Welcome to the neighborhood!  I live near Allatoona Creek and would love to meet a fellow Chiner rider.  There is a group ride at Allatoona Tuesday at 6:45- look for a yellow Jeep (the ride leader, not mine).  I was planning to go, but I need to find my lights- it gets dark before we finish now.  If you can't make that, what about on Thursday?  I could go at lunch time or in the evening.  It's supposed to rain Wednesday and Friday, will have to see if it closes the trails.

My -057 is two years old, and I'm seeing some bubbles under the paint where the front derailer cable exits.  Maybe I've been pushing too hard or holding it too long when upshifting? I didn't think it was a problem, but that may be why it doesn't always upshift right away.

I'm in Florida, so sand is a huge issue and keeping the drive train clean is impossible.  I average about 50 offroad miles a week and I have found that changing out my chain every 3 months is cheaper than replacing the chain and cassette every 9 months.

I never thought of the chain as a "wear part"

I'm a little late to the thread, but have you considered building your own?  Either way $500 should be plenty, but I got a lot of satisfaction from building my wheels.  I've gotten two sets of carbon rims from Peter, one 29" with 25 mm internal width and one 27.5" with 35 mm internal width.   Both are for my -057.  Building them up was no trouble at all, following some online calculators for getting the right spoke size and how to put them together.  If I was doing it again I think I would go with a 35 mm internal 29" rim.  The -057 frame is too narrow to fit really large tires, but a 2.4" tire on the wide rim gives great cornering and at 200 lbs I can run 18-20 psi in the rear.

On both wheelsets I used DT Revolution spokes.  No problems, even with my weight riding on lots of rocks and roots (Southeast US trails).   

I used DT Swiss 350s on the 29" rims and they have been great.  For the wider 27.5" rims I decided to try XT hubs- the pair of hubs costs about the same as the front 350 hub (mine were ~$70 for the set), and they only weigh a couple of ounces more than the 350s.  The XT hubs have been great as well- they have 36 engagement points and have not given any problems, though they are due to be opened up and re-greased.

but it whore like shit

One of the best typos I've seen in a while


If I wanted black, I'd probably just leave it unpainted.  Paint does help protect a little from scratches, but it will only stop the minor cosmetic ones. 

If I were going to paint mine I'd want a color, like red- had Peter do mine and it has held up well for almost two years now.

Looks good!  Careful with that saddle, though.  I had two of them, and each lasted about 3 months before a rail cracked.

I had my frame painted by Peter at XmiPlay (before he started CS), and after 2 years am very satisfied with it.  It added $75 for a single color, all over paint job.  The paint has held up well, though I did notice that it is chipping right around the drive side, lower edge of the bottom bracket.  I assume this is due to flexing or poor prep on the metal- the paint has only chipped where it was on the metal BB insert, it stops right at the carbon.  I didn't notice it until I removed the crank ( chipped area is almost completely covered by the chainring). 

I would do it again, and most likely will when I get frames for the kids.  I considered trying painting with Plastidip as well- this gives you the option to peel it off if you want to change colors, but with zero painting experience I haven't decided to try it yet.

With the profile of the teeth, it is tough to tell if they are worn or not.  I don't know if there is a single "normal" tooth on the whole thing.   

Anyway, got a new chainring this week and all is well.  The local shop had a take-off SLX chainring from a bike he converted to 1X.  It looks to be pretty much the same as an XT ring, except for cosmetics (it is all black) and it has a longer chain drop pin.  Weight on each one is around 75 g.  I thought the pin would be difficult to shorten, but it is either Al or mild steel- the grinder went through it like butter.