Cyclocross frame: Felt, Kinesis, Ridley or Monoc?

[alain]

I'm looking at the following frame options for my CC project :

- Ridley Crossbow
- Felt Cross F1 X
- Kinesis Pro3
- Monoc Cyclocross

Any opinion or experience on these frames is welcome.

[Stolichnaya]

Try a brand/model that utilizes a standard threaded headset. Integrated headsets are just a bad idea for cross and a bad idea in general. Hope you like overhauling headsets, because that is what you will be doing several times a season with an integrated headset on a cross bike. Check out the white paper on headsets on the Chris King website. See the link on this page:
http://www.chrisking.com/headsets/hds_index.html

[beavisbnc1]

I have been super happy with my 2004 Trek Xo1. Its built like a tank, and accecpts standard headsets.

[sub10]

I'll recommend a Ridley Crossbow.
I've ridden it a few times and it performs well.
Its a true cross bike, with great geometry and a nice riding stability.
Its easy to carry due to the shape of toptube.

It might not be as fancy as some of the other frames, but it has qualitys when riding it! and its fair in weight.

BRG

[Boonen]

I'll second the Ridley. I have a crossbow as well and I like it very much. The geometry is VERY nice. It is very stable and performs like a real crossbike. You can get it with bottlecage holes as well, which I like as I use the bike on the road pretty much as well in the winter. The frameset has an integrated headset, but with pressed in cups for the bearings. The headset does need some atention every now and then. I like the idea of being able to swap the cups if anything should go wrong with the headset as supposed to replacing the whole frame... I have seen this happen with roadframes If you would prefer to use a standard headset, the 2004 crossbow frames use these.
I don't have any first hand experience with the other bikes you mentioned, but I have to say the Trek beavisbnc1 mentioned would be worth a look as well.
Good luck deciding, this is always a fun part of building a bike because as long as you haven't bought anything there is stil room to fantasize!

[alain]

Thanks everyone for the help.

The "building kit" is on its way:

Ridley Crosswind frameset
Ritchey WCS & Shimano XT parts
FSA Gossamer Compact Crankset

Weight ? 8.4kg.