork
combo

I've never built up a bike before
tho..... although have done all my own
maint in past

Does there exist a web page that
provides step by step instructions for
building ones own bike?

Hank wrote:

I've got one of the X-Frame cross frames that I built up this spring,
mostly as a rain-safe commuter.

http://www.bikejournal.com/images/hankamanianashbike[1].jpg

Nice!