IMO, the Crestline would have done better in the shootout, particularly turning, climbing & descending, if it had been shipped with the 450mm dropouts or even the 455s.He’s waiting for them to be #1 or #2 on the PB shootout to coincide with the drop
Pre-order starts next month - Next Crestline Avinox frame set
- Thread starter BikingBad
- Start date
Scford
Active member
What was is for the shootout? I just saw they listed it as a range but didn’t catch how theirs was setup.
Pretty certain it was 445mm as that's how all the MX's ship and is standard.
You have to purchase the other sizes separately.
Plummet
Flash Git
Troydon has certainly done a great job of creating the hype. I wonder if Santacruz put out the exact same bike spec if people would flock too it?
sethimus
😠 Donald Duck 😠
anyone got any intel on how many bikes the next batch consists of?
300
He has done the same marketing concept as Russian River brewing did with Pliny the Elder IPA. Low volume, high price, hard to get, creates demand.
Plummet
Flash Git
But also backed it up with a fantastic product that is optionable to a wide variety of riders.
Porsche being the best example of this, for the in demand models anyways. You just build 10-30% less than the amount that you think you can sell at full price and you don't have to discount them, they all sell out, even resale remains high. Heck, you don't even have to store them!
Blownoutrides
Active member
To bring this full circle, Pliny is no small part of the reason I need an ebike
412MTB
Member
Bikes or frames?
Scford
Active member
I’ll second that, having been lucky to snag a first release bike, I can say it’s really good and the modularity is insane. 160-180 travel, fully adjustable chainstay and reach, ability to pretty easily drop the battery and now possible travel option up to 200mm 
He’s knocked it out of the park to be honest.
He’s knocked it out of the park to be honest.
Pretty sure they are going frame motor battery only package for next drop.
Blownoutrides
Active member
I'm tall and heavy like Troydon. Bullit missed my mark with the 600wh battery, 27.5 rear only, and short chainstays on the XL.
Santa Cruz make beautiful bikes but don't seem overly concerned with proportionality in either geo or battery range.
Oh, well... Crestline has us covered
slickrock
Well-known member
Having 200mm rear on a enduro bike can be really be intoxicating. It is essential however, that the bike be designed for that exact travel for it to work kinematically. My Sonni was designed for 200mm where everything works incredibly well, but was less successful with the 160mm linkage. Chose the travel for the bike for what it was best designed for (there's always a designers sweet spot in travel, CS, and frame size).I’ll second that, having been lucky to snag a first release bike, I can say it’s really good and the modularity is insane. 160-180 travel, fully adjustable chainstay and reach, ability to pretty easily drop the battery and now possible travel option up to 200mm
Pliny the Younger is more Crestline-ish. Much harder to get than the Elder.
The Founder/Operator of Crestline confirmed 300 frame kits in this recent YouTube video.
John_likes_bikes
Well-known member
The bolt in BB he mentioned is really cool too. It's amazing what can be offered if you're not a huge money hungry corporation putting out what's best for you and not the consumer.
John_likes_bikes
Well-known member
Troydon also said Avinox has a warehouse in Cali with warranty inventory. It's a good watch.
Blownoutrides
Active member
His comment about eventually using the motor to eliminate gears altogether is kind of mind blowing. Motor could either self adjust to maintain a pre-defined cadence or provide simulated "gears" selected by rider.
Glad I watched.
sethimus
😠 Donald Duck 😠
i literally screamed alto ebike (the rivian spinoff) when they talked about that, too bad they hadn’t seen that one yet, would have been interesting hearing their take on it. they do exactly that
Troydon told me last month it will be frame only again, and available in alpine white and gloss raw carbon options.
EDIT: That said.... how is the paint on these bikes? All my other bikes are some kind of black or raw carbon. Was kinda looking forward to switching it up and possibly going white. But not if the paint job isn't great. I would ride wrap it either way.
EDIT: That said.... how is the paint on these bikes? All my other bikes are some kind of black or raw carbon. Was kinda looking forward to switching it up and possibly going white. But not if the paint job isn't great. I would ride wrap it either way.
Last edited:
Blownoutrides
Active member
Welp... the future is here I guess:
ALSO. TM-B on Test – is Rivian’s Sister Brand’s eBike Too Good to Be True?
Electric car manufacturer Rivian is launching an eBike spin-off featuring an innovative pedal-by-wire drive system. We put the ALSO. TM-B through the wringer to find out what it’s capable of.
ebike-mtb.com
Digital gears and regenerative braking for $4,500.
It weights 90lbs with an 808wh battery unfortunately.
They key leap to deraileur/cassette delete is to disassociate the geared connection between pedals and motor, with pedal input charging a generator instead (ostensibly the same generator charged by the regenerative braking) with software creating the feel of connection.
By my math there is about 2 lbs to save by getting rid of cassette and derailleur. It isn't immediately clear how much the Rivian Also TM-B motor + generator system weighs, but my totally uninformed guess would be about 15lbs.
The Avinox motor is 5.5lbs and cassette/deraileur is 2lbs, so equivalent system weight (motor + shifting) is 7.5lbs.
This means there's currently a 7.5lbs weight gap to cover from a design evolution perspective before it makes sense from a weight perspective. Maybe there's ~2lbs of fluff in Rivian's design given weight wasn't a massive priority, so figure that gap could actually look more like 5-6lbs.
It's exciting. My completely uninformed but somewhat pessimistic guess at timeline to cover that weight gap in a real way (no dumb under-specced part nonsense) is... 6-7 years?
What do y'all think(?)
Scford
Active member
sethimus
😠 Donald Duck 😠
i really like that they started with a complete blank sheet, not going by established industry parts and rethought the complete drive train.Welp... the future is here I guess:
ALSO. TM-B on Test – is Rivian’s Sister Brand’s eBike Too Good to Be True?
Electric car manufacturer Rivian is launching an eBike spin-off featuring an innovative pedal-by-wire drive system. We put the ALSO. TM-B through the wringer to find out what it’s capable of.
Digital gears and regenerative braking for $4,500.
It weights 90lbs with an 808wh battery unfortunately.
They key leap to deraileur/cassette delete is to disassociate the geared connection between pedals and motor, with pedal input charging a generator instead (ostensibly the same generator charged by the regenerative braking) with software creating the feel of connection.
By my math there is about 2 lbs to save by getting rid of cassette and derailleur. It isn't immediately clear how much the Rivian Also TM-B motor + generator system weighs, but my totally uninformed guess would be about 15lbs.
The Avinox motor is 5.5lbs and cassette/deraileur is 2lbs, so equivalent system weight (motor + shifting) is 7.5lbs.
This means there's currently a 7.5lbs weight gap to cover from a design evolution perspective before it makes sense from a weight perspective. Maybe there's ~2lbs of fluff in Rivian's design given weight wasn't a massive priority, so figure that gap could actually look more like 5-6lbs.
It's exciting. My completely uninformed but somewhat pessimistic guess at timeline to cover that weight gap in a real way (no dumb under-specced part nonsense) is... 6-7 years?
What do y'all think(?)
slickrock
Well-known member
Well their wish of no gearbox with just a motor spinning up with automatic continuous and artificial gear shifting is being realized with Rivian/ALSO TM-B ebike with the motor and battery tech fittingly derived from Rivian. It is a Pedal-by-Wire (PBW) mechanism, so the entire pedal cadence/torgue experience is entirely virtual [because it is not mechanically connected to output shaft], right down to haptic gear shifts being felt at the pedal. It's not an EMTB, but conceptually variants of this idea could work, including the idler that is not idle- its actually the output drive of the motor, which gives clean and direct chain/belt line to the rear wheel.
If you can't stomach PBW, then and E-CVT/Hybrid Transmission solution is about the only alternative to integrate human power with motor power in a single non-carriage, non-spur-gearbox transmission mechanism to provide that kind of stepless response you could get with a EV motor like in a Tesla/Rivian.
I am curious if you could go into more detail about "idler that is not idle- its actually the output drive of the motor, which gives clean and direct chain/belt line to the rear wheel."
I see the challenges as: With the most efficient means of power transfer being a direct mechanical drivetrain. The alternatives have 3 "mountains to climb" Efficiency, weight, and size.
slickrock
Well-known member
If you spend time on the TM-B thread you will notice that the placement of the drive shaft (mechanically connected to the motor) is not along the pedal shaft but well above it, exactly where an idler would be for HP ebike. The drive directly connects to rear hub via the belt where there is NO freewheel. The belt is always moving, even when you coast. Apply brakes and the rear wheel charges the battery via the motor operating as a generator, just like with an EV. There is no mechanical slop in the system (no pawls, freewheels, etcs. in hub or motor). The belt is taught (no spring tensioner needed or clutch needed) so no whipping effects where Sidekicks and Ochains have no purchase. And there is no kickback because the pedal shaft is connect to a separate generator, which basically recharges the battery with human power and acts a counter torque force to simulate what we feel when pedal a normal bike.
We will see how the efficiency angle pans out. What is lost in mechanical-to-battery-to-mechanical conversion is made up somewhat by regen and optimum power transmission delivery (as in not wasting both motor power curve and human power curves losses with suboptimal manual shifting). Size and weight, yes, that is why I would like see PDW and also E-CVTs (as it has similar benefits without the mech-to-battery-to-mech conversion) iterated on. It would be cool if the likes of DJI could take this head-on.
Blownoutrides
Active member
W
What a time to be alive. The solutions that leapfrog the problematic aspects of traditional bicycle components are already here, just need to wait a few years for them to slim down to suit EMTB's. Very cool.
2supple
Member
So when is this thing going to drop? Not a lot of days left this year.
