2000 Marin Mount Vision Build

[Meejoir]

Hi Walter1775, my Mount Vision, purchased new in 1998, has been a labour of love. She’s a bit like ‘Trigger’s Broom’ now as the only original part left is the main frame. God knows how much money I’ve chucked at her over the years.

I decided to leave mine un-decalled as I liked the clean look, but I did manage to pick up a metal head tube badge on eBay. It came from China and took a month to arrive, but there’s a few American companies make them as well.

 

[hawkhill97]

Another lovely build - they are such good looking bikes!

 

[walter1775]

Thank you! It really is a beautiful frame, nothing beats the polished aluminum and X shape.

I opted for a 100mm Rockshox Judy 27.5, former remote lockout but I found I never used the lockout so I took it off. The longer fork gives it about a 69 degree headtube angle but makes the bottom bracket pretty tall. I don't mind the height though, and I imagine your also familiar with how high it feels. Its nice to pedal straight over pretty much everything.

My original intent was to buy a modern rear derailleur and wide range cassette, but after riding in its "temporary" set up for a while I kind of realized I didn't need any extra range, its 11-36 rear and 32 front which I found gives me plenty for the riding I do. The small wheels help compensate for sure.

Never considered putting the granny ring back on, but now that you point it out I might do it when I go home from college again since I still have the original shifters and chainrings. I live in Northeastern USA so not crazy flat but most trails I ride are not steep enough that I have needed any more range.

Also the Exmoor and Dartmoor pics look amazing, for sure puts all the trails near me to shame. Super jealous.

The bottle cage was interesting... The mounts on the top tube made it so I had no stand over height, and I hate wearing a bag to ride(most of my riding is sub 5 miles anyways) so I tried the downtube zip tie idea. It gets caked in crud in a few minutes sadly but I just take the entire top off my water bottle to not deal with that. Worth saving me a bag.

Next upgrade dropper post maybe, I was considering a one up v2 and drilling a hole in the seat tube to route the cable. Will certainly update if I do but that would be in a couple months most likely.

 

[walter1775]

Hi Walter1775, my Mount Vision, purchased new in 1998, has been a labour of love. She’s a bit like ‘Trigger’s Broom’ now as the only original part left is the main frame. God knows how much money I’ve chucked at her over the years.

I decided to leave mine un-decalled as I liked the clean look, but I did manage to pick up a metal head tube badge on eBay. It came from China and took a month to arrive, but there’s a few American companies make them as well.

So cool! Did not realize there were more retro mount visions riding. Did you add the Black paint yourself? The all Black looks super clean

 

[hawkhill97]

Nice!

Totally agree on the high bottom bracket being a bit of a feature on these frames. I found going above around 465mm axle to crown length started to tip this into being a slight negative trait for the riding I commonly do, but they are awesome for seated pedaling over rough terrain without worrying about pedal strikes.

I think if I wanted to ride it with a longer fork I'd probably try out an angleset and offset shock bushes to bring the BB height back down a smidge. I did ride mine with a 110mm fork for a while and to be fair it was pretty capable, but it always felt a tiny bit "off" whereas at 85mm travel it feels really natural.

Is yours a 30.0mm seat post like mine? I did wonder if it would be possible to ream out the seat tube to fit a 30.9mm dropper, but I'm not brave enough to try. You could always use a 27.2mm with a shim though. Do stick a pic up if you end up adding this.

 

[thatmattwooding]

What’s the difference between an East Peak and a Mount Vision? Are they different models or different specs?

For no terribly good reason, here’s mine from Monday evening. I got wet.

 

[Meejoir]

The order of things in 98 at least, went (High to Low) was Mount Vision Pro (XTR), Mount Vision (XT), Rift Zone (LX) then East Peak (mostly STX IIRC), then lastly was Alpine Trail which has a more feeble swing arm with more budget type components.

 

[hawkhill97]

Frames for the mount vision / east peak were identical AFAIK, the models only differed in the parts used to build them up.

Marin did loads of similar frames around this period, some had longer travel with shock mount points in different places, and there was a different swing arm design pretty much every year.

The mount vision, MtV pro, rift zone and east peak will all have been pretty much identical. Not sure about the differences between some of the others (wolf ridge, B17, rock springs, attack trail etc).

 

[thatmattwooding]

Mine is half East Peak (swingarm) and half Shoreline Trail (front bit). Google suggests the shoreline trail was at the low end of the range. The steel swingarm weighs a tonne but the front half felt about the same as the East Peak front half.

 

[hawkhill97]

I had a Shoreline Trail before my Mount Vision. Think you're right that the front triangle is the same between the two, it's just the swing arm (and components) that's different.