Great writeup, Ben. You’ve clearly put a lot of time and effort into this and it’s appreciated by those of us who like to wait until the dust clears before trying something new.
Nimbus does have a 32 hole ISIS hub; I have one on a 26" muni and a 700c road wheel. Of course, you can’t use it on an Oregon or if you like hub mounted disc brakes but if you’re looking to run your Knard wheel in a custom frame (or maybe a KH36 frame?) with an external disc brake then the Nimbus 32 hole hub to rabbit hole would work for you.
Great writeup, Ben. You’ve clearly put a lot of time and effort into this and it’s appreciated by those of us who like to wait until the dust clears before trying something new.
Nimbus does have a 32 hole ISIS hub; I have one on a 26" muni and a 700c road wheel. Of course, you can’t use it on an Oregon or if you like hub mounted disc brakes but for someone looking to run a Knard wheel in a custom/Triton frame (or maybe a KH36 frame?) with an external disc brake then the Nimbus 32 hole hub to rabbit hole would work.
Nice write up. I like the summary. Tho, I’m in a bit of a quandry now. This is the 29er tire I’ve always wanted and I’ve been waiting for it for what seems like months, but the frame choices are so limited. I don’t think the Oracle has rim brake mounts and I do have a thing for the Maggies on all my unicycles. . . .so . . . . .I sent an e-mail to Triton to ask about spending a lot of money on a frame made from Russian Ti.
Please excuse this minor thread-jack: Anyone know which of the Triton standard 29er compatible frames will fit the 29er knard tire? Will it have to be a custom frame?? . . . or maybe all Tritons are semi-custom anyway??
Any experience out there with this?
Bryce
I’m pretty sure the standard Triton 26-29 frame will not fit a Knard. You can see in this photo of SinisterJay’s frame that it doesn’t have a ton of extra clearance with a Dissent 2.5.
So yes, I think you’ll need a custom frame. If you don’t need the frame to work with a 26x4 tire then it might be as simple as ordering a 26-29 with a taller crown.
Bryce, I have a Triton Tripple Muni frame with the crown raised 25mm since I wanted to be able to ride a 26x4, my 29x3 Frankentire and my 32" homebrew wheel. Dmitry sent me a pre-made triple frame to see if it would work but the crown was too low for the fat 29 (I hadn’t made the 32 yet)
The regular 29" frame is designed for a “snug fit” so you can probably rule that one out.
I would shoot Dmitry an e-mail, he might have what you need laying around but you are probably going to have to go semi-custom which means getting in line and waiting for approximately one schlumpf spa day for your frame.
In the mean time you can always add some frame extenders (what I did while I waited for my frame):
Now there’s a good ghetto solution. That’s better than my shim idea. I don’t really want to buy a new frame, so I may have to try that. $12 for a set of frame brackets from UDC, 2 bolts and a few washers.
Hey, I just thought of something…if the Oracle frame is redesigned to fit a Knard, you don’t have to change hubs to the Oracle disc hub, instead you could run a Spirit crank and use the D Brake on the other side.
It is a shame the KH frames are not just a smidgen taller and wider, hopefully they’ll get a redesign in the near future.
Does anyone have a inside dimension (between the legs) and a crown height (spindle center to underside of seat tube) for a QuAx 29, Drak, Nimbus II 29, etc…? Maybe there’s a frame out there that’ll work.
@ Bryce, you could buy a Nimbus steel frame and remodel it for far less (and far faster) than you could get a Ti frame made. Geez, for the price of a Triton you could buy an Impulse 29 or an Oregon!
Oh, and one more thing, the 27tpi is significantly taller and wider than the 120tpi, about 5mm in each direction. After a few rides I just measured 75mm outside knob to outside knob! It barely fits in my Thule roof rack tray
Today, on the last leg of my ride I bumped the pressure to 17psi on the 27tpi Knard and it was quite firm, felt like the 120tpi at 20-22 psi.
Check your frame width first, the Knard is wider than a 3" Duro by 5mm (75mm vs 70mm), but in looking at Nimbus 24" muni there appears to 1/2" on either side, so you’ll need to get the tire tread in the sweat spot, but otherwise it’ll work. Too bad there isn’t a purpose built frame extender…but wait, I believe Bryce has a Tig welder, oh Bryce…
Yeah definitely. There’s no way I have the frame clearance, and really have no desire to use a knard. But if I ever want to use a tire that won’t fit my frame, I know what to try first…
Over on MTBR there is an interesting/worrying thread about Surly being uncharacteristically lame and not warranty a clearly poorly vulcanised tyre for someone which is generating lots of ill feeling.
Have a read and decide for yourself as it maybe a dodgy first batch of them and if Surly are not honouring the warranty (and coming up with some lame excuses without even checking they tyre in person) then it be wise to stay clear for a while to see how things pan out.
