My New Sonder Mountain Bike.

[chriswoody]

Whilst I was away adventuring in Switzerland, this rather large box arrived from the U.K.

So now I'm back I was able to open it up and bring out my new Sonder Frontier. I've decided I needed to try a hardtail mountain bike so I can set my goals on some more adventurous off-road touring goals in the coming years.

The Sonder is an aluminium framed hardtail with a SRAM NX Eagle 12 speed group set and a 100mm travel RockShox fork. I took it out for a quick spin today and it felt really good, looking forward to some interesting adventures ahead now.

 

[ianrauk]

Love the colour

 

[Cathryn]

It’s beautiful

 

[Cycleops]

Lovely, just a shame they couldn’t get the decals straight. Maybe fitted after a boozy lunch break?

 

[Sittingduck]

Looking good

 

[chriswoody]

Thanks folks, it is an interesting colour for sure. I wasn't too sure when I ordered it but looking at in real life it's definitely grown on me.
@Cycleops who needs straight stickers in there life, besides I can't see them when I'm riding it!
Another thing I wasn't expecting was the Goodyear tires, it's advertised as having WTB tires, but looking online reveals that not only do Goodyear make MTB tires, but their apparently rather good as well, so I'll have to see if that's so.
So I just need to get out and set up the front shock properly now.

 

[Cycleops]

They’re meant to be like that Chris, just pulling your plonker . Enjoy.

 

[Aquilo]

Two of us have just come back from riding the Great Divide mountain bike route on ours. Fully loaded with camping/ touring gear, absolutely rock solid performance. Just a put a new chain on mid ride and one set of brake pads on one bike and that was that.
the 1x Sram system never missed a gear change or require adjustment despite some challenging conditions at times.
Enjoy yours.

 

[chriswoody]

Cool, good to hear they traversed the Great Divide, that must have been an amazing adventure.

My future ambitions are not quite so ambitious, but I am set on riding the Highland Trail 550 on this one, though not the event itself, just a more leisurely ride in a couple of summers time.

I already have SRAM 1x on my gravel bike and like with you, it has never skipped a beat, despite seeing some challenging conditions. A lot of folk on this forum can be very scathing of 1x, but for me it was an automatic choice when choosing this bike.

 

[Aquilo]

To be honest the HT550 is probably harder than the Divide, certainly harder on the bike I suspect.

 

[HobbesOnTour]

A bit late but wanted to wish you and the new bike well.

I'd love to see a pic or two when you have it loaded up and out on adventure.

I'm also curious on the front suspension. How often does it need to be serviced and how straightforward is that?

Happy riding!

 

[Milzy]

Very cool bike for c.c usually something like an old Dawes on show. Nice.

 

[chriswoody]

A bit late but wanted to wish you and the new bike well.

I'd love to see a pic or two when you have it loaded up and out on adventure.

I'm also curious on the front suspension. How often does it need to be serviced and how straightforward is that?

Happy riding!

Thanks Hobbes.

Front Suspension, yep that's a pain. Technically it requires a 50 hour service and a 200 hour service. The 50 hour service is for lower legs, so remove them, clean the foam seals and replace the oil. 200 hour is a little more involved with the seals in the top stanchions, I need to look into this a bit more though, these modern bikes do need a lot of TLC from time to time. I Suspect the 200 hour service will be yearly, I don't know though I've never really tallied up how much time I spend riding before so I've no real idea how many months it will take to chalk up 50 hours let alone 200.

I thing I was agonising about prior to purchase was fork travel, was 100mm enough or do I need 120mm? in the end I swung for this bike for a bunch of other factors and figured I'd be fine with 100mm. Intriguingly it turns out that with Recon forks, there are a bunch of spacers inside the fork that determine the length of travel, remove a spacer whilst you're doing the lower leg service and viola you have 120mm travel. The downside is that the bike frame geometry is optimised for 100mm and funny things might occur if you start playing around. One to ponder for another day I think.

With regards to longer tours as well, my plan is to just service the forks prior to going and then just not worry about it. The Highland 550 for example will be longer than 50 hours riding time, but it's not like the forks will self destruct at 51 hours so it will be fine.

Loaded up pictures might be a little while, this needs to be set up in a different way to the Kona and whilst a number of bags will just fit both bikes, I'll need to re-think my set up and buy a new frame bag, maybe for christmas!

 

[HobbesOnTour]

Thanks Hobbes.

Front Suspension, yep that's a pain. Technically it requires a 50 hour service and a 200 hour service. The 50 hour service is for lower legs, so remove them, clean the foam seals and replace the oil. 200 hour is a little more involved with the seals in the top stanchions, I need to look into this a bit more though, these modern bikes do need a lot of TLC from time to time. I Suspect the 200 hour service will be yearly, I don't know though I've never really tallied up how much time I spend riding before so I've no real idea how many months it will take to chalk up 50 hours let alone 200.

I thing I was agonising about prior to purchase was fork travel, was 100mm enough or do I need 120mm? in the end I swung for this bike for a bunch of other factors and figured I'd be fine with 100mm. Intriguingly it turns out that with Recon forks, there are a bunch of spacers inside the fork that determine the length of travel, remove a spacer whilst you're doing the lower leg service and viola you have 120mm travel. The downside is that the bike frame geometry is optimised for 100mm and funny things might occur if you start playing around. One to ponder for another day I think.

With regards to longer tours as well, my plan is to just service the forks prior to going and then just not worry about it. The Highland 550 for example will be longer than 50 hours riding time, but it's not like the forks will self destruct at 51 hours so it will be fine.

Loaded up pictures might be a little while, this needs to be set up in a different way to the Kona and whilst a number of bags will just fit both bikes, I'll need to re-think my set up and buy a new frame bag, maybe for christmas!

Thanks, @chriswoody
I find forks to be very confusing and suspension forks particularly so. My first touring bike had (cheapy) front suspension that I just locked out.
Maintenance is an issue for long tours, I suppose, I'd be confident that the service intervals are conservative. 50 hours at five hours per day is ten days. Based on your Travelogues it's not an issue for you but something for folks to consider.

Sorry, I didn't mean to put any pressure on you for pics. Lots of fun ahead checking out Frame bags. Enjoy!