Thanks for the response! I haven't ridden a low trail bike, so I really can't say how trail influences the ride. I do know exactly what you're saying about the trail effects of fat tires, though. By the numbers, my Wednesday already has well over 100mm of trail. Add the extremely low tire pressure I like to run, and it can be interesting to get the bike to change lines sometimes. That's when the short chainstays are nice, I can loft the front end and apply a little body english to get the ship to come around. I don't know if it's a holdover from riding dirt bikes, but I also find myself dabbing the rear brake a bit to help change direction sometimes.
Yes, my Wednesday has a 150mm front hub. The ability to swap that into the Jones would be a plus. However, I needed to replace the bearings in that hub, and found that getting replacement parts is almost impossible. I was able to find replacement bearings, but the dust seals and other parts are proprietary and not available separately. It makes me very leery of buying a frame that will lock me into requiring "flavor of the week" hubs. Another option that I'm considering is building up a set of 29+ wheels for a Surly Pugsley I picked up on a whim a few months ago. The price was too hard to resist, even though I don't need two fat bikes. The older geometry of the Pugsley is interesting to contrast to the Wednesday. I think it would be kind of in between the Wednesday and the Jones if I changed out the wheels for 29x3". On Wednesday, December 21, 2016 at 2:21:47 PM UTC-5, iamkeith wrote: > > Christopher, > > *Regarding the low trail of the Jones:* > Don't let this worry you. One of the reasons he designs it this way is > precisely because his bikes have always intended to use fatter tires than > the rest of the industry. The low trail geometry compensates for the > mysterious but very real "pneumatic trail" that a large volume tire gives > you. If you've ever felt your Wednesday "self-steer" on hard surfaces, > you'll know what I mean. Even with a 4.5" tire, the Jones does NOT ride > like a fat bike in any way, shape or form. The Plus is also optimized to > work with tires that are 31" or taller, so the big fork offset isn't really > as big as it sounds, when you do the math. > > *Regarding the hub standards and dropout options:* > I agree that qr is more than adequate (especially on a fully rigid bike, > and for grown adults that aren't hucking their meat off cliffs on a daily > basis), and think the Trek-initiated boost spacings, while a step in the > right direction, are silly and will be a short lived standard. But, in your > case, I'd say get the one in which the front fork matches your Wednesday, > so you can use your existing fat front wheel! Without researching, I'm > assuming that's the 150mm thru-axle? For riders of the regular Jones 29, > it is very, very rare that someone tries a 26" fat front and decides that > they liked the skinnier, 29" wheel better. The plus tires will make the > improvement less dramatic but, based on my own experience, I would sure > want to be able to take advantage of the option inexpensively, if I could. > > On Wednesday, December 21, 2016 at 11:16:25 AM UTC-7, Christopher Cote > wrote: >> >> This is a timely thread for me. I've been considering a Jones Plus. I >> definitely want a bike that fits 29x3" tires. I was considering the >> Krampus, but Jeff Jones' designs and fit philosophy really meshes with my >> experiences. I have a Surly Wednesday fat bike that I bought to ride on the >> snow, but have been riding everywhere this year. I'm fully sold on the >> larger wheels and tires for rolling over the sand, mud, roots, and rocks >> that we have here. The Wednesday has the "long and slack" geometry that the >> MTB world is going nuts over right now. I love how it rides, so I'm a >> little concerned with how the Jones is really the opposite with longer >> chainstays and much lower trail. Fit-wise, I know the Jones would be >> better, as I run a large offset seatpost and jam the seat back as far as it >> will go, and wish it went further. I'm also right in the ideal spot for the >> 24" frame. They still have some older 135mm rear-spaced frames, so if I >> were to go with the Jones Plus, I'd have to decide between that and the new >> 148mm rear-spaced frames. My experience with fat bike hubs makes me tend >> toward being able to use old standard sized parts, but the benefits of the >> wider rear hub are tangible. >> >> >> On Friday, December 16, 2016 at 3:00:43 PM UTC-5, Geeter wrote: >>> >>> Just curious if anyone on the board has a Jones 29er or Plus and a Hunq? >>> Overlap aside, just wondering thoughts and comparisons between the two. >>> >> -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
