trailwright
GT Fan
As I'm an impatient bugger, taking the time to photo and narrate a build thread is not usually my cup of tea. I'd make a shite youtuber with all that editing and camera repositioning. However, I'm making an exception for this build as I've been waiting to get a new garage built and this has been delayed, and it gives me an excuse to fondle componentry!
Having been involved in the scene from the late 80s I started my local riding with guys who owned Specializeds - mainly Rockhoppers and one Team Stumpy, but for some reason I never did own the brand until only a couple of years ago. My mate's Team Stumpy was always the one I had my eye on sourcing, the Epic being just too far into unicorn territory to contemplate. The thing I've always found interesting though is that the road version of the Epic is relatively speaking not too hard to find for sale, I've got three of the things, but I've yet to see the offroad Epic on ebay, and the very few that have been shown off on this site seem to mainly be continent purchased.
And then, out of the blue, an '89 appears here in almost perfect condition, and in my size - 21.5" C-T. This gave me a dilemma. Because the frame is in such good nick my original intention of sticking on a spare XC Pro 7 speed groupset has been dropped, and I've decided as far as is reasonably practicable, to create a catalogue spec build over the coming weeks. This means standard XT 7-speed, but that's ok, eh?
Some teaser shots to get things started...
Having been involved in the scene from the late 80s I started my local riding with guys who owned Specializeds - mainly Rockhoppers and one Team Stumpy, but for some reason I never did own the brand until only a couple of years ago. My mate's Team Stumpy was always the one I had my eye on sourcing, the Epic being just too far into unicorn territory to contemplate. The thing I've always found interesting though is that the road version of the Epic is relatively speaking not too hard to find for sale, I've got three of the things, but I've yet to see the offroad Epic on ebay, and the very few that have been shown off on this site seem to mainly be continent purchased.
And then, out of the blue, an '89 appears here in almost perfect condition, and in my size - 21.5" C-T. This gave me a dilemma. Because the frame is in such good nick my original intention of sticking on a spare XC Pro 7 speed groupset has been dropped, and I've decided as far as is reasonably practicable, to create a catalogue spec build over the coming weeks. This means standard XT 7-speed, but that's ok, eh?
Some teaser shots to get things started...
