New Light Carbon LCSF980 XC bike

[bosbik]

Really enjoy seeing your builds.. This model really is growing on me and getting pretty tempted to get one.. One question though.. I saw on hambini's video review of a road frame that there are frame grades.. Do you know what frame grade you got?

[Bigbobby1482]

That doesn't sound good, there should be no play in the pivot side to side. Make sure there isn't any play, if there is you should contact LC to fix it. Play in pivot is really not good, it might also be the bearings they supplied with the frame are terrible.

The rear shock usually makes some noises when squashed. Check if it is there it's coming from.

[repoman]

I wound up making my own pin and bushings, very solid now. 
The bushing kit wasn't Fox, it was some budget one so the problem was there.

I wasn't presented with the options that were in the Hambini vid, I see some other people got that with the new road frame. Dunno what's up with that, maybe this model frame doesn't come with those options.

[jefflinde]

I reached out to Wendy and specifically asked about the grades. I was told that all of their frames are Z3 grade frames.  To me that seems to make sense as I have had very well finished and sorted frames.  Not to be a shill or anything as I have no affiliation with them but I have ordered 10+ frames from them at this point for friends and family, and all of them have been trouble free. 

[jefflinde]

I was hoping for an even lighter version of the 980 through. That would have been icing on the cake. 

[bosbik]

Jim also replied and said the same thing frames arw Z3 level so thats really pushing me to pull the trigger

[gf]

What do you mean with Z3 grade? Does Lightcarbon offers different quality for the same frame?

[federic000]

More than 2kg without ammo yes it’s heavy I hope it’s strong at least

[repoman]

I should've weighed my frame before building it.
My build is at 25.1 lbs with 2 weight weenie parts (lexon crank and transfer SL dropper) and 1kg downhill/enduro tires. Wheelset is 1400g. I think if I put some 650g XC tires on and an XTR cassette the weight would be around 23.3 lbs. 

[JimLee]

 

I found this in the handle bar when trimming to length, dunno what to make of it. The carbon feels like it has no resin on the surface of the interior. I can feel the weave and pick at it. There aren't loose threads but I can feel the texture of the weave. Anyone know if that is normal? Never seen that on handlebars before.  Cross section of the tubing looks very solid. 

The best quality is to not see any resin inside the handlebar. The high quality we pursue is that the resin does not leak out at all, but is all inside the carbon fiber layers.
Regarding BB, I'm sorry. The bottom bracket is pre-embedded into the carbon fiber frame. Resin may overflow during high-temperature molding, or one or two threads in the purchased BB are not deep enough (usually we will check before using these aluminum alloy accessories, but they may be missed), resulting in the need to manually deepen the threads again. We will improve quality inspection standards in the future.
In addition, we have added an inspection step. During packaging, workers will use tools to try installation again to confirm that the threads are correct.

[repoman]

fixed

[impmonkey]

fixed

So not a frame issue?

[repoman]

So not a frame issue?

Nah
Rear shock had play but that was because of the aftermarket bushing kit. There was some rattling but it turned out it was the rear cassette had become a bit loose, tightened down the hub nut, no more rattling.  I have some cable slap inside the downtube but I just need to put some foam cable covers on.   
It's super fun, although I already smashed my ribs on a crash from my front wheel washing out on some wet leaves    so I've not been able to ride it for a couple days, right after getting it sorted  anxious to ride it again.
I don't have any reference to compare unfortunately since I've never ridden MTB before.

[tisun]

Hey repoman, I like this post and love your detailed build report.  I'm building an XC bike myself.  Question for you:
- Why did you pick this frame over others such as Tantan FM121, SpCycle Sp-M861, etc?  To my understanding, this frame is the heaviest among them.
- Total weight of your bike after build?

Thanks for reading man.

[repoman]

Hey repoman, I like this post and love your detailed build report.  I'm building an XC bike myself.  Question for you:
- Why did you pick this frame over others such as Tantan FM121, SpCycle Sp-M861, etc?  To my understanding, this frame is the heaviest among them.
- Total weight of your bike after build?

Thanks for reading man.

I went with this frame primarily because I have a Lightcarbon Gravel frame that I think is pretty good, I don't know much about MTBing, I built this one up to basically learn how to ride technical stuff easier for gravel rides/races that incorporate tech so I figured a short-ish rear travel would be good. I have no interest in bike park/shredding gnar/tail whips sort of stuff.

Bike weighs 25 lbs right now, the 2.4" Purgatories are 1kg each, so with some legit XC tires IE Race Kings/Fast Tracks/Renegades/Ground Controls, a light saddle, and a weight weenie cassette I think this would be a sub 23lbs bike.   The post is a Transfer SL so it's super light for a dropper, the rear shock is a Float DPS so its sort of light but not the weight weenie one, the fork is a 2022 Stepcast which is pretty light.


You can't really trust published weights for any of these frames tbh. A lot of them weigh a lot more than what the sellers claim, sometimes they weigh a bit less.