Benedikt Skúlason is the main man at Icelandic bike brand Lauf Cycles and he’s not shy of opinions.
In this episode of the Singletrack Magazine MTB Podcast, Benji chats to Benedikt about the origins of Lauf and what makes them stand out amongst the relatively conservative cycling scene.
For this Podcast we’ve specifically tried to stay on the subject of mountain bikes and mountain biking. There are plenty of other Pods out there about Lauf’s gravel and fatbike stuff. In fact, the best place is on Lauf’s own website – check out the Our Story section.
Click on the play button below for 25 minutes of mountain bike nerdery. Principally about the Lauf Elja but also encompassing subjects like tyre volume, single pivots done differently and why fancypants high-modulus carbon fibre may not actually be the best thing to make a mountain bike out of…
Really good pod and what he said made sense to me. I do like a single pivot bike though!
Interesting podcast.
Demonstrates why Orange have been ahead of the game for years with their properly braced single pivots and none of this high modulus prone to failure marketing stuff.
Orange Stage Evo 👌
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I was going to say the same. Wasn’t sure if it was an ironic post or not, but the number of cracked Orange frames appearing on the interwebz compared to other brands appeared very disproportionateÂ
Over the years I have had four Oranges and no cracks. Two friends I used to ride regularly with pre covid have had numerous Oranges and .. .. no cracks. Admittedly one of them is a bit of an Orange addict with, currently, four of them!
I have read about cracks in the swing arm and some have been quick to tell me they have also read about Oranges cracking .. ..Â
Edit: just checked, five of them.
Orange used to have such a low failure rate that they would use it in their advertising. What ever they did to the design of the rear drop outs or thickness of the metal around 2016-19 is what caused most of the issues with cracking and it’s that era that seemed especially prone. I’ve had five Orange full suss bikes and the only one to crack was a 2016 Segment which developed the usual hairline crack in the rear dropout and was replaced under warranty with my Stage 5.
They seem to be back on track now but that era certainly bashed their reputation.
Touch wood I’ve yet to break a carbon frame whether HM or otherwise. Current 27.5 carbon Zesty is 9 years old. However I broke both a single pivot alu and a multi- link alu, both at the dropouts pre through axle.
Any well designed frame that makes intelligent use of the material chosen and used as intended will give years of service whether single or multi pivot.
We all knew the old QR design derived from 1930s roadies was crap at the back and dangerous at the front.Â
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