IP - 036 by Sussed.

[Sussed.]

Have just ridden the Outer Hebrides from the most southerly point to the northern tip, then over to Isle of Skye. 

Headwinds, driving rain and the odd moment of brilliant sunshine !

[Sussed.]

So I am just getting around to cleaning up the bike and making some minor adjustments and came across this 




The Jagwire looks like it was coming out of the housing when operated and the metal threads in the outer sheath have been scraping away at the guide.  The cable was cut cleanly and inserted without a ferrule as per Fox instructions.  I can only think that I may have had too much of an angle on the cable into the shock housing as you can see where it has bent and damaged the the outer plastic, causing it to slide back and expose the metal threads. 

I have re-cut and adjusted the angle of the cable and it seems to be operating smoothly again but it is something I need to keep an eye on ! 


If any of you have had anything similar please chip in with some suggestions ! 

[Carbon_Dude]

I will need to double check when I get home, but I believe I have a ferrule on the end of the cable housing that goes to my Fox CTD remote.

[Sussed.]

I will need to double check when I get home, but I believe I have a ferrule on the end of the cable housing that goes to my Fox CTD remote.

Did you manage to check this CD ? I am just about to reroute the cable around the back of the fork and zip tie it down so the cable stays horizontal into the cable guide.

Will probably buy this to fit into the steerer tube of the fork to keep cable in place.

[Carbon_Dude]

Hi Sussed, I checked and see there is no ferrule, just the cable housing to the remote lockout.  No unexpected wear on the end of the cable.  Yours must have been somehow not tight enough or was set at a bad angle in order for the end of the housing to get so knackered.  For me there is just no movement on the end of the cable housing relative to the cap on the fork.

Also, my cable housing goes into the cable guide by about 5-6mm.  If the end is cut clean, it feeds into the guide and to the stop.  Yours appears to have butted up against the outside of the cable guide.  Your cable also appears to have been oddly compressed against the cable guide rather than sliding inside the loop.  Possibly the cable housing is too large for the guide and it didn't slip in for you?

[Sussed.]

Build Updates !

I ended up installing the Fork Cable guide into the Steerer to keep the cable firmly in place.  Works as it should and have had no movement in the cable since.





I have been tinkering with my position on the bike since day one and now I have finally got it dialled in.  I had a Carbon seat post from XMI but I had to have the seat slammed back on the rails.....




I found a seat post that has a 32mm setback which now gave me more room to play with on the rails.




And lastly I replaced the Fox dual suspension lever and splitter box !   For those going with remote lock outs, skip the Fox system from the start.  The splitter box as well as looking very ugly it didn't last very long.  The lever was fine but the Scott Twinloc is a much better piece of engineering.

[Carbon_Dude]

Hi Sussed, thanks for posting an update.  Looks like you have the front lockout sorted out, although I am wondering about the tie wrap on the end of the cable. If I did that to mine, I would half expect doing so would constrain the lock from rotating.  However, it must not otherwise yours would not have it that way.

A laid back seat post can be useful for allowing you to get your weight back and provide a bit more room between the bars and your seating position.  I wouldn't mind trying one myself, maybe I will see if my friend at the LBS has one he can loan me for a week or so.

The Scott twin-loc lever is the ticket, glad to see you also got one installed.  It's one of my favorite things that I changed out on my IP-036, every time I ride I appreciate how nicely it works and how good it looks on the bike.

[Sussed.]

Hi Sussed, thanks for posting an update.  Looks like you have the front lockout sorted out, although I am wondering about the tie wrap on the end of the cable. If I did that to mine, I would half expect doing so would constrain the lock from rotating.  However, it must not otherwise yours would not have it that way.

Dont worry CD, the tie wrap is just to stop the cable hitting the forks when it flicks round during operation, the cable moves freely !  I will cut down the length of cable when I'm happy everything is OK and lose the tie wrap.v 

[Oolak]

This and CD's are two of the nicer chiners on the site imo. Thanks for sharing.. making it harder for me to settle for a hardtail.

[Sussed.]

Cheers Oolak !

One of the best decisions I have made to build up my own bike. Very satisfying and of course you get to know your bike inside out ! 

HT or FS, just get it built 

[Carbon_Dude]

This and CD's are two of the nicer chiners on the site imo. Thanks for sharing.. making it harder for me to settle for a hardtail.

Thanks for the kind words Oolak!  Here is another picture of my IP-036.

[Reggie n SF]

Beautiful, and lots of info to boot.., thanks

[Sussed.]

Updates:

As my bike is coming up for its first birthday I thought I would give you all some updates !

Mileage wise I reckon I am coming up for about 1200 miles and still going strong.  Over the past couple of months I have replaced a few consumables:

BB30: Has been swapped out for a new ceramic one.  I had noticed that the BB30 was getting very worn on one side and the cranks weren’t spinning freely.  Inspecting the old one after installation it was in a bad way, a rusty crunchy mess !  I got the new SRAM Ceramic very cheap off E-bay and hope it lasts a bit longer !




Headset Bottom Assembly: After retrieving the bike from the shed from a few weeks of storage over Xmas I found that the steering had seized.  A quick twist of the bars freed up the steering but it wasn’t as smooth as it once had been.  While dis-assembling, the lower bearing fell apart in my hands so it was replaced !  The old bearing was a Cane Creek 40 series, It was replaced with the more expensive 110 series.  The upper assembly was in good condition so was just cleaned, re-greased and re-installed.


Old.


New.



Pedals: I decided to service the Crank-Bros Eggbeater 2’s. which were also not spinning freely. I purchased the Service kit which comes with new Nyloc nuts, bushings, screw caps, seals and bearings.  After stripping down both pedals it was apparent that both bearings had seized.  It’s a nice straightforward job to strip and rebuild the pedals.  The hardest part was removing the plastic screw caps which chew up very easily !




Rear Shock:  I had noticed the rear shock (FOX CTD Remote) was not returning to its Descend mode properly, as If there wasn’t enough force on the spring mechanism.  At first I thought it may be the remote cable stopping the shock returning to its correct position but the problem remained without cable attached.  I could turn the barrel on the shock to its correct position manually but it would not ‘spring’ round.  After a brief email exchange with MOJO who deal with FOX UK I sent it off to them to look at.  I posted the shock on Thursday and had it returned the following Tuesday. MOJO had done a full service and fixed whatever the problem was under warranty with no questions asked.  I suspect this may be common problem as no proof of purchase was required ! I was expecting a bit of hassle as I bought my shock from the US !  Either way, great customer service !

[Sussed.]

A friend at the LBS is thinking of building up at 27.5 HT and wanted to try out the XX1 so I lent him my rig and he gave me one of the hire bikes to try out, a mid range 29er Scott Spark.  After the ride he was impressed with the bike and the XX1 and he will probably go with  1x11 set up !  He did however point out a few things wrong with my bike.  Loose headset, rear brake judder and the rear frame had a lot of play in it !  I was aware of the brake problem as the rear rotor is slightly warped and needs replacing.  I hadn’t noticed the headset had a slight amount of play in it but that was a quick fix.


Rear frame triangle !!  So after close inspection there was a lot of lateral movement in the rear frame.  By a lot I mean about 2-3mm in the Top tube pivot and slight movement in the seat stay to linkage pivot. I checked the torque on all the bolts and all seemed in order. (I did snap a bolt head whilst re-torquing the seatstay to suspension linkage,  pay attention to torque settings ! LOL    !!)

With the reoccurring theme of trashed bearings I decided to strip down the suspension linkage and chainstay/seatstay pivots and check them out.




Before I built up the IP-036 whilst waiting for parts I stripped the frame, greased the bearings  and re-torqued all the pivot points to make sure they would last.  This seems to have worked as all parts were in near perfect order.  Some of the black paint had worn away from the bolts and spacers but nothing to worry about.  The only wear I could see was on the spacers and on the non-drive side to the Top tube pivot point. This is probably accounting for the lateral play.



Edit:  The aluminium is worn, there is a slight 'dishing' to the face of the pivot housing !




The only bearing of slight concern was in the seatstay/chainstay pivot.  Basically this bearing sits in a recess within the chainstay and the recess was filled with dirt/grime so if you ride in the wet/wash regularly the bearing will always sit in gunk !  The bearing moves freely but is starting to discolour.  The amount of movement that this bearing goes through I doubt I would ever notice if it was seized so I don’t suggest everyone goes tearing it out to give it a good clean as it’s a real ball ache to get back together !!


I took this foto after I had cleaned most of the crap out and decided to mention it on here !






So happy with everything working as it should I addressed the lateral play with some shims.  I added one 8 x 14 x 0.3 shim in the seatstay to suspension linkage on the drive side.  Then ended up with six 12 x 18 x 0.3 shims to the Top tube pivot point (Three on each side sitting between the bearing face and existing spacer) 

Picture of shims and existing washers/spacers.





Without the back wheel on and rear shock attached I pushed, pulled and twisted the frame as much as I dared looking for movement.  There is now almost no play in all pivot points , I doubt whether all play in this linkage could be removed completely. 

For reference the bearings in the:

Seatstay to chainstay (x2) were  698RS.
Seatstay to Suspension Linkage (x2) were 698RS
Top Tube Pivot (x2) were 6901RS

I didn’t remove the BB pivot as when all the other component were off it cycled freely with no play. (And I couldn’t be bothered removing the cranks, rear brake and derailleur with cabling ! ) I suspect the bearings there is also 6901RS !

[Vipassana]

Great write-up.  So much good information!  I can't believe how bad your bearings were!  Living in a wetter location seems rough on bike bearings.  What is the advantage to the Ceramic BB30 kit over standard?  Mine are due for an upgrade.

The rear suspension odyssey is information I will certainly be passing on to my riding partner with the IP-036.