Custom Sycip Finally Done! (Ride Report)

[go4custom]

After almost 10 months of waiting my custom Sycip Finally showed up on Friday. Having a BMC Racemaster I knew I wanted to copy many of the race geometry and handling from this bike. Knowing Jeremy personally and him knowing how I ride, he had some improving suggestions on geometry, measurements, and tubing.

Tubing is oversize Columbus Spirt with Life seat tube.
DT is 38mm, curved seatstays, PF30 BB, new 44mm Chris King head tube.

This is truly not a weight weenie from coming from steel, but hopefully with some well chosen parts the weight won't be too bad. I originally was going to mix components to make it the lightest possible, but after test riding 2011 Super Record and spending time at Above Category, I made the switch to everything part complimenting each other rather than being the lightest. Just looking at the frame and color, I think it was the right move.

Build Specs:
-2011 Super Record w/Ti Crank
-ENVE 1.0 fork, bar, seatpost
-Deda Stem
-Reynold MV32T rims (237g ea.)
-C-4 50f,170r hubs w/ceramic hybrids (was told they came in 10g under weight)
-Sapim CX-Ray
-C-4 Ti UL Skewers
-Vittoria corsa evo 320tpi
-Selle Italia SLR carbon
-CAN'T DECIDE ABOUT CAGES, KING TI OR NEW ULTIMATE CARBON. Suggestions, opinions?

Having ridden carbon, aluminum, steel/carbon, aluminum/carbon, I'm a little anxious/curious how this will ride. Talking to Jeremy and many other builders, its been everything from "it will ride awesome" to "will ride like a brick".

Build pics and weight coming sometime this week. For now...




update

[shinyboy]

[strobbekoen]

Wow.. !
Nice selection of parts too.
Go with the King cages, the NU's are too fragile in my opinion and don't hold bottles that well. (I used both)

[Powerful Pete]

That will be fantastic with SR. Cannot wait to see the final build and weight.

[Wingnut]

BEAUTIFUL!

Steel is real...

[lcoolb]

Wow, that's absolutely beautiful!
Has the top tube an oval section, or does it just seem so in the pics?

[dcj9]

more on this please, looking forward to the build up

[JasonS]

Sweet looking bike. Keep us posted on the build.

I have a custom steel frame on order from Strong. Should be complete in the next month or so. We selected True Temper S3 for the main tubes, Columbus Spirit for the chainstays and 16mm seat stays. I was looking for something that was stiff out of the saddle and with a nice ride in the saddle.

I LOVE the ride of my '00 Serotta Atlanta with '01 Record, but it weights 21lbs. I love the stiffness of my Caad9 with '07 Record (18.0 lbs) but it beats the hell out of you on rough roads. I'm hoping that the Strong will come in around the weight of the Caad9 with similar out of the saddle stiffness and the great ride of steel.

Having ridden Steel, AL, and Carbon bikes, nothing compares to the comfort of steel...

[go4custom]

Top tube is round, probably just the picture. Also went with all internal cable routing. It might be a little headache, but wanted to keep things really clean.

Might have some weights posted by the end of the day.

[JasonS]

What did the bare frame weight? About what size is it?

Thanks!

[odin99]

wow. looks great! will probably ride even better!
the tube shaping is very impressive. i bet a lot of people won't be able to tell that is steel from a short distance.

[jghall]

Beautiful. Can't wait to see the complete build. Have a feeling you will like the ride of steel.

[go4custom]

Effective TT is 55cm, HT-132mm, Chainstays-405mm

I apologize for iphone photos, but it was the quickest with my 1yr old daughter. Having an experienced frame builder, and personal friend, has made all the different in the world. I almost pulled the trigger on a Cervelo R5 because I thought I wanted the"Lightest possible bike"...and I would still get one if possible. However, after having many conversations and spending a lot of time on here, I decided having Jeremy build exactly what I want was more important than just weight.

Jeremy has build hundreds of frames and used to do all his own paint in house before outsourcing. He said the frame weight is very light for steel and the tubing/options we went with. Also, the powder probably adds 100-150 grams. That could put the bare frame around 1550ish grams.

It was a little shock to see how much the "little parts" weighed...seatpost collar, headset, seatpost clamp...maybe I can work on these later.

Complete weights and partial build at the bottom

























At this point need to add cables, housing, chain, bar tape, cages, pedals....enjoy

[bricky21]

Nice bike
Can you post a closeup of those rear dropouts?

[rajMAN]

Looking fantastic I love the frame.