Retro jump bikes?

Mr G

Dirt Disciple
BITD before I went all DH and park BMX I used to hammer a DMR Trailstar around the streets and local dirt jumps. Mine was an early one about 97 or 98 (ended up sprayed a awfull camo colour with rattlecans) and I rode it to death untill it got sold (probably to buy skunk and cider :roll: ) At the time most of my mates had jump bikes too and I remember being envious of my mates Orange Missile and another lad who had a very nice Kona Chute. Recently I have got together some of the parts that were on it and have started out of mainly spare parts and odd items picked up cheaply building up a spec for one. I am now planning to build the 'battle cruiser' up again. All I really need is the frame and a few trick bits so which one would people go for? I know there are quite a few but which would be the best an old DMR or look for the Kona or the Orange. The build will be as bomb proof as you can get really with Z1 drop offs, DMR and Truvativ crank set and bash gaurd, D521 on hope hubs, magura HS33, SDG saddle and a few other retro Azonic and Kore trick bits. All advice greatly received as i would like to keep it quite period.

P.S. I might replace the Marin Eldridge Grade with this as I am finding modern full sussers more fun for off road and its just not so fun for riding to work (I want something to tear up the streets and pull ridiculous wheelies around town! :twisted: )
 
There's a few of us here that have fond memories of the "hardcore hardtails " that came around that time , I have an old trailstar of 98 vintage that is set up for all round winter riding and is ideal at it ( 33lbs though :LOL: .) I also have a spare frame just because .

You could either go with what you had or what you dreamed of .

Lgf has a near original Chute
 
best jump bike i've owned is my 2000 saracen x-ess :D bought it new and still use it so it must be strong :LOL: :LOL: :LOL:
 
It would be nice to build it up with the spec I dreamed of BITD but in fairness it would just feel better if it was how it was meant to be back then. TBF we always had crazy builds with no colour co-ordination whatsoever but everything took the punishment it was given daily.
 
I still have my jump bike frames from BITD. A Planet X Jack flash and an original DMR Trailstar.
They've both been through many different builds ranging from hardcore and heavy to fast(ish) and light(ish).
Both the wee buggers are still hanging in there.

Michael.
 
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I built up a 16" Kona Lavadome in around 1996/7, used all the bits from my GT LTS DH (the original one) and raced DH on it. A few of us had little Kona's built up with DH bits.
Then had:

Spooky Bandwagon
Santacruz Chameleon
Azonic DS1
raleigh RSP

Now have a newer Chameleon, that I'm considering selling in parts and funding a small retro esque hardtail. Thought about doing a JMC M2, but that wouldn't be cheap contemplating a Zaskar at the moment.
 
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