Not one for the purists

Spent a good part of the day assembling my recently acquired 93 Merlin

Just a quick pic, will post better ones in readers wives tomorrow

Be warned though, not one for the purists, but its a rider and no garage queen, so set up with a good few modern bits

Nice and less nice comments are all welcome, suits me and thats what really counts with this one

Cheers
Rich

I'm diggin it though it does look totally modern IMO. How do you find the small blocks?

Looks rubbish.....can i have it.

No seriously its very nice, i would welcome it into my collection!!

How do you find the small blocks?

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In a word excellent, far better than I expected and after reading a few reviews went for the 1.95's although they ride and look much wider

Gave the bike a quick test run and they are great on wet leaves, not sure how they would be in winter mud.
Had them on my S-Works HT for a couple of months and they have been very impressive throughout the wet late summer.
Designed for hardpack conditions really, but seem fine on almost everything else too and damn fast on tarmac (noisy though)

looks great - Merlin frames lend themselves to any amount of updating and still look great.

Well all Merlins look good tbh, but I think it looks fine with the modern components. All XTR suits ti frames.

My only concern would be about having the SIDs on the 80mm setting. As it's a 1993 frame, it will have been designed for the length of a fork with 50-63mm travel and if that bike was mine (some hopes), I would re-set the SID to 63mm. I know lots of people prefer having extra travel and say they don't mind the slacker geometry that results from it, but I personally prefer sharp to slack. And it just seems strange to judge a bike without ever riding it with the geometry that the designer intended.

Fair comment that Anthony, but to be honest not sure how they adjust
Assuming spacers inside, but not had time to look too deeply yet

They are cut and shut jobs to get the 1in steerer and are not dual air even though the legs say so, will investigate and see what can be done.

Must say it handles very nicely although anything with a longer axle to crown height might be too much

Huntso":39d4lpra said:

Fair comment that Anthony, but to be honest not sure how they adjust
Assuming spacers inside, but not had time to look too deeply yet
They are cut and shut jobs to get the 1in steerer and are not dual air even though the legs say so, will investigate and see what can be done.

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I think it's the other way round actually - you put the spacer in to reduce the travel and shorten the fork. So if you didn't get a spacer with the fork, then you'd need one if you were going to try this. It's just a 17mm piece of plastic though, so hopefully can't cost much (famous last words). I've never done the job either, but it's supposed to be something that can be done easily as part of a service.

As far as I can remember, SIDs started out as 63mm only, then moved to 63/80 with spacer, then went to 63/80 externally adjustable and stayed with that for a fair while and only recently went over to 80/100. I don't recall there ever being a time when they were 80mm only, but I expect I'll now be told I'm completely wrong as usual.

I know on Judy's you just rearrange the spacers to alter the travel and in fact think I have a couple of the spacers about somewhere

If its too involved think they will just stay as they are, will have a look at the manual and see what gives

Or, if you wanted to, you could just run the forks say 15-20mm further into their travel (ie less pre-load).
Always seems an easier (and better) option to me than restricting the travel with spacers. You get all that extra negative travel for good tracking through rough corners.

I think it looks fine as it is anyway - I could live with an extra degree or two slacker head angle on most bikes.