Advice Please: Need To Lighten My Onza!

[† CETFLY †]

Hi guys.

Ive been riding XC all my life (29yo now from Aus) but want to get into more tricks, skate parks, technical skill stuff.

I just bought a second hand Onza Woodstock. It weighs more than my full suspension XC!

I need advice on what wheels to get. I have (probably) an Onza rear which is double walled, with Maxxis Minion Super Tacky 26 x 2.5 tyre (tyre alone is 1350g!) and the heavy duty Minion tube on the rear.

On the front it has Onza Hog single wall, Minion Super Tacky and heavy duty tube 26 x 2.35

Now, this bike seems set up for heavier duty work than it will see from me. The tyres are new (ive ridden it twice)

I want to get into street/urban, not some of the mad 10ft gap jumps you boys do.

On the XC I can one handed wheelie, wheelie downhill at top speed, manual, manual down staircases etc. I love that style of riding.

With this bike I'll get into hopping onto park benches etc, but atm its way too heavy. I really just dont think I need a 2.5 wide rear. This is where most of the weight is.

What wheel/tyre combo would you recommend for me and my style of riding? I need something light. I weigh 74kgs (165lbs)

I need advice as soon as possible as my time here in the UK is getting short and I need the bike set up, ready to take back to Australia.

Im up for selling my wheels if needed

Cheers

Edited May 13, 2009 by CETFLY

[N.Wood]

Could go with:

Ditching both heavy duty tubes and just running standard or lightweight ones - I've never run anything but shitty standard tubes, and never had a problem.

Change rear tyre to a Continental Rubber Queen

Change front tyre to a Try-All or Continental Mountain King

This will lose you alot of weight.

If you wanna change wheels, look into Try-All rims on whatever kind of light hubs you want/fit in your price range.

Everything you need can be found on tartybikes.co.uk. Give them a ring in the morning if you need some more help, they'll be able to sort you out with anything you need

[trials_pimp]

There is loads you can do to lighten your Bike.

Have a look on tartybikes.co.uk for weights of items.

Rims like the Try-alls and Echos are light and strong.

The thing with weight is that you loose alot of strength, but also with newer perducts the technology is there to make sure you dont loose alot.

Theres also other areas you can loose weight. You would be suprised at how heavy some parts are.

Just dont go nuts and break your bike every ride.

As for Tyres I would highly recamend Scwallbe Tyres.

Big Betty For the rear and Nobby Nic for the Front. Nice and light, and puncture resistant.

You want to try and keep a nice wide tyre on the rear, as it will help with balance and grip.

[† CETFLY †]

Quote From N.Wood:

"Could go with:

Ditching both heavy duty tubes and just running standard or lightweight ones - I've never run anything but shitty standard tubes, and never had a problem.

Change rear tyre to a Continental Rubber Queen

Change front tyre to a Try-All or Continental Mountain King

This will lose you alot of weight.

If you wanna change wheels, look into Try-All rims on whatever kind of light hubs you want/fit in your price range.

Everything you need can be found on tartybikes.co.uk. Give them a ring in the morning if you need some more help, they'll be able to sort you out with anything you need"

Yeah mate, cheers

I gave one of the boys there a call today and he recommended those two tyres to me - not the Try-All though.

If I can get this gear second hand Id prefer to. Moneys a little tight now which isnt good!

I will definitely swap my tubes over . I have a spare pair here which havent been used. Wouldnt mind a Presto valve tube though as thats the only pump Ive got

There is loads you can do to lighten your Bike.

Have a look on tartybikes.co.uk for weights of items.

Rims like the Try-alls and Echos are light and strong.

The thing with weight is that you loose alot of strength, but also with newer perducts the technology is there to make sure you dont loose alot.

Theres also other areas you can loose weight. You would be suprised at how heavy some parts are.

Just dont go nuts and break your bike every ride.

As for Tyres I would highly recamend Scwallbe Tyres.

Big Betty For the rear and Nobby Nic for the Front. Nice and light, and puncture resistant.

You want to try and keep a nice wide tyre on the rear, as it will help with balance and grip.

Wise advice from you both. Thanks boys

Do you think I'd lose more weight in tyres+tubes alone, compared to changing rims?

No doubt I'll be breaking things lol. As soon as I get used to the geometry, Im sure i'll be pushing the bike quite hard!

I love Ryan Leech-style riding in most of his Youtube vids. Not the pure-bred trials obstacle courses though. Thats beyond what I want.

Ive seen some specs of one of his bikes and a close up pic here:

http://www.observedtrials.net/vb/showthread.php?t=40564

Theres a link to a write up on that page of what the set up is. That front rim looks mad. Bet that was cheap

He doesnt have heavy-duty looking rims on his. They look like something Id put on my XC. I put EX721's on that. He hasnt got a rear drilled rim, which to me means it cant weigh enough to justify holes? Id weight the same as him and same height 5 11, so I think my current rims are over kill...

Yeah, Ive had Schwalbe Alberts on my XC. I like that brand.

I looked on here to find the weights of items. Thats really great to have such a good list of items. Makes researching so much faster and simpler.

I really need to know if theres anyone on here selling any wheel sets along the lines of what Im chasing. I need to buy second hand to save money. If I could buy new, I would.

[† CETFLY †]

Edited May 14, 2009 by CETFLY

[forteh]

If the front tyre is a dual ply maxxis then swap it for a single ply, that will save 400g on the tyre alone, as said change both tubes to standard, thats another 500g. Convert it to singlespeed and youve lost at least a kilo off your bike for not much expenditure

I wouldnt swap rims unless its the next big weight saving move, its the thick end of 100 quid to put a pair of lightweight rims on and youre unlikely to notice the benefit whilst learning. Pedals can save alot of weight aswell, the list is almost endless of mods you can do to achieve a lightweight bike. My 26" setup is currently weighing about 8.75kg, Ive spent a fair amount of time (and a bit of cash) getting it pretty light but still plenty strong enough; Im still a crap rider though

[† CETFLY †]

If the front tyre is a dual ply maxxis then swap it for a single ply, that will save 400g on the tyre alone, as said change both tubes to standard, thats another 500g. Convert it to singlespeed and youve lost at least a kilo off your bike for not much expenditure

I wouldnt swap rims unless its the next big weight saving move, its the thick end of 100 quid to put a pair of lightweight rims on and youre unlikely to notice the benefit whilst learning. Pedals can save alot of weight aswell, the list is almost endless of mods you can do to achieve a lightweight bike. My 26" setup is currently weighing about 8.75kg, Ive spent a fair amount of time (and a bit of cash) getting it pretty light but still plenty strong enough; Im still a crap rider though

Lol

I think I may already have the Echo rear rim

http://www.tartybikes.co.uk/product.php?pr...;category_id=87

As it looks identical to the one in that links picture. I cant tell though as theres no brand name on it.

From the research Ive done, a couple of PM's (thanks) its seeming to be mainly down to tyres and tubes. I may be splitting hairs here, especially on the rear rim anyway. The front is light enough, but I can try the different tyre combo swap first.

I cant see me needing anything too strong or heavy on the front in terms of rims, as anything I'm to be doing will be loading the rear mainly.

Yeah I agree with what youre saying about the rims. Ive gone through all this stuff with my XC bike. Its a nice wallet lightening exercise!

On the scales my Onza weighs around 13kgs. I couldnt believe it.

I wanted to get a lighter weight rear mech (I dont want to go single speed) but they arent cheap either for a high quality unit.

I'll lose these 2Ply Minion Super Tackys which are the heaviest of the range and try to find some Continental Rubber Queen 2.4 for the rear and the Mountain King for the front.

That Mountain King has a pretty good write-up on Tartybikes.

Sounds better than the Try-All for grip but it didnt fair too well in reviews I've just read. I hope its wide enough. Some people including Tartybikes say its really narrow and more like a 2.0 or a 2.1. Depends on the size of the rim to an extent though...

My pedal are ok. Theyre Planet X dual cage.

Can you put up some pics of your bike please? Would love to see it

Thanks

Edited May 14, 2009 by CETFLY

[Bigman]

The rear rim you have is deffinatly an onza hog, but one of the ones that was made with round holes and not the hog shaped ones, they are exactly the same as koxx/trialtech rims etc except for the fact that they have eyelets, the eyelets do add a little weight, usualy around 30-50g for one rim.

If you were to ditch the maxxis tyres front and rear and the heavy duty tubes and changed to say a rubber queen rear with a std tube and a try-all conti mountain king front with a std tube you could loose almost 1kg from the bike!!! (thats assuming the front tyre is also a dual ply, if it is a single you may loose around 600g)

The mountain king front tyre will not be as grippy as a try-all tyre, i have ridden a fair few different bikes with these tyres fitted and i have always found my try-all tyre to grip alot better (and its pretty much bald!!) The mountain king would probably be ok for street.

I am not sure what sort of weights those DDG hubs are, the front one could deffinatly be changed for something lighter, if you are on a budget the echo TR front disc hub is very good hub!

Hope that helps a little, if i think of anything else i will post it up.

Adam