Alliance Bicycles

[William]

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[4Rings6Stars]

That last one is my favorite...I just want to hop into that picture and ride.

Frames look very well designed and well built, paint is great, builds look nicely thought out...great stuff all around.

Thanks paceline for putting yet another framebuilder on my radar!

[William]

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[William]

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[William]

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[crownjewelwl]

hi erik,
great interview...very intrigued by your full suspension mtb as you don't see a ton of custom builders doing it (soft tail maybe)...

what are the challenges and how did you decide upon the ventana design?

thanks,
WL

[timto]

was the best riding bike i've owned - and i've had many nice bikes.

This is the bike I shoudn't have sold. Now with a fellow forumite.

Having difficulty resisting urge to get a titanium one...I forgot to mention what an easy going and awesome guy he was to work with.

[William]

Originally Posted by timto

was the best riding bike i've owned - and i've had many nice bikes.

This is the bike I shoudn't have sold. Now with a fellow forumite.

Having difficulty resisting urge to get a titanium one...I forgot to mention what an easy going and awesome guy he was to work with.

Sweet ride there T. Too bad you let it go, but I'm sure Erik would be happy to build you another.

Heard from Erik earlier today, he's been pretty busy but he said he wasgoing to try to answer questions tonight.





William

[AllianceBicycle]

Originally Posted by 4Rings6Stars

That last one is my favorite...I just want to hop into that picture and ride.

Frames look very well designed and well built, paint is great, builds look nicely thought out...great stuff all around.

Thanks paceline for putting yet another framebuilder on my radar!

Thanks for taking a look at my bikes. I hope to get the word out and I'm grateful that the forum was willing to let me do this.

Erik

[AllianceBicycle]

Originally Posted by crownjewelwl

hi erik,
great interview...very intrigued by your full suspension mtb as you don't see a ton of custom builders doing it (soft tail maybe)...

what are the challenges and how did you decide upon the ventana design?

thanks,
WL

That's a great question and something that I wish I could explain to more people. The problem with posting a picture of a full suspension bike is that some people assume it's just a heavy and flexy Ventana. It's usually followed by something about how they can see the merits of a steel or titanium hardtail, but can't understand why you would want that material in a full suspension chassis.

The steel and titanium front triangles are quite stiff as I use large diameter tubing. In some examples, the front triangle is made entirely of downtubes. My new personal 5"rear/5.5" front bike has a 1.75" dt, 1.375tt, and a 1.375st. Compare that to your average steel bike. It makes the rear end almost seem a bit flex in comparison. It's worth noting that aluminum is only 1/3 as stiff as steel (Young's Modulus for those wanting to pursue further info). Tubing diameter being the greatest contributor to stiffness, followed by wall thickness. The downtube diameter on many aluminum full suspension bikes is 1.75" for reference (Ventana included). This is a huge topic that probably deserves it's own thread, but a quick google search yielded this bike related article http://sheldonbrown.com/frame-materials.html

I'm currently working on having the necassary parts made in titanium and hope to start offering that this year. I'm planning on teaming up with Carl Strong on this and having Tyler at 26 Industries in Bozeman machine the parts. This should open a lot of doors for this model in the weight savings department. That being said, a steel version weighs between 6.5-7.3 pounds including the shock, depending on travel and stiffness requirements.

Also, I deviate from the stock Ventana drawing heavily. I have reduced the chainstays by 20mm on all the 29ers that I've done. I've gone as far as 28mm shorter than stock, which put the chainstay at 438mm with 4 inchs of travel in the back on a 29er. I would most likely chop some length off the back of a 650b bike too depending on what the customer is asking for. I think that really allows the bike to have better climbing traction and lends itself to being ridden more aggressively as it's easier to loft the front wheel and pump the bike through terrain. The limiting issue on design is front derailleur interference. However with groups like Sram's XX1 coming out, I will be able to drastically relocate things.

I also use a revised pivot location for the main pivot. I do this to add more anti-squat for additional pedalling platform. On some of the bikes, I've done a revised rocker location to tune the leverage curve or change the total amount of travel. Lastly, I will use certain rockers with non-stock rear shocks in both the stroke and the compression tune to achieve certain goals. All of this in addition to custom fit and geometry are why I think it's a solid offering.

[AllianceBicycle]

Here are a couple of pictures from this fall. The painted one is owned by a friend of mine. I built it a couple of years ago. The unpainted one is mine.

[AllianceBicycle]

Originally Posted by William

Sweet ride there T. Too bad you let it go, but I'm sure Erik would be happy to build you another.

Heard from Erik earlier today, he's been pretty busy but he said he wasgoing to try to answer questions tonight.





William

I have a soft spot for that bike. It was the first one ever built at my shop in Ketchum when I relocated there from Bozeman.

I like this version too.....

[soulspinner]

Originally Posted by William

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I dont even own a mtb and I wanna ride that one!

[crownjewelwl]

Thanks for that great explanation!

[William]

Erik, have you fabricated any frames utilizing the Gates Carbon belt drive drivetrain yet?





William