Author: Joe McEwan

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Cane Creek Tigon – The Perfect Rear Shock For Single Pivot Bikes?

Youtube thumbnail with pic of Cane Creek Tigon Shock

Cane Creek has recently introduced the Cane Creek Tigon rear shock.

To celebrate the launch we grabbed an in-depth and geeky chat with Sam Anderson at CC. Sam talks Joe through all of the fine details and there wheres, whats and whys of the new shock.

And – we’ve also launched a Ltd Edition Cane Creek Tigon Starling Cycles complete bike, available for Twist and Murmur.

Don’t have time to watch the video? Here’s the short version…

So, the Cane Creek Tigon, what’s it all about? The clue is in the name – half tiger, half lion. Half coil, half air.

Rather than using some meaningless marketing bullshit and saying it gives “the best of both coil and air” I think it’s better to think of it as a coil shock with some extra capabilities.

Let’s take a step back.

First, are coil rear shocks good for single pivot mountain bikes, and for Starling Cycles?

CaneCreek Tigon shock on Starling Cycles MegaMurmur

We actually really, strongly recommend coil shocks for Starling Cycles mountain bike frames. You can read more about that here on our blog about coil shocks and single pivot, steel frames.

Why do we love coil shocks so much? Coil shocks give great early stroke sensitivity resulting in amazing grip. They also provide great mid-stroke support to control chassis shape and provide a platform to push against. 

Oppositely, air shocks have some initial friction to overcome. Progressive frame designs have been developed to overcome the negative traits of air shocks.  There are plenty of frames out there that are way too progressive, they are so soft at the start, and they don’t ramp up quick enough so they need overly stiff springs to stop them from blowing through mid-stroke travel.  And then they ramp up so much at the end you don’t get full travel.

Coil rear mountain bike shocks are great, but the linear curve does mean they don’t stiffen up at the end. 

“Linear” means that the shock gets stiffer in proportion with the compression.
“Progressive” means that the shock gets stiffer at a rate that’s higher than the compression.
“Bottom out” is the point at that you reach the very end of the shock’s stroke and run out of travel to compress.

The Starling’s steel swing arm means that there’s no harsh, clangy bottom out, but you might feel it through your feet on big hits.  Coil shocks employ simple solutions to resolve this; rubber bumpers or hydraulic bottom outs.

Many bike companies say that a progressive suspension gives good ‘pop’. 

This just isn’t the case, ‘pop’ comes from good mid-stroke support (probably just a bit past sag point), something linear suspension and coil is very good at.  If you were to optimise progressive suspension for mid-stroke support, you’d have to up your spring rate and it would be way too stiff at the end stroke and you wouldn’t get full stroke.

Starling Cycles Mega Murmur on a beach, with Cane Creek Suspension

So where does the Cane Creek Tigon come into this?

The Tigon rear shock uses a low-pressure air shock in parallel to the coil spring to increase spring rate as you move towards the end of the travel. This allows the benefits of coil whilst also allowing the shock to ramp-up, giving a smoother transition to the end-stroke compared to a classic coil shock.

The Cane Creek Tigon also allows you to easily tune the amount of ramp-up, by adjusting the air pressure. Finally, since the air pressure is so low, <30psi, there is minimal extra pressure on the seals, meaning minimal friction.

So, is the Cane Creek Tigon the perfect rear shock for single-pivot mountain bikes?

First, I actually don’t think that ramp-up is an issue. The shocks we spec work brilliantly with our frames and there’s no ill effects of using a linear coil damper with our single pivot, steel design.

But – if you’re still put off and would like more tuneability, the ability to vary your rate of ramp-up and a more progressive feel then the Cane Creek Tigon looks to be a great option.

Available Now With Tigon Shock

And we’ve now created a limited edition, top-spec super build – all geared around the new Cane Creek Tigon shock.

Available for Murmur and Twist, the Starling Cycles Cane Creek Tigon Limited Edition is a complete bike, supplied with a Helm Fork, Middleburn crankset, Hope components, Starling Pro Wheels (Hope, DT, Sapim) and Shimano. And, of course, the new Tigon. And if that’s not quite high-end enough, you’ve got the option to upgrade to eeWing cranks.

You can learn more about this super limited edition build here.

Starling Cycles Cane Creek Tigon 1x1-39
Starling Cycles Cane Creek Tigon 1x1-39
Starling Cycles Cane Creek Tigon 1x1-39
Starling Cycles Mega Murmur Swing Arm photo'd in window
Starling Cycles Cane Creek Helm Fork on beach close up
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CushCore is the #1 best upgrade you can make.

Anyone who knows me and has talked about bikes with me will know I talk a lot about CushCore.

In my opinion, it’s one of the best bike inventions since dropper posts or disc brakes. “But why is it so good” you ask? Well, let me explain.

CushCore does several things:

  • It gives impact protection to your rims
  • It provides sidewall support to stop your tyres from rolling in a corner
  • Because of the above, it allows you to run lower pressure in your tyres for a bigger contact patch and more grip
  • Because of the above, it allows you to run lighter weight tyres to offset th additional weight it adds
  • It puts increased damping into the tyre system

CushCore is a properly engineered product and so much more than other ‘pool noodle’ type inserts from other companies.

Impact Protection
Everyone thinks this is the only point of inserts. Whilst it is indeed a positive quality, the other aspects are so much more important to performance. Other tyre inserts tend to only address impact performance.

I believe the other benefits of CushCore are so much more important that I have run bikes with only a front tyre insert before, where the added grip and control are most needed.

Sidewall Support
CuschCore pulls tight against the rim and extends up a portion of the sidewall. In hard cornering, it supports the tyre and reduces it from rolling.

Increased Grip
Tyre contact patch is a function of pressure in the tyre and nothing else. A lower pressure needs a bigger contact patch to support the weight of the bike and the rider. So low pressures are good, except they often lead to rim damage and tyre roll. CushCore allows you to run super low pressures reducing the effect of the negative aspects.

You can run some very low pressures for super grip. The only limit tends to be tyre roll. As much as CushCore helps reduce tyre roll, in very grippy conditions and surfaces, very hard cornering will try to roll the tyre off the rim and you’ll need to add a bit more pressure. But when grip is low, in very muddy sloppy conditions, you can just keep dropping pressures.

In a race a while back, I ended up running 10psi in the front tyre to find grip in super muddy conditions. There was one off-camber and tricky high line that only some of the Elite riders could stick. But “fastest of the duffers” rider that I am, with the aid of low pressures and CushCore I managed to stick the line too, riding well above my pay grade!

Lighter Tyres
The additional support, protection and damping of the CushCore system allows you to run lighter weight tyres than you normally could. This offsets any weight that the inserts add to the wheel.

In fact, on many of my personal bikes I am now running light weight 2.2″ trail tyres with CushCore XC, running them at the sort of low pressures I would expect in an enduro tyre. It works great!

Tyre Damping
Tyre damping is something I’ve been thinking about for a long time. I even applied for a patent on a system I had developed over ten years ago. Unfortunately, my idea had already been patented in 1935, so people have been thinking about the problem for a long time. And unfortunately, it had some fundamental flaws!

Currently, we have say 150mm of suspension in our bike controlled with very expensive and tuned units. We could talk for hours about the relative pros and cons of different systems and solutions, it is well understood.

However, attached to the end of this system, we have say 25mm of tyre suspension. This is at the most cirital part of a bike, the contact to the ground. This 25mm of suspension only has minimal damping in normal trail tyres, and not much more (but a noticeable amount) in DH tyres. Discussion on this particular subject would not go far with most riders.

See System (1) in my diamgram. Why do we not have damping in this crucial part of our suspension system? Damping would stop tyres rebounding off obstacles and improve grip. See System (2).

Watch any slow-motion footage of someone jumping into a rough rock garden (as well as all the slow mo huck to flat videos loved by bike testers). The first thing their tyre does is rebound off the ground. There tends to be several rebounds before it settles. The suspension cannot deal with this.

Imagine a case where the tyre sticks to the ground on the first bounce.

How much more control would we have?

CushCore doesn’t yet offer this level of damping. But it adds much more than tyres alone can achieve!

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Boosted Bryn Gets Buck Wild on the Swoop

Reece Richards. What a guy!

Commonly known as BoostedBryn, Reece is from Bristol in the UK and I’ve been meaning to try and shoot something with him for a while now.

I kept seeing him sending wild gaps on Instagram and knew he would cut the mustard for a wild video. Lucky for us, he rides for Starling and the big dog Joe McEwan brought us together at Bryn’s local trails to make some magic happen.

As well as being pinned on the Starling Cycles Swoop, Reece was handed a Starling Klunker and a wild fancy dress outfit (not sure it was fancy dress for him though or just the norm!) for us to give a good beating and grab some attention. 60 psi, dangerous drifts and sore wrists ensued. And also lots of laughs… and very strange looks. He actually convinced a chap (fully in character) at Belmont that he was looking to send the biggest gaps on it. Said chap was very worried for his safety!

Making the most of the last of the summer, we headed to some of the Southwest’s finest spots where berms were concrete hard and the tech was loose and dusty.

Reece, and Starling, would love to thank BikeYoke, Magura, Funn, BETD, Sprung Suspension, Morvelo, Ohlins, Cushcore, RyanBuildsWheels and TheOverlandStore.

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What Difference Does Fork Offset Make?

Fork offset is a pretty hot topic, but personally, I think it’s one driven mostly by marketing.

Firstly, the simple part, fork offset only has a small impact on frame geometry; 1.3mm in BB height, 0.2° in head angle. So running either short or long offset on your Starling frame isn’t really an issue.

What is better, short or long? To be honest, I have ridden both short and long offsets, and personally can’t tell the difference.

There is a slight difference in ‘feel’, but I couldn’t put into words what that is. These findings agree with a lot of journalists and other industry types who I have talked to about the subject.

Some people also believe that on single crown forks, the deflection when riding dominates over any small difference in offset.

However, popular marketing-led wisdom tells us that shorter is better, so maybe that’s a good place to start?

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What Difference Does Mountain Bike Wheel Size Really Make?

Mountain Bike wheel size has caused much debate over the years. Are 29″ mountain bike wheels better than 27.5″ wheels? Are larger mountain bike wheels better?

Let’s discuss the differences between 29″ and 27.5″ wheels. Take it away Joe:

Mountain bike wheel size and the difference between 27.5″ and 29″ wheels. Let’s break it down.

I’ll consider one parameter at a time. Tyre contact patch, rollover, dropping into holes, rotational energy, gyroscopic stability, relationship to BB drop.

Mountain Bike tyre contact patch. OK, let’s do the easiest one first. Bigger mountain bike wheels do not have a bigger contact patch. The contact patch is purely a function of the air pressure in your tyres. It is the air pressure that supports your weight. Force (your weight) = Tyre pressures x contact patch area. Simple.

Different-sized mountain bike wheels may have slightly different shaped contact patches, longer and thinner on bigger diameter wheels, but the area is the same. On a side note, the same is true of fatter tyres, a 2.2″ tyre with 20 psi has same contact patch as a 4″ tyre with 20psi. It’s just that the bigger volume allows you to run lower pressure without damaging your rims.

Mountain Bike ‘Rollover’. Do larger mountain bike wheels roll over bumps better? Well, no, not really. Realistically, I would consider a bump of 2” (50mm) in the realm of ‘rollover’. Anything much bigger and you need to start lifting the bike up and it’s not really rollover. If you consider where a 2” bump hits a wheel on both 29″ and 27.5″ wheels, you can see the difference in angle of attack is negligible, 1.14°.

Bigger mountain bike wheels don’t drop into holes as much. Also untrue. Sorry. Realistically, when the bike is moving forward at a speed any faster than a crawl, it’s unlikely you’ll touch both sides of a hole. The forward motion means you’ll hit the backside of the hole. In this case, wheel size then becomes irrelevant and we revert to the rollover case.

Rotational Energy. Do bigger mountain bike wheels carry more rotational energy? This is true, but only as a function of the difference in wheel weight. A bigger wheel is heavier by 29/27.5=5% (probably about 0.5% of bike plus rider system).

If this heavier wheel was spinning at the same speed as a smaller wheel, there would be more angular momentum, but larger mountain bike wheels spin slower.

Think of the amount of ground the circumference of the wheel covers in one rotation. It is proportionally less for a bigger wheel, so it spins slower. This affects acceleration too; other than the tiny bit of extra weight it requires no extra energy to accelerate bigger wheels.

Gyroscopic stability and mountain bike wheels. OK, this is the important one. Although there’s no change in angular momentum, there is an impact on the gyroscopic stability of the larger mountain bike wheels. This is because it is proportional to the diameter squared. The gyroscopic stability is the tendency for your wheel to stay ‘in-plane’ when rotating. Like the child’s toy, which stays upright when spinning, it doesn’t want to lean over. Take your front wheel out of the bike and spin it up to speed holding it at the axle. Feel the forces to try and move the wheel out of plane.

Now imagine riding along on your bike and trying to lean it over, bigger wheels will make it harder to lean. But also, it means the bigger wheel will not be knocked offline as much by bumps. Anyone who has moved from smaller wheels to big 29″ wheels will have felt this effect. The big-wheeled mountain bike is harder to lean over, you need to put more effort in. But once it’s leant over, it’s more stable. People who are capable, will be able to tell you a 29″ is harder to whip off a jump.

Relationship to BB drop. The offset from the wheel axles and the bottom bracket is called the BB drop. For bigger wheels, to maintain a similar BB height from the ground, the drop is more. This drop in relation to the gyroscopic forces acting in the wheels will affect how the bike rides. To be honest, I’m yet to fully understand this topic and have plans to partner up with a final year Engineering student to try and understand this effect.

So, what does this mean for mountain bike design?

The Murmur 29″ bike will track and carry speed better (due to gyroscopic stability not rollover). The Swoop 27.5″ bike will be more manoeuvrable, allowing you to hop and pop between line choices. The Twist mullet bike, aims to give the stability on the steering front wheel, and manoeuvrability on the rear wheel. But, it’s not the golden ticket, rather a mid-point between the other bikes.

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What’s the best way to join steel tubes?

There are two commonly used ways to join steel tubes for bicycle construction. Fillet brazing and TIG welding. Frames used to be soldered using lugs, but that doesn’t lend itself well to complex, modern, full suspension mountain bikes.

So, what is better, TIG welding or Brazing? The common belief is that TIG welding is better as it uses a stronger filler material, steel, vs. brass with brazing. The stress engineer in me, notices that you use a lot less of it, and the filler joints are a lot smaller with tighter more stress-raising radii.

There’s also the question of the Heat Affected Zone, HAZ. This is the region of the tube where the heat from the welding affects the properties of the material. Typically, this is where failures occur. Brazing occurs at a lower temperature, but spreads the heat over a larger area. TIG welding is more localised, but to a higher temperature.

Brass is also much more ductile than steel, cracks grow much more slowly in ductile materials. If I were to design a joint system from scratch using any materials I could, I would use a strong base material joined with a ductile joining material using large, stress-dissipating fillets, just like a brazed joint.

‘What is best’ is still not a question that has been answered. Simply put, both ways of joining tubes are fine, as long as the joints are designed properly and the frame structure as a whole is well considered.

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The Secret to a Fast Bike is…

What makes a fast bike? The geometry? The suspension? 29″” wheels? A fancy red paintjob?

The proper answer is the rider. Steve Peat would be quicker than me on a shopping bike. Replace Steve Peat with Loic Bruni for the youngsters amongst you.

Your mate who is faster than you, is always faster than you. Even when you get the spangliest, freshest new bike with all the gadgets and gizmos.

The best and fastest you’ll ever ride is when you’re fully in the ‘zone’. You hit every line you want, rail every corner, pop off every lip, full commitment into the tricky features.

So, lets embrace that. Let’s make you comfortable and confident on the bike, so that you can go as fast as possible. Let’s keep suspension simple and understandable.

If we’re getting technical, anti rise as close to 100% through the full stroke means the bike will react as little as possible to your weight shifts and movements. It will always do what you expect.

Let’s make it strong so that you are fully confident it won’t break. Let’s make it silent so that there’s nothing to distract you from the ‘zone’. Finally, let’s make it beautiful so that you are attracted to it and want to ride it fast.

Not sure if a Starling is the fastest bike for you? Why not book a demo ride?

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Starling Frame Colours and Matching Parts

Over anything, frame colour is the one decision that seems to be the hardest for our customers. Starling frames are available in a range of colours, and lots of component companies have strong brand colours. Different decal colours, and various anodised coloured parts. It’s understandable why it’s so tricky.

We’ve spent a lot of time in the workshop discussing people’s colour choices. If you follow a few simple rules, I can guarantee a great-looking bike.

Pick a strong frame colour, then fit with only black and silver parts. Sorted, your bike looks good.

Dark colours look classy, bright colours lively.

If you want a highlight colour, make it just that, a ‘highlight’. Pick just a few components for highlight; maybe Öhlins fork and shock, or an anodised Hope headset and seat clamp. Gold as a highlight works pretty well in all cases.

A dark or neutral frame, black or grey, works very well with highlights. A bright colour, needs much more consideration when adding highlights.

Don’t try to colour-match parts from different suppliers or of different material types. For example:

  • A red Hope headset, will not match red Funn bars.
  • Green custom wheel decals will not match green DVO shock.
  • Even anodizing from the same company is very tricky to match, Fox Kashima is a prime example of this.

If you want colours that clash, that’s fine, but go for it with all your heart. Orange frame, purple headset, green chainrings, blue hubs, multi-coloured spokes.

Or just do whatever the hell you want and prove us wrong.

Take a look through all our colour options here.

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Oh baby I like it raw… Raw Starling frames?

My frames do indeed look very lovely unpainted, it’s a great way to show off the raw golden brazing and steel patina. Very quickly, however, an unpainted frame will start to rust.

Just cover it in a lacquer I hear you cry. Yes, this works temporarily, but firstly, lacquer is slightly porous, so moisture can get though. On top of that, any scratches or damage to the lacquer will let moisture in leading to thin vein of rust growing on the tubes.

Paint and lacquer form a barrier between the steel frame and the environment. Rust also takes up a larger area than unaffected steel, putting undesired forces on the frame.

Raw frames are often used on BMXs, but these just aren’t subject to the wet conditions and power-washing of MTBs.

So, no I won’t be offering raw, unpainted frames to go unpainted. I can supply you an unpainted frame to paint yourself, but if it’s not painted straight away, the warranty will be void.

Check out all our paint and colour options here.

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Our Seat Stays Aren’t Too Thin… And Here’s Why

As sure as the day is long, post a picture of my bikes on Pinkbike and someone will say the seat stays are far too thin.

“I could snap them just by looking at them” they’ll say… or something similar.

Let’s be clear here. Steel IS STRONG. 

Think about the tiny screws holding up your shelves, they’re plenty strong enough to support a lot of weight. 

Think about the thin steel wires used to support telegraph poles and the like.  An 853-steel wire with an area of 1mm2 could easily support your weight.

The UTS (Ultimate Tensile Strength) of a 7005 aluminium typically used to build a bike is around 350MPa.  The heat-treated steel used for my swingarms is around 900MPa.  

But static tensile strength is only half the issue. 

Aluminium fatigues, that is – multiple load cycles – cause cracks to initiate and ultimately grow.  Because of this behaviour, you need to add extra material to counteract this potential behaviour. 

Steel doesn’t exhibit fatigue behaviour to anywhere near the same level as aluminium and it isn’t a design driver. 

So the short story is that aluminium swingarms need to be a much bigger diameter and use much thicker tubes to stop them from failing when compared to steel tubes.  It’s just that people are familiar with aluminium tubes and believe that’s what all material should be like.

But what about carbon? 

Well, carbon used in a quasi-isotropic manner (i.e. strength is not biased towards any direction) actually has strength similar to aluminium. But it doesn’t suffer from fatigue issues, so it can potentially use less material. 

However, manufacturing constraints and the need for internal tooling mean making very small diameter carbon tubes is very difficult, larger diameter tubes are much easier.  So, again you need to use much more material than with steel resulting in bigger, thicker tubes.

To summarise. Steel IS STRONG!  My thin seat stays are plenty strong enough and the compliance they give results in the great ride feel and grip of my bikes.