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The evolution of my Stab Primo from 2001 through 2005

作成日時: Feb 03, 2005, 01:37 PM

First, this is the photo from Kona site and how stock Stab Primo 2001 looks like.

This is almost stock Kona Stab Primo 2001 model as I bought it. First time I saw this bike at Nukaya in Meguro, I fell in love with the phatness of its looks. The Marzocchi Shiver looked awesome. But, I never thought I would spend over $6,000 for a bike, so my heart was broken. Then some days later, I found the same model on Yahoo! Auction and I was lucky to win bid. This bike happened to be specially priced at a shop because Kona Japan was selling this out after the bike show.

I already had changed the stem at this point, but the wheels are still 26 inch.

This picture is the first major modification that I worked on. The wheels were changed to Mavic XY 24 inch rims with Sapim Leader spokes.

I did not know many brands of tyre. Here, you can see they are IRC tyres. Also, the stem is changed to the Marzocchi original direct clumps.

Now, it is getting to be a lot more colorful. My wife bought me the Raceface Northshore cranks for my birthday. The coil spring for the rear shock is changed to MRP, too. By this time, I found a lot of different tyre brands like Arrow Racing, Nokian and Maxxis (shown in the photo). Also, this period must be the first time I got the SRAM XO components.

My photos are getting better around this period with the Nikon Coolpix 990. A good weather helped, too.

Now, after these photos, I started going really nuts. The photo below is the phase of major change in 2003. Got a Manitou Dorado.

Then I got the Therapy Components floating brake retrofit kit.

Here's the close-up photo of the floating brake kit.

Upon getting the floating brake kit, I had to change the whole wheel components. I ordered the Hadley hubs with the floating kit and Sun Ringle's Singletrack rims.
Why Singletrack rims, not Doubletrack? Because I was getting fed up with the haevy wieght of this bike.

Now, this is the best photo I took of my bikes and it must had been the most expensive period of my Stab Primo.

The rear shock was changed to Progressive Suspension's 5th Element shock. I had some problems every time I jumped off from rather high (not so high) drop-offs and I would get the bottom out in the rear shock. However, the famous tech like Mr. Nagai from Koowhoo would tell me the spring rate is too high. So, I had to change the shock. After I made this change, it made the whole bike so valuable. I wouldn't have pedaling loss, won't bottom out and suspension works for whatever the bumps ahead. Notice the coil spring is still steel.

And the top crown for Dorado is changed to Betd's 1 inch drop top crown. This crown provided me more setting range for the head angle.

The wheels are changed to Intense MAG30 24 inch rims, the spokes are Sapim CX-Ray and the tyres were Intense FRO 909 tyres. The chain device is changed to Blackspire's ITC-1 for the larger ring. When you use 24 inch wheels, using larger ring is required to compensate the wheel size/gear ratio. I had gone all the way with everything I could.

HOWEVER!!! After trying everything I could with 24 inch wheels, I couldn't figure out why I would be so slow in rough terrain. Then realized that smaller wheels don't work good in typical Japanese rough terrain. So, I made a big change and switched to 26 inch wheels.

The Dorado was good, but the bike shop I bought the Dorado really distracted me that he could not service the forks as often as I wanted it to be and had a problem with the top cap and he could not even open it up completely. So, I sold it to his customer and for the time moment, I found the Boxxer Worldcup 2003 at very cheap price. Tracy Moseley of Kona/Clark Team was using this combination (now they are using Marzocchi 888), so it can't go wrong. So, the changes here are; Mavic EX823 rims, titanium spring for the 5th Element, Boxxer Worldcup and the Betd 2 inch drop top crown with direct clumps.

Here's the close look for the Betd 2 inch drop crown.

and here's the photo from the back.

It looks cool, but actually, the top crown would hit the frame's top tube, so I had to add the rubber bumper and it did not make it look that hot.

The photo below is when I went to Takamineyama with Ganaha from Fox Flagship Store Harajuku after this modification.

Gangs from Guava Jelly

These photos are taken after I had moved to Shibuya.

Pro freerider, Daiki Takahashi (Norco/Idun), had pointed out that the handlebar was too close for me, so the stem was changed to Easton Vise stem and the top crown is back to normal low crown. This advice had improved my riding position a lot, but this low height crown was too low that the frame was ducked towards the front too low.

Here's another photo.

Then, this is the most current photo of my Stab Primo (June 2004). Betd had manufactured the 1 inch drop crown that I originally wanted, so I purchased it right away. Although he promised me that he could make me a special version with 65 mm reach, the actual crown I received was regular 35/45 mm reach version. So, I got hold of X-lite DHR Stem with 75 mm reach (kind of worried if it was too long).

This is the photo from the front. The color of the stem is perfect for my bike.

I will take better picture later, but this is the whole shot of current Stab Primo.

At last (this moment), you can compare the 2004 model (stock). Besides the front forks, my modified 2001 Stab Primo is more capable than the stock 2004 Stab Primo off the shelf.

and to wrap up for now, here's the photo of Atom Lab's limited CNC'd pedal.

Another photo of the current setup taken at Fujimi Panorama Downhill Course.

Oct. 27th 2004
Waiting for about 5 months, I finally got my set of Mojo Suspension's Boxxcart, an upgrade kit for the RockShox Boxxer. Now, some issues like not getting enough rebound damping and getting little astound when the shock extend when I pick up the front are gone. Feels a little too firm as I would like it to be, so maybe change the spring back to yellow, instead of the spring provide by Mojo.

This is the damping dial of the Boxxcart. All you have is this. Today is a little better road condition and I descended long stairs near by with rather faster speed and IT FEELS GOOD! It feels like perfectly tuned suspension forks.

Nov. 5th, 2004.

I made it in time. I enjoyed my last chance to go to Fujimi Panoramo for this season and tested my MOJO tuned Boxxer. I nolonger feel the kickback and the forks feel very firm. The spring provided with the Boxcart is firmer than Yellow or Silver. I changed to Yellow spring but it could be even softer. I will try the silver spring next time.

Dec. 20th, 2004

Some parts from Chain Reaction Cycle came in today. It took about 5 days to receive them from England.

I was always interested in Romic Integrated Top Crown for Boxxer, but Chain Reaction Cycle is the first company that indicated that they have it "in stock". Installation was easy and put it together during my lunch break. I will post some photos later.

Enter new content

Happy 2005!!

As I mentioned on the last paragraph, taking advantage on my winter break, I installed all of the new parts and renewed my Stab Primo signicantly for 2005.

It might look like small change to you, but combining the changes during the 2004, I really feel more complete with this bike now. I'm going to go through with each details on the new changes.

Here's the big change. I bought Raceface X-type Diabolus crank set and swapped with Raceface Northshore XS crank set that is getting to be worned out a little. With this Diabolus crank set, it supposed to give me a lot more rigidity, but also fixed the chain line problem that I always had.

Also, I changed the chain device from ITC-1 which was too large for after changing 24 inch wheels to 26 in wheels, and to AS-1 that is compatible with upto 44 teeth chain ring. Also changed the chain guard to lexan, so I can play around with different color chain ring.

Since the Mojo Boxxcart is working so beautifully, I decided to give it a new lower leg that matches better with my sliver Stab Primo frame. I peeled off one side of the Boxxer plate and sticked the Mojo Sticker.

The red dial is the part of Mojo Boxxcart which works as rebound damping adjustment. I use yellow spring and specially adjusted Boxxcart for my weight and riding style. Also, I had changed the top crown from Betd to Romic. Romic top crown gives me a little more drop than Betd.

And the handle bar is changed to Answer ProTAPER 1 inch rise bar. The previous bar was the middle rise Easton Carbon bar, but since I raise the fork length by the Romic top crown, I had to compensate the total handle bar height, so I changed to the lower rise handle bar.

I used the Michelin tyres for the whole season of 2004, so I'm going to change the tyres to Nokian Gazzaloddi G after this. Also probably change the brake hoses to Goodrige since the current hose and oil are probably over used by now.

The photo album is here.

January 20th, 2005

I know....I'm crazy frenzy. The color of the Boxxer Race 2003 was not quite the color I expected then I found a special sale at Chain Reaction Cycle on Boxxer Worldcup 2004, the model that I really wanted. I figure I can sell the Race 2003 as is on Auction or to friends, so I went for the special sale and got the Worldcup 2004. The exact moment I opened up the box that I received, I was very delighted with the color.

Since the logo plate is a lot nicer comparing to the other models and years, I'm keeping them instead of changing to the Mojo fork stickers. Instead, putting some marks of "Mojofied" in couple of places.

The right is at the bottom of the lower leg's arch, I like how this sticker turned out on this side. I have to think of how to make it look nice on the other side, though.

As you can see here that the silver logo plates of the Worldcup 2004 are nice, but then the black logos of Stab Primo really stands out, making the Worldcup 2004 looking like albino. So, I'm thinking to paste black "Boxxer" stickers over it.

Well, that's it for now. It really take time, effort, thinking and money to make everything perfect. Now most of the things are close to perfect, I'm staring at the original Hayes Purple Disc brakes and thinking these are not matching the color of bike at all.... It's endless.

Evolution of my 2002 Kona Bear Dee-lux

Date Created: Dec 12, 2004, 10:16 AM

WHY DO I OWN SAME KIND OF BIKES?

After I started to ride Kona Dawg, although I was uncertain about its durability of the frame, the lightness was giving me a lot more pleasure than worries. Kona sells Bear and Dawg (samething with different names) for "Back Country" riding. You can sort of say that back country is less harsh than freeride and more harsh than cross country riding. The idea is to make it more tough than cross country bikes and keep the lightness to climb up easily or carry up some cliffs if you had to. At the same time, make it strong so it can take reasonable drop offs and jumps. The photo above is how Bear Dee-lux looks like out of the box.

I was doing a lot of modifications on Dawg by the time I came across with a deal on this Bear Dee-lux at a shop. Since I was uncertain about the durability of the Dawg/Bear frame, I thought I wanted a spare bike and the price was so hard to refuse. So, I decided to buy this Bear Dee-lux. Then I was riding the Bear Dee-lux as stock as possible to compare between my heavily modified Kona Dawg for a while.<Photo Album of Dawg in this period>

LIGHT OF ENLIGHTMENT ARISE

At this point, as the Bear Dee-lux remained as stock, Dawg was wearing 24 inch wheels and 130 mm Manitou Sherman Firefly. Dawg was ready for slope style more than climbing up. As I was riding both bikes having the same frames but different extremeties (I mean the handlebar, the cranks, the fork and the wheels), I noticed the pros and cons of the both settings.

First of all, although Bear Dee-lux was wearing stock 26 inch wheels, I was able to bunnyhop the same hight as I can with my 24 inch wheeled Dawg. Hmm, I thought I could bunny hop better with 24 inch wheels.... The stock Bear Dee-lux was significantly lighter than modified Dawg because of the reasons below.

Stock Bear Dee-lux
All mountain Mavic rims
Shimano Deore hubs (Junk!)
Foxshox Float 100RL front fork
Raceface Turbine cranks
Raceface XC Stem

Modified Dawg
SunRingle SingleTrack 24 inch rims
Hadley DH hubs
Manitou Sherman Firefly
Blackspire Badger DH cranks
Raceface Diabolus Stem

The Stock Bear Dee-lux was much lighter and I started wondering how much necessary to convert 26 inch wheeled bike into 24 inch.

HAVING AN EXTRA BIKE IS NICE

In the world of Internet Communication, what happens is that you get to join up with old friends. The photo on the right, the stock Bear Dee-lux and the original member of my BMX team back in Kunitachi from late 1970's, Shigeru Maeba. It was the first experience for him to descend any downhill course. He enjoyed every second of it.

THE FIRST ARRIVAL WAS THE MARZOCCHI Z150FR SL
The photo above shows my Bear Dee-lux with Z150FR SL installed. Along with the fork, I ordered the parts for the wheels, all seperately to build them by myself.

The photo on the right is the Z150FR SL extended all the way. I chose Hadley hubs so that the wheels are interchangiable with my Stab Primo in case something happens. The rims are Mavic EX823UST, so I can use tubeless tires. Here, the photo shows that the wheel wore Maxxis HighRoller UST 2.1.

The photo on the right now shows the travel adjusted and locked at the shortest travel position, so it would be easier to climb steep hills. It was very handy when guys at Guava Jelly took me for freeride tour in Zushi. <Photo Album from this period>

BUT THAT WAS ONLY THE BEGINING

My original plan on modifying my Bear Dee-lux doesn't end by just changing the fork and the wheels. It actually took more than half a year of waiting, Betd's long travel linkplate kits for Bear/Dawg arrived finally. The story is similar to what I mentioned in the Dawg storyk, so please read them there.

And not only the plates arrived, but the rear suspension, Manitou Swinger Air 3-way had arrived, too. So, it is becoming more complete. I had to change the rear shock, too because when you change the linkplates to Betd, the shock requires more resistance against the revelage and force caused by the long travel link plates. Before the modification of Bear Dee-lux, I experienced some problems with stock Fox shock and 5th Air not being tough enough. So, I ended up with Swinger Air 3-way for Bear Dee-lux for saving weight rather than Swinger Air 4-way that I selected for Dawg. Now my Bear started looking like a long travel light downhill bike.

AND IT IS THE TIME FOR THE REAL FUN!!

Six days later, on December 29th, 2003, the gangs at Guava Jelly took me to freeride session in Zushi. It was first time for me to do real uphill riding, but my Bear Dee-lux made it possible to have real fun. It was such pleasant way to end the year of 2003. <Photos from this session>

DAIKI TAKAHASHI'S ADVICE

Daiki Takahashi/Norco•Idun gave me the advice to lower the handlebar height because the fork is a lot longer than original. So, I chose the low rise handlebar and changed the stem to Thomson XC stem.

The photo below describes how it looked after changing the stem & the handlebar. Also, since the Dawg is the same frame, I oftenly swap the rear shock for trying out. <Photo Album from this period>

APRIL 2ND, 2004

While the Dawg still wore 24 wheels at this period, I oftenly switch between Dawg and Bear to see which is better.

and I did not like how the black handlebar looked, so I changed the handlebar to grey Scandium handlebar (medium rise) and made the Raceface Diabolus stem upside down to keep the handlebar height low.

Evolution of my 2003 Kona Dawg

Date Created: Jul 15, 2004, 07:06 PM

This is how stock Kona Dawg looks like.

Before I bought my Dawg, I was riding around modified Kona Stab 1999 model. I bought the frame on Yahoo! Auction and built it as easy to kick around play bike. It had Marzocchi Shiver SC and the rear suspension was modified with Betd LT linkplates to have 6 inch travel. Also, I was into 24 inch wheels not knowing what it takes for Japanese typical downhill course and to feel more comfortable and closer to what I'm used to doing rather radical stuff, BMX, 24 inch wheels gave me more confident to get back into action riding. I must have had jumped with this bike for over 500 times, but later realized that it was little too heavy for city assault use. Since I already owned my Stab Primo at this point, I needed a lighter and strong enough bike for kicking around.

[photos of modified 1999 Kona Stab]

Then I read an article on Mountainbike Action Magazine that this Kona Dawg could be seamlessly accepted by BMX riders because of its lightness and its low stand-over height. That really caught my attention. I bought this Dawg as a complete bike, but since I was going to transfer most of the critical components from the 99 Stab, the photo on the left is how my Dawg looked like in the beginning.

By this time, I was able to build my own wheels (I have to thank Ogawa-ringyo for teaching me the tips) and built these wheels with myself using Hadley hubs, SunRingle Singletrack rims and DT Swiss Champion spokes. DT Swiss provides online spoke length calculator, so by selecting the part names and the way you want to build your wheels, the calculator will come back with the spoke length you need.

Hadley hub is an expensive product. However, it is very accessible to maintain and very strong. By this time I had build a pair of 24 inch wheels for my Stab Primo for lighter and strong enough application, so my idea was to make the Dawg's wheels to be compatible with my Stab Primo. The 10 mm axle shaft is needed for the Dawg and 12 mm axle is needed for Stab Primo, but they could be swapped by changing the parts. Hadley hubs are made for downhill, so they are little heavier, then I tried to choose lighter rims like Singletrack to keep the weight down.

My comment on the web page says that it is around 15kg. I wanted it to be lighter than that, but I guess I went overboard with Shiver SC and Blackspire Badger cranks. The chain device was rather heavy duty, too.

[photos of this period]

Then, I thought Shiver was too heavy (that wasn't true) or just fell in love with the looks and the name of it, I changed the forks to Manitou Sherman Firefly. Shiver was too long for Dawg when Dawg has only 100 mm travel in the rear. I thought Sherman could adjust the travel down to 110 mm, which is possible, but it is not safe to do aggressive stuff with that postion (at least for 2003 model, I found out later at Guava Jelly). I chose camo color. That was a mistake, because it did not match with anything else.

and I also got in my hands on SRAM XO derailleur from U.S.. I know Shimano components work good, but do you think their logo is that hot? and the designs? Anyway, I'm a SRAM fan and look at that design. It helps when it started working good.

You will notice when you look at the photo on the left, that I was trying to be creative with the decals. Also, this is before Anson told me that Kona's logo design is designed based on asx-xole.

[photos of this period]

And here comes almost famous camo Dawg. I did not get used to the camo color of the fork. But I was not ready to send the frame to paint shop because I was having so much fun with the bike. I just could not take the down time. Then I shot the photo of the fork and tried to copy the patterns to create decals with Adobe Illustrator and Epson printer. The photo above is after I did the whole design and pasting work.

I thought it was cool to leave the base color of the frame, so I made it to look like the base color (green) is revealing out over camouflage coloring. The stem is changed to Thomson XC stem. One of the challenges for making the bike lighter.

The Kona logo and Manitou logo designs are embedded with the camouflage decals. People thought it was painted directly on to the frame.

It was fun to ride around and you get a kick out of people talking about your bike on internet forums saying that it must be a prototype (lol). There was a post that a guy claims to be someone I know and telling other people all wrong information like this frame is Stinky frame and I had it custom painted. It was funny. The Kona clump logos are gone from my frame, because this is after Anson told me the real meaning of the logo. It is not red blood cell, it is ass-xole. Cedric Gracia loved the fact, though.

[photos of this period]

My frustration over the weight was building up. Although I changed the stem and pedals to the lighter products, it was too heavy. So, I had to make a big change, changing the fork. Here, you can see I got in hold of RockShox Psylo Race. Comparing to Sherman, Psylo Race is over 400 grams lighter. However, it is gold.

So, what I did was to peel off all of the camouflage decals and create gold color logos of everything. During this period, I was trying to help the rebirth of legendary BMX/MTB shop "Wildcat", so I made the gold Wildcat logo.

But I left the taste of camouflage here. SDG Bel-Air camouflage, but the green is based on this pattern, so it matches well with the frame. Also, please look close to the first picture of this section. The spokes are silver. These spokes are the Sapim CX-Ray spokes. They are expensive. They are hard to find. I bought them a web shopping company in Germany. They accepted my peculiar order of CX-Ray of very short length for 24 inch wheels. Bulding wheels with CX-Ray made the weight 100 grams lighter and they are supposed to be stronger than regular spokes.

[photos of this period]

and here's more tweaked version of the Dawg in the same period.

Basically the same, the stem is changed to Raceface Diabolus.

The decals are tweaked to look better.

The tires are changed to Arrow Launch, but that is not all. They are working as tubeless tires with Stan's No-tube kit.

[photos of this period]
Must see these photos. They are my favorites.

You must be wondering when will I ever quite. Not yet. Here, now Dawg is equipped with Progressive Suspension's 5th Element Air rear shock. I was having bottom out problem every time I was jumping off from stairs. So, I was really interested in air sprung rear shock with progressive travel and the bobless feature.

I don't have many photos because this shock is actually made for cross country riding and the bolt went wrecked after I jumped off in Shibuya. So I had to go back to Fox Float for a short time.

[photos of this period]

I guess I was getting used to doing more stuff especially after Psylo Race was installed and kept getting more aggressive in riding. This is the period that I started to drop in at Guava Jelly. Asano-kun at Guava Jelly told me about the immediate availability of Manitou Swinger Air 3-way, so I ordered it right away. I was desperate.

Asano-kun had to fine adjust the bolt and the bushes for the maximum fitting. Thank you very much.

The Manitou Swinger Air 3-way is fitted here and the chain device is changed. I found a new chain device on an issue of "Flow" magazine call "Livid". For a while, I was into Carbon material and this Livid's plates are made out of carbon. This chain device set is very light. Instead, I got the beefy Palmer pedals for better sureness of the feet.

[photos of this period]

At this point, I also purchased a Kona Bear Dee-lux. Since I got it very cheap, I kept it stock for a long time. Which means that it's on 26 inch wheels. I was trying to feel the difference between 24 inch and 26 inch wheels on the same frame (Dawg and Bear are the same). Time to time, I was jumping better on Bear with 26 inch wheels. I started wondering. The photo describes my Dawg with 26 inch wheels. These wheels are built by me for Stab Primo, but I wanted to try tubeless tires so badly and I also tried to put these 26 inch tubeless wheels on Dawg to feel the difference.

Mavic EX823 Disc rim with Michelin tubeless tyres.

[photos of this period]

Phew, how many words did I typed so far? It's been almost three hours since I started to create this post. But here comes even more major modification. I had experience in using Betd's long travel link plates for Kona bikes. I found out that Dan at Betd started to produce LT plates for Bear/Dawg, but when I asked him, they were already sold out. So, I had to wait more than few months for him to produce again. Then finally, I got them for both Dawg and Bear. These were needed especially for Dawg with 24 inch wheels because by having lower profiled 24 inch wheels, I tend to hit ground with my pedals because the bottom bracket height is lowered. These plates make the BB height whole inch higher. By the way, those are not my hands. They are my wife's.

But unfortunately, Dan forgot to send me all of the parts. I could not install them for about a week until rest of the parts arrived.

[photos of this period]

Then, finally the parts arrived!!!

You see the rear suspension being different from Swinger 3-way. Yes. It's Swinger 4-way. I got this for Bear (Bear was going trough a major change to be light downhill bike). Since they are sharing the same specs, I can swap the parts whenever I want, so I was trying to use the 4-way with my Dawg.

Not only the rear suspension, I was swapping the wheels to feel the differences. I began to wonder the needs for 24 inch wheels for myself. At this point I already decided that to graduate from 24 inch wheels for downhilling. But I still thought that 24 inch wheels are good for riding on road. I wasn't sure.

[photos of this period]

This section will show the last days of my Dawg with 24 inch wheels.

I had moved to Shibuya this April and these photos were taken after I had moved and taken around my neighborhood.

The stem is changed to Atomic Aircorp stem. Since the Betd LT plates are titanium silver color, I wanted to bring in more of that color in my bike.

Atomic has that titanium silver color for their products. Luckily I found already discontinued Palmer pedals in this color.

You can see the matching color of the LT plates and the pedals.

I posted these photos on MTB review and East Cost Mountainbike galleries and people seem to love the setup.

[Photos of this period]

But I had to say good-bye to 24 inch wheels. After comparing the rides between 24 inch wheeled Dawg and 26 inch wheeled Bear, I was enjoying 26 inch wheeled Bear a lot more. One thing I was't sure about at this point about 26 inch wheels is the bunnyhop height that I can achieve with. But I was confident about 26 inch wheels after going to Takamineyama and Fujimi Panorama with 26 inch wheeled Stab Primo and Bear Dee-lux. I also begin to like the looks of bikes with 26 inch wheels better. Also, as Hiro Aoyama told me to switch to 26 inch wheels before, there are more tire choices. So I decided to sell all of my 24 inch wheels and parts. I was fortunate to sell them in good prices because I was using rare and good parts.

Using Maxxis HighRoller tubeless tires.

It doesn't look like kid's bike that is what my wife says (lol).

and do you know what surprised me? I could bunnyhop better with this setup better than ever. Now a lot of downhill courses have courses for 4X, this bike is better suited for enjoying the 4X ride. But the RockShox Psylo Race is probably going bad soon, so I have to think of next fork to buy when 2005 models are available. Thinking of buying something silver.

[Photos of current setup]