Parkpre

ParkPre popped up as one of those companies that said they made stuff for other companies, then suddenly decided they could do it themselves. Well I hope they didn't quit their day jobs, because they didn't last long in the North American marketplace.

825 - 825 means "eight to five", or, the steel tubes in the frame go from .8mm thick at the joints to .5mm in the middle of the tube. It was a pretty cool steel bike actually. This one has a cool newer Manitou fork too.

Pace

Pace is an English company, and they make unusual square tube hardtails, and weird backwards forks. I remember them being the first European company to make a bike that MBA magazine liked. It was cool for American magazines to make fun or Euros back then - it doesn't happen anymore.


RC 100 - The RC-100 was "out there" for a couple reasons - brakes on the back of the fork, a threadless headset, and "butted" square tubes. Looks like a pretty cool bike to me. [edit] the butting was actually areas on the outside faces of the tubes where the aluminum was machined away.

Outland

I believe that Outland was a Canadian company, I know the concept originated with Canadian designers anyway. The Outland was based around the Virtual Pivot Point concept, which promised to isolate chain and brake forces from suspension action. Outland didn't last long, and to add insult to injury, Mountain Bike magazine recently named them one of the worst bikes ever. [edit] what i didn't mention is that the reason for that was the poor pivots and bearings used in the system. fast forward to 2004 (roughly, i can't remember) and santa cruz buys the outland patents and the blur is born. and oh yeah, everybody and their dog builds a bike with a 'virtual pivot point'

VPP5 - It's a poor pic, but a rare bike, so deal with it. I guess one of the downsides to this bike was the frame weight, but it's hard to keep the weight down on anything with 5 inches of travel.

VPP5 - This one has more of a XC feel for sure. It looks like a pretty good bike, though apparently one of the bad things about it is weak pivots. Bad news for a bike that has zero support.

Oryx

Oryx is a Canadian company, out of Quebec actually, that I really don't know much about. But being Canadian is good enough to get them on the BikeGuide. [edit] oryx is part of the procycle group which includes rocky mountain, ccm, and miele. their corporate website doesn't include oryx though, but there is an oryx site with nothing on it, so i don't know what their deal is.

HTA 750 - This looks like a full-on race bike - XTR everywhere, Marzocchi X-Fly fork, aluminum frame - very nice.

Nuke Proof

Nuke Proof started out making carbon shell hubs, and then moved one to titanium frames and even their own headtube mounted suspension forks. I'm not sure if they're still in the frame business though.

Hardtail - This is a titanium bike, but I don't understand the handlebar arrangement. It's got 3/4 of an inch of headset spacers to move the bars up, then the stem is upside-down to move the bars down, then it's got riser bars too... Get a hacksaw, lose the spacers, turn that stem around - learn to work on your bike, trust me, it's worth it.

Northstar

Northstar was an aluminum pioneer back in the day. But I guess they just weren't able to convince the masses that they made the bike to own, because I think they went out of business some time ago.

Hardtail - I can't remember at all what the Northstar bike was called. This is a fairly crude looking frame, but remember that few people had used aluminum in a welded application at this time.

100th post!

I just noticed that this will be my 100th post, and I thought that putting in a one bike post for a company that nobody remembers would be a lame 100th post.

So instead, a quick recap of what all this is;

All these bike pics I have are from a site I used to run where I'd post bike pics. [A blog is not the best format for this to be honest, but it's just easier to let someone else do the coding.] I used to look for used bikes and a lot of times without a picture, it was hard to know what was being sold. So I thought it would be cool to have a database of bikes so that you could see what they were.

I don't think I ever meant it to be comprehensive - I don't have time for that, it would be a full-time job trying to get pics of every bike ever. [check out http://www.bikepedia.com for an example of what that would look like; sorry, but it's not good] So instead I grabbed pics of bikes I liked, or bikes that were rare, or bikes that I didn't like.

The bikes I didn't like, I made fun of, and that is what made it go. it was my need to trash bad bikes that drove the site.

The cool thing is, in 2009, a lot of these pics are of bikes that are 'vintage.' Or near vintage anyway. And lots of parts that don't exist anymore; Rock Shox Judy, weird carbon Spinergy and Spyn wheels, AMP forks, AMP rear ends, cantilever brakes...

I'm close to getting all of the old pics posted - and once that's done, then I can start posting new stuff. What exactly I'll post, I don't know, but hopefully it'll be something good.

Norco

Norco is a Canadian company that we Canadians used to make fun of because they made so many cheap, department-store type bikes. Things have changed though, and since 1993, they've made plenty of really good bikes. And now, they have one of the most compelte line of North Shore style bikes on the market. [edit] norco has the market covered like few other bike companies. each micro-niche has a bike, and most of them have three price points. you need a 4 inch travel single speed park bike? sure, we have three!


Team Issue - Textbook trials set-up - a steel frame, Maguras, small frame, short stem, wide bars. And outstanding color matching between the brakes, tires and grips.

Torrent - I really like Norco's spec - Marzocchi forks, Formula hydraulic discs, RaceFace and Panaracer Fires. This is an older one, and now the Torrent is Norco's "Shore" hardtail. I'm not sure that they make any other type of bike anymore. My apologies for the weak pic, but I like Canadian bikes.

Nitro - There was a time when the only bike Norco made was a steel hardtail with a plain, metallic paint job. That was about 1995. [edit] seriously, i swear that there was one year they had a steel hardtail at each component level, with a marzocchi fork, and they were all the same colour. just like this bike.

VPS 1 - This would seem to the bike to own if you ride super technical, North Shore style trails. At least in Canada anyway. This is one bike where that fork doesn't look out of place.

TNT - Another excellent Norco hardtail. This is probably the first time I've ever seen yellow RaceFace cranks look good on a bike.

Nishiki

Nishiki started out pretty early in the game, and had a moment in the sun when they were the cheap way to get your hands on the technological advancements made by Richard Cunningham at Mantis. Though I guess this wasn't enough to keep them in business for too long.


FS2 - This FS2 was the poor man's way to get their hands on a Mantis Profloater. And this one is authentic 1993 right down to it's Rock Shox Mag 21 and the original XTR group.


Alien - The Alien came in two forms; the exotic bolted together steel and aluminum frame, and the less expensive, all-aluminum welded one like this one here. I like this bike because it has both the new forks and V-brakes, and the old SunTour cranks that were OEM in 1991.


Alien - What I said for the previous Alien; forget it. Here's the third Alien - a steel frame. This one is all original too, just like the last ten years never happened.

Mountain Goat

Mountain Goat was another one of the first custom mountain bikes that everybody wanted. They had crazy paint jobs and were named for some of the first mountain bike races. They eventually went out of business, but not before taking a shot at the Easton tubed aluminum race bike that everybody made in 1996.


Whiskeytown - This is pretty neat bike actually. It's got the old skool geometry and paint job, but modern brakes and derailleurs.



Whiskeytown - The same bike as the one about, but a better picture. Stare at that paint and be transported back to the 80's!!