Bike Check: Richard's Edit v2

Richard's a Sheffield local and we see him out riding in the woods every now and then. He was stoked on the local brand thing and wanted to stick with British brands for his build, so we called in Hope and Burgtec to finish the job. The results are tidy...

When we first started to work with Richard, we knew Edit v2 frames were out of stock and like many of our customers - he was very understanding. The bottom line is we just can't afford to get these frames made fast enough. (Edit v2 frames are due back in stock next week by the way). We don't like to keep people waiting but it did give us time to really get to grips with the spec and make sure Richard's bike was exactly how he wanted it. I think we did four or five different specs for this one to get it dialled.

Our usual black garage doors weren't available so we had to go with the flaky wall this time. Just look at that bike though! Such a sweet build, and some great colour choices too. 

The Frame

Richard's quite tall but he dropped in for a demo and it was pretty clear that the Large would be the right size straight away. We had a bit of a debate about the colour because he wanted orange to feature in the colour scheme, but in the end we decided that the raw alloy finish would be a great complement for the anodised alloy components, and we could colour match on the decals.

The Forks

Typically we'd fit Rockshox Lyriks or Cane Creek Helms to a bike like this. Not that we've got anything against Fox - far from it - we just get on really well with SRAM and Cane Creek. But it was clear that Richard only had eyes for the mighty 36's so we were very happy to supply them, and it's clear that they work in the context of the build.

We can supply the Performance Series forks, which are excellent. But if you're going for Fox, it's gotta be Kashima. So the ones Richard ended up with are the 2019 version of the Factory series Kashima fork, with the Fit 4 damper. That's a lot of fork. 160mm travel, 36mm stanchions, buttery smooth Kashima coating and Fox quality finish: if you ask me, this is one one the best looking forks out there.

Finishing Kit

We used our Hope bike build kit as the starting point which we figured would be the best way to get Richard started on his British build. So that made things pretty simple in many ways; Hope headset, stem, space-doctor and top-cap, Hope grips, Hope seat clamp, Hope hubs, Hope floating rotors and of course Hope Tech 3 E4 brakes.

Where we did deviate a little bit is on the handlebars. Hope do produce a carbon bar, which is very slick and has a price to match. Richard wanted something a bit more practical and Hope don't produce an alloy bar, so we turned to the boys at Burgtec who supplied their excellent Ridewide alloy bar. The original wide bar, and still probably the best.

Drivetrain

So far this year, most of the bikes we've built have used the SRAM GX Eagle groupset. We do offer NX, the new NX Eagle and of course X01 Eagle too, but in terms of both price and Performance, GX Eagle is hard to beat. It hits that sweet-spot of light, crisp and consistent shifting, good reliability and it won't break the bank when you eventually wear stuff out.

At the back, the Hope Pro 4 hubs, 180mm floating rotors and E4 callipers kind of steal the show, but that cassette is a work of art.

And now we come to my favourite bit. The GX Eagle groupset has a really nice crankset with it, but Richard was going full Hope, so the Spiderless Crankset had to go on. When it comes to colour matching, you can go a bit too much for orange, so I think Richard's choice to have the BB in orange, the cranks in black and the Retainer Ring in orange was spot on. And to top it off, those Burgtecs...

I think this might be my favourite part of the bike.

Richard's Bike Spec

We used our 'standard' Hope build (nothing much standard about it mind you) as a basis for Richard's bike, with a few tasty embellishments such as the Fox 36's up front and a set of Burgtec Penthouse flats.