Chinertown
Chinese Carbon MTB => 29er => Topic started by: MethodM on October 26, 2025, 07:18:28 PM
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I'm tyring my luck this winter by building a frankenstein mountain bike. I ordered a LCFS 947 direct from lightcarbon, ordered it painted (british racing green... zoom zoom!) and a pair of carbon wheels with dt350 hubs. I'm still not 100% sure i'll put the wheels on that bike, or if I'll put them on my santa cruz hightower and take the raceface there and put them on the carbon frame. Still TBD, the lightcarbon bike will be for one of my son (assuming it works! haha).
Ordered a Shimano SLX derailer already, i'm starting to shop on marketplace for a fork. saw a bunch of fox 36 rythm there, all fairly new. I think people swapping them for 38 quickly (or they order fake and sell them online... not sure if fake fox 36 is a thing, probably need to shop before making a move).
anyway. I'll report back here (hopefully with pictures if i receive something!) when i get the frame and the wheels. I sent 2500$ CAD, so wish me good luck!
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I'm not sure if this will help but Merlin in the UK are selling Fox 36 or 38 Performance forks for £350.
https://www.merlincycles.com/fox-36-float-performance-grip-boost-mtb-forks-29-280585.html
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thanks Mate, i'm in Canada unfortunately. With the exchange rate (CAD is worth crap) and the taxes, anything from Merlin is not making much sense sadly.
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Alright, we just received the carbon parts from lightcarbon, and we have most parts beside the fork.
I'll put the whole list here, with price. The built ended up being much more expensive than i initially anticipated, but i think the heir will have an awesome ride for a big chunk of his life on that one.
I'll start with what I ordered from lightcarbon. I dealt with their sales lady, wendy, mostly through email but we ended up chatting on whatsapp too at the end. I got the enduro LCFS 947, and had it painted in dark green. Since I have alloy wheels on my own bike, I decided to order some carbon one and I'll give the allow to the heir and use the carbon wheels on my santa cruz. After a few days, I asked them to add a handlebar (not show in the invoice below), and they put it in the same box as the frame so no shipping fee, only had to pay the 45$ USD for the handle bar. I picked the larger carbon wheels (enduro) with the 350 microspline. They put cables to pull my cables, which will definetely help.
Here's a bunch of picture of the parts. The color of the frame is crazy crazy nice. We're really happy with the result, the frame itself looks well built. The only thing I had to say is that the paint around the holes was probably poorly taped, but I don't think it'll show once all the parts are installed. The movement looks fine, they sent the parts needed (head bearings, 3 hangers, etc. )
the handlebar looks quite sturdy and thick (while lightweight), so i'm not concern whatsoever.
Wheels are also looking very very good. I'm really wondering if that swiss dt350 is an original one or not. I compared to my santa cruz (same DT350) and they look identical.
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Part list:
frame: $719
paint: $120
wheels: $619 (pair)
handle bar: $45
shipping: $263
paypal fee: $77
lightcarbon total: $1843 USD. The exchange rate is killing me badly here.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/YSBEELiqJY7F6VpD9
For the other parts, here's what I got:
rear shock: got a discounted fox float x factory (185, trunnion) fox during black friday. 450$ CAD
shimano grx RT64 disc brake (aliexpress): $75 (pair) CAD
orange handel grip: $13 CAD
tires: Maxxis (dhr II & assegai dh) 29X2.4WT EXO TR, 29x2.5WT 3CT EXO TR: $150 CAD
orange pedals (raceface replica): $20 CAD
dropper seatpost (sp26a) aliexpress: $100 CAD
seat: ryet 3d printed aliexpress: $54 CAD
chainguard (there was one with the frame, did not know): $11 CAD
crankset shimano SLX M7100 aliexpress, FC-M7100 170mm, 32T, including bottomn bracket MT801: $151 CAD (looks very legit)
shimano shifting cable casing: $16 CAD
shimano derailler xt m8100 aliexpress complet groupset: $238
shimano barke M8120 with resin ice pad: $269 (pair)
raceface stem R35, got a blackfriday deal, included wheel stickers to replace the one on my allow wheels: $100
added 2 tubeless valve and some carbon paste: $30
That's it. I'm missing the fork, which I guess will be around $1k. We will go with the fox 36 perf orange to go along with the green/orange theme. The boy is fairly light, so no point in going 38 anyway.
Total cost: $4219, and with the fork it'll be $5219
This is well above what I anticipated. The frame seems of very high quality, but the unknown around it will dictate whether this was a good purchase or not. lightcarbon provides warranty apparently, and I could always get another frame, but still.
That's it for now, we'll start putting this together during/after the holidays. Will be the first build for the heir, stay tune for some pictures and comment on whether it all fits together or I just threw $4k in the fire. Wish me good luck!
(if you can't see the pictures using the url, lmk. I do think it works but google sometimes..)