Kona King Kahuna '98 - TST factory tabs

[al-onestare]

Re: Re:

Thanks dude. Keeping the bars for now, but if I decide move it on, I’ll definitely let you know.

psst - <and the seat-post>

Cheers!

 

[romanrinos]

Re:

Someones hoarding..? :!:

 

[al-onestare]

Re: Kona King Kahuna 98'

Ah, you've made the rookie mistake of sharing your parts stash. By RB law that means you need to split and share with the first person to reply to said post

 

[romanrinos]

Re:

Ti Riser bar

It's gonna be a Monster.

 

[romanrinos]

Re: Kona King Kahuna 98 - BMXC build

The last component has arrived - an SGS long cage. Nothing in Europe, was going, so ended up going the extra mile, and getting this from a sale action in Japan of all places. 4 weeks later, it's finally here.

The cranks are carried over from my former 97' Hei Hei (viewtopic.php?f=6&t=387791) which happened to be an M952 set, and have now reverted the chainrings back to matching 9-speed.

The Z1 BAMs have been nominally lowered from the standard 100mm to 90mm, via a travel reduction kit, and a set of extra-stiff springs applied along with new seals courtesy of https://www.mtbforksbymark.com

Will be going tubeless.

 

[romanrinos]

Been a while since I updated this build thread. Although I'm aware that there has been various other KK builds since, this is to round off where I got to when I completed this build at the beginning of the year. I'll update the later thread with where I subsequently took the build, after these photos, along with the lesson's learnt along the way.

It's still not at its final stage where I feel I can say the build is 'done', but it's a vastly different beast compared to my Hei Hei build of 2 years ago (thread here https://www.retrobike.co.uk/threads/97’-kona-hei-hei-completed-build.387791/page-2) My original aim was to build something much more burly aimed at hitting Surrey Hills /Northdowns, rather than necessary catalogue spec, of which all of my other Kona's are.

When compared to the Hei, the resulting ride is a helluva lot more assured and confident. Coupled with the stiffer frame, slightly increased fork travel (90mm) to achieve a longer front end, it is really solid on straight line descends and for going big on the steeps. Although both frames are 20", the KK has a 1/2" longer top tube and the head angle seems slacker

CK hubs as you'd expect are FAST, and whilst the outcome is more retro-mod than what I originally intended (it's now currently running 'blacked out' modern Magura's unpictured here) I'm really pleased with the resulting feel, proportion, stance.

Images below, therefore, capture the previous build state, before latest changes, but show the effects of the reduced travel heights Z1 BAMS to work with the frame geometry to stop the front end from being too high, as well as various bars and headset spacers that I tried
to get the ride dialled in and looking 'just right'.

As pictured here: Black aluminium Answer bars, BAMS, Thomson post and Bianco Oro brakes, Ti King Cage, Stans ZTR rims running tubeless and a modern Kona water bottle )

 

[wadsy]

 

[W7Ford]

That is rather beautiful! I'd be scared to ride it.

 

[albash82]

Bloody heck. My size too. Best not ever sell it, I'll bankrupt myself to buy it.

 

[romanrinos]

A couple of ‘new’ additions to the build since last updates here. Two Flites we’re given some tlc, one of which was featherlight nos carbon leather which other than heavy scuffs was in nice shape. The Z1 BAM fork was also moved on.