On One Lurcher

Having completed a recent race series on the Niner EMD I couldn't help but feel I was lacking a little, especially in the climbs.  This led me to start experimenting with one or two longer stems which I had lying around and I found getting a stem over 100mm made things much more comfortable, but with the seatpost at almost the minimum insertion line I couldn't get away from thinking that the frame could just be a little on the small side for me.

When I bought the Niner frame, I picked it up for a bargain and had taken good care of so thought I should be able to sell it for a similar price, linked with selling a few other parts I had lying around I set myself a budget of $500 or so to get something new in XL sizing.

I looked at the current Niner offerings which I have to say are very nice however I wanted to try a different material to Aluminium if possible.  Having always admired On-One's line up I found myself looking at the steel Inbred frames which can be had for under $300 but whilst on their site it was hard to resist the draw of their carbon fiber Lurcher frame.

The Lurcher spec reads as follows:

Frame Details
Frame Material - Mitsubishi High Modulus Carbon
Approx. Frame Weight (g) - 1550
Seatpost Size (mm) - 31.6mm
Seat Clamp Size (mm) - 34.9mm
Font Mech Clamp Size (mm) -High Direct Mount 
Wheels - 29" x 2.4 tyres will fit, but we recommend 2.0 - 2.3" for best performance
Mudguard mounts - No
Rack Mounts - No
Bottle Cage Bosses - 2 sets
Fork Travel - 100mm MAX
Dropout - Swapout (vertical supplied with frame, horizontal available)
Bottom Bracket shell - Pressfit92
Headset - Smoothie Mixer standard (44mm upper, 49.6mm lower)

The great thing about the Lurcher frame in comparison to the Niner EMD is that everything with the exception of the headset and bottom bracket would just be a straight swap.

For the headset I went with On-One's Smoothie Mixer which fits the Lurcher's tapered head tube, however comes with a crown race which allows you to run a straight steerer fork.  If at a later date I want to run a Tapered fork I can purchase a different crown race for minimal cost.

On-One Smoothie Mixer Headset

Headset cups installed

For the bottom bracket, I went with the Token Pressfit Bottom Bracket which comes with all the adaptors to work with SRAM/Shimano and also spacer for BB Shells from 86mm up to 92mm as I'm using a Shimano SLX Crankset installation was simple with no additional spacers needed.

Token Press Fit BB

With headset and BB installed, I set about transferring all of the other components.  Definitely the most time consuming part of the build was routing the cables and hoses everything else was an extremely simple swap.  I really like that the Lurcher allows for full length housing for your shifter cables as that will add to the longevity and also the quality of shifting.

Here's a few snaps of the build:

Crankset on, mocked up with some spare forks

Halfway there

Finished and ready to ride

I do want to try and get some forks with a tapered steerer and hopefully a 15mm through axle to stiffen up the front end however my Reba's have been solid servants for me so that's a project for another day.

Spec:

Frame: On-One Lurcher
Fork: Rockshox Reba RL
Headset: On-One Smoothie Mixer
Wheels: Sun Ringle Charger Comp
Tires: Maxxis Ardent 2.25
BB: Token Pressfit
Crankset: Shimano SLX
Rear Derailleur: SRAM X9
Shifter: SRAM X7
Pedals: Shimano M520 SPD
Brakes: Shimano Deore M615
Stem: Race Face Ride 70mm
Bars: Crankbrothers
Seatpost: Crankbrothers
Seat: Charge Spoon
Seatpost Clamp: Niner
Grips: On-One Bob On Lock On
Front Rotor: Shimano 180mm
Rear Rotor: Avid 160mm