This looks like a Conti tire, correct? What internal width is your wheel and how squared off does the (2.2 Race King I suppose?) get? I‘d like a second lightweight wheelset to run fast, narrow tires on but I‘m kinda not looking at 28-30 id wheels…
I think I am done with project “Dark Grimace” for now!
My 2023 Epic Evo has come in at 22.4lbs on my scale, so it is pretty decent in terms of weight.
It is easiest if I say what I did not replace on the bike, here is the list;
-Stock/OEM handlebar and stem
-Stock/OEM suspension (reba and Deluxe select+)
Here is a list of what has been changed on the bike and doing a quick google search as to what it would cost (not hunting for deals);
I already had most of the stuff laying around, realistically I only purchased the Bike, Alpha wheelset, tires, chainring (so a real cost of $4,271.99). I think that realistically I could lose another 1-1.25lbs by changing out the suspension and handlebars etc. I don’t really see a reason to do this however.
So, figured I would drop this here, for under $6500, if you picked up a EE while on sale you can have an extremely light capable bike.
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You inspired me to tally up the damage and see how well I did against my original goal.
My project started from outrage at the S-Works Epic 8 being 14.5K - my hypothesis was I could build something comparable for around 6K starting from the ZFS-5 120 while it was on sale. Not a completely fair characterization because I planned to reuse some parts like my old wheels.
Conclusion: My first build was within my budget but not at my weight goal so did a few more upgrades. Now I’m over budget but I think I’ve met the goal that I could build a similarly capable bike for the same or less weight of the S-Works Epic 8 for a lot less. The Epic 8 weights are for medium bikes without pedals and cages etc, so I’d be shocked if an actual size Large S-Works Epic 8 with pedals, cages, computer mount, sealant weighed less than this.
My secondary conclusion is that buying last years Epic Evo on deep sale was probably the best starting point for this type of project, but since I couldn’t find any in my size that would ship to me at the time, I still think the ZFS-5 120 was a smart approach.
I also have a ton of takeoff parts I haven’t done anything with yet, a full GX groupset, handlebar, stem, seatpost, saddle, original stock wheelset with tires & rotors. Selling these off would get me back down into at least to 7.5k cost at least which would allow me to achieve my 50% of the cost of an Epic 8 goal.
Thank you for coming to my TED talk.
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Correct, Race King on 25mm IW We Are One Revive. Away now, but will see if I can take some pictures next week. They’ve worked great for me except for one sidewall tear going through a rock garden last year.
Primary use case has been longer marathon events, I do have a 30 IW “every day” wheelset that gets used most of the time.
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Anyone running YBN SLA 12 speed chains on their SRAM Eagle drivetrain? Seems like availability in Canada isn’t great, questioning whether the Amazon listings for them are legit, notice alot of the Amazon reviews report they worked/fit poorly and some suggest they broke early. See they are also available from euro sites.
Thinking about swapping my chain ring (wanna go from 32T to 30T to spend more time in the middle of the cassette, don’t run out of range with the 11-50 NX eagle but feel like when I’m riding single track I’m generally in the top 1/3 of the cassette) and cassette so was considering giving the YBN chain a try given they are supposed to be faster.
Thanks. You don’t need to take pictures for me. I trust you when you say they work well. I mounted conti race king 2.0 on my Berd GVX 25 so I have an idea how they‘ll look.
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I always ran YBN as my race chain on Eagle. I haven’t looked at other places to buy in a long time, but I had similar concerns about getting a genuine SLA1210 at the time and ended up buying from MSW: MSPEEDWAX | Molten Speed Wax - 04. YBN 12 Speed Chains
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I picked up the epic evo and have been doing upgrades as well. I just put on a SID Ultimate fork and SIDLuxe shock (picked up both at various sales) and have to say it is a HUGE upgrade compared to the Reba and Deluxe+ it comes with. It absolutely eats up the chatter and is so much more capable. Just my opinion…. sell the old parts and put toward the suspension. Definitely worth the upgrade!
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Thanks for the advice and first hand experience!
I might consider it next year, I have a shockwiz and have been tuning the reba as best I can.
It has taken +4 tokens, a ton of slowed rebound and about 15-18% reduced air pressure from recommendation (from specialized) to get it happy with the shockwiz.
I’m not quite done tuning yet, it’s high speed compression is just not happy and I can’t do anything about it but everything else is looking good. It feels pretty solid now vs when I got it, I
was going to start working on the rear next week.
I wouldn’t mind having suspension components that has even more adjustability though.
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Finally pulled the trigger on new wheels for my Epic Evo Comp (last years model)
The outgoing set that came stock:
The new Roval Carbon Control:
Both weights with tubeless tape and valves. Nearly 700 grams of savings! My size large is now sitting at 26.7 lbs (with pedals, power2max powermeter, cages+multitool, garmin mount)
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White and black on these frames look so nice
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How good are those Singularis wheels?
Thinking about making some upgrades to my 2021 Norco Revolver FS2 100. Don’t want to go too crazy as I think I will be looking to move to something with 120/120 in 2025 (like the Epic 8) but other than adding a dropper and changing the tires and chain its fully stock.
Here are some things I was considering and would love to hear the thoughts of those who have built up some crazy bikes.
Hunt Proven XC wheels (the cheaper non-carbon spoke version), 30mm internal, my stock wheels are probably close to 2kg so ~500g weight savings, on sale for ~1310 CAD + shipping right now. Would probably put the H2S rotors on these and Racing Ralphs front and rear in 2.35. This is cheaper and lighter than Light Bicycle AM930S with DT350 by ~$500 CAD.
GX Eagle or XO1 Eagle cassette (stock NX cassette is 629g so savings of 178g with GX, 257g with XO1) not sure if there is a difference in shift performance.
Other areas I’m less certain about the value of:
upgrading G2R brakes to Level Bronze
Upgrading 170mm NX Eagle Crank to 165mm GX Eagle Crank (~50g weight savings) I run 165mm on my road and gravel bike, would be more for the shorter crank than the weight.
Upgrading NX shifter to GX (would this make a difference if still using NX derailleur?)
Here is the stock specs
https://www.norco.com/bike-archives/2022/2022-revolver-fs-2-100/
Full NX Eagle with G2R brakes
Not sure on where you’re located, but i was able to pick up an entire brand new x01 drivetrain with carbon cranks for 800 CAD. I think the shifting difference won’t be huge without the x01 shifter and derailler.
I think you’re absolutely on the right track. Those wheels would carryover to any future builds if you wanted and they come with hunts lifetime warranty. The cassette would be significant weight savings for the dollar and would likely be necessary anyway if you’re buying the wheels with an XD driver, so you don’t have to change it out in the future beyond those two all of the others would definitely be minimal gains if anything would really be based on preference or a desire with parts than significant performance games. I think you would notice a really big difference with the wheel set though.
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Canada, so some euro and US sites wont ship SRAM or Shimano to me
You might already know this - the NX cassette uses the classic Shimano splined free hub body, while GX and higher use SRAM’s XD free hub body.
So the upgrade the cassette, you’ll need to confirm if your original wheelset can change the free hub body easily. Or just buy a new wheelset with an XD free hub body, and upgrade the wheels and cassette at the same time. You wouldn’t be able to use the original wheels as a backup/winter set then though.
Have an XD driver for my stock wheels, it was hard to get given they are ‘Bear Pawls’ hubs but would probably keep the NX on the stock wheels and put a GX or XO1 on the ‘race’ wheels.
If I have an 11-50 cassette on one wheelset and a 10-50 on the other I wonder if it will cause issues for my NX derailleur.
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