New VooDoo website.

http://voodoocycles.co/

Looks like a bit of a rebirth, 853 Steel Bizango frames available in 27.5.
.......

Interesting that they have five 26" bikes in their lineup, and none of them appear to have tapered head tubes or "modern" geometry.

They are bringing retroback?

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Halford bikes though, so it'll for for that market

Big NEW advert on their pages, here's the bikes.

Though they only have the two bigger sizes wheels on there.

http://www.halfords.com/cycling/bikes?b ... 4-_-voodoo

Halfords is interesting. Sorta like Canadian Tire but with better bikes. Though CT doesn't service bikes at all.

Anyway, about Voodoo - I see a tweet on their page that is signed "-Joe."

Joe Murray is handling their social media as well as the bikes then?

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It's a Taiwan company based or run by some Australians as far as I can see.

No idea what the old Voodoo was though.

From a previous 'about us' on the old website:

VooDoo Cycles - A short bit about where we came from and who we are: VooDoo began in 1994 by a group of bicycle fanatics various cycling industry people who decided that it was possible to get a high- quality, semi-custom bike, yet at production produced price. Shinji Mizutani who runs a Japanese trading company called "ASAP" has been the owner since the beginning. Joe Murray (who at the time was just riding his bike about the southwest) was recruited to design this new line of bikes. VooDoo soon gained a solid reputation for offering a innovative line of hardtail and suspension bikes made of steel, aluminum and titanium where you could choose a range of kits, forks and other custom options. Also most every bike was assembled in California to order with a level of QC rarely seen before. Needless to say, business was booming for VooDoo until the year 2000 and for various reasons Shinji shut down the VooDoo HQ that was located in Silicon Valley, California. Yet VooDoo never went away and is alive and well today. Shinji still held on the the VooDoo spirit and was selling a few of the classic models in Japan until once again Joe was brought back to get things going again in the USA in 2004. John Benson (Web design, product manager and promotion) and Joe (frame design, testing and so on...) work in one of mountain biking's best kept secrets in the largest Ponderosa pine forest in the world in northern Arizona town of Flagstaff at a nice cool elevation of 7000 feet. Only 45 minutes south and 2500 feet lower is the mountain bike cult mecca of Sedona. The nuts and bolts of VooDoo is going on in Taiwan where some of the best quality bicycles are made today. Keeping VooDoo rolling are Sandra [Sandra Lam] the manager, Becky in the office and Jeson in the warehouse. And Shinji is still running the ASAP office in Japan.

Click to expand...

All Steel/Alu frames were then actually made in Taiwan (with 1-2 exceptions occasionally) then 'assembled' in the US and now production is split between Taiwan & China.

Joe Murray said around 2012 (http://cycloculture.blogspot.com/2012/1 ... other.html) he wasn't very involved with Voodoo anymore and didn't know what was going to happen with the brand, but noted its popularity.

More recently this: http://halfordsblog.com/2015/06/18/joe- ... voodoo-qa/ suggests he is now more involved with the company again as they are becoming more proactive.

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Thanks, never knew of Voodoo BiTD and they are built where they know how to build frames of all types. So what's the connection with Australia?/ it's Lims email address and business location for the website.

Well, those 26" frames on the 'new' website are not new, let's say..

The Hoodoo picture is the 97/98 Voodoo Hoodoo (even a 'retro' MTB these days would not be non-disc..)



And all are wearing the 'old' logo and fonts etc. The D-Jab is slightly later, around 2005 I think, and the Bizango & Sobo from around their 2002 range.



My guess would be if they are advertising these that either the site is wrong (which on the face of it seems unlikely, but you never know!) or someone's uncovered a warehouse's worth of old NOS frames!
All that said, the Sobo is one of the best Alu frames ever made, weighs nothing and rides awesomely..
I have the 'Black Magic' as opposed to Reynolds 525 Hoodoo and it's more compliant and climbs better than my 853 RSP.

I'd say keep an eye out for some frames cropping up, perhaps on Ebay as 'factory seconds' etc; but I'd think it's 99.9% certain that Halfords aren't going to start stocking late 90's Voodoo frames at any time soon, sadly..!

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Clearly the Hoodoo picture is a mistake (I think it's the 1996 frame), but the 26" Bizango, Sobo and D-Jab frames all appear to be new in some way, or at least reworkings of previous frames. They all have under the top tube cable routing, which no earlier VooDoo had, except that the Bizango in the largely still-born 2011 range had it. Very few of the 2011 Bizangos seem to have made it to the market however, so it is possible that the picture they're now showing is of unsold 2011 stock.
However the 26" D-Jab has dropouts that have never appeared on any previous D-Jab. The Sobo pictured resembles the 2005* frame and may just be a reworking with new cable routing (but why?)
Why they're showing these pictures is a mystery. There's no suggestion that any of the frames is actually for sale anywhere, and what would be the point anyway of marketing frames that you can no longer buy forks to fit?
The 27.5 frames all look new and good, but again there's no suggestion that any of them are available for sale. They say they have distributors in China, Japan, Thailand, Malaysia, Taiwan and the Philippines, so the new frames could go on sale there at some point I guess.
As far as I'm aware, the Halfords VooDoo range remains completely distinct, nothing to do with Joe Murray or the on/off VooDoo operation in Taiwan. Halfords VooDoos are not sold anywhere outside the UK and Joe Murray VooDoos haven't been sold in the UK for many years, and I would guess any new ones that might ever find their way to the market won't be sold in the UK either. Joe has always seemed supportive of the Halfords operation though, which may explain its appearance on this new website.
I think we might guess at Joe Murray's attitude from his saying "The gears are starting to grind again at VooDoo, really." Adding the word really, almost as if to say 'although you may not believe it until you see it, any more than I do.'


[* there were no VooDoos between 2000 and 2005 incidentally]