old mountain goat

Slackers, made by Vince, the guy who machines parts for Intense Bikes, is a new product designed to take your Uzzi and Socom and make them a little more downhill friendly. What they are exactly is replacement dropouts that bolt on to your bike. They are very simple to install and if you understand how they are bolted to the rear triangle you will have no trouble with the install.

So what makes them different than the originals? The rear axle position has been moved rearward and upward resulting in a longer wheelbase, lower bottom bracket height, and a slacker head tube angle. Your next question is going to be by how much. Keep reading, we are about to get to the hard numbers.

I have an ’06 Uzzi VPX.

• ’07 Marzocchi 888 RC2XVA forks with heavy springs and stock, flat triple clamps
• ’08 Cane Creek Double X Flush headset
• ’07 Fox DHX5.0 shock with a 550lb. spring

I set front sag at 25% and rear sag at 30%. I have the forks set to the max line to help reduce head angle.

Stock measurements:

• Head angle – 66.5 degrees
• Bottom bracket height – 14.25 inches
• Wheelbase – 44.375 inches

Slackers measurements:

• Head angle – 65.5 degrees
• Bottom bracket height – 13.875 inches
• Wheelbase – 44.750 inches

Obviously those are some very good numbers. 1 degree on the HA and a sub 14 inch BB height are the most obvious benefits. Let me add that at this point I installed a 165mm FSA Gravity Light crankset on my bike. I had previously been running 175mm Saints and had been having a bit of a problem bashing rocks with them. With the lower BB height from the Slackers I knew this needed to be addressed.

Setup changes:

I double checked my baseline setup after the install and found I was a little deeper into the sag than I like in the rear. An additional 3/4 turn of preload solved that. Bouncing the bike it felt a little softer in the ass end but I wasnt about to change anything based on static bounce tests. I had a little time before dark so it was time for a test ride.

In the seat:

The changes in the bike are obvious from the time you throw your leg over it. I’m an old guy and I come from a motocross background so I like to sit “in” my bike. The stock Uzzi always made me feel like I was on top of it, not part of it. The Slackers go a long ways to putting you into the bike. The handlebars are now in front of you rather than below you and when you corner you dont feel like you are tipping over. Very cool indeed.

The Ride:

Ok, now for the good stuff. I have to pedal up to get my downhill run so I can comment a little on how the Slackers affect the climbing. They dont. Period. An Uzzi set up for downhill isnt a light bike so ANY change made to the geometry isnt going to help or hurt enough to bother commenting on.

When I layed the bike into the first turn of my first run I had a strange sensation. Instead of feeling like I had to lean the bike to keep it from tipping over, I leaned it which made it feel like it sucked into the ground. I figured I was just imagining things so I really threw it into the second turn. Same thing. I kept going into the turns with less and less brake and about mid run I finally got it to drift on me. Now Im no expert rider by any means, much closer to being a beginner, but the increase in downforce and grip seems to be right about 20 -30% over the old set up. And its a very solid feeling, not an ‘oh crap’ kinda feeling. When it did finally drift both tires slid at the same time and by the same amount so it seems the weight distribution is very good.

The second half of the first run and the entire second run was dedicated to suspension settings. The last third of the run I was doing is small whoops and rollers. Very good for setting your suspension to keep the tires in contact with the ground. The first pass through this section it seemed like the rear tire was tracking slower. Along the order of the rear tire staying in the air longer than it should after an obsticle. My guess is I was feeeling the longer wheelbase and the associated linkage geometry change. The bike also felt a little out of balance front to rear. At this point I wasnt sure if it was spring or dampening but I found out rather quickly.

I didnt figure out the change in wheel rate associated with the Slackers install, but I went with the assumption that it wasnt enough to require a spring change so I started messing with the shock compression and rebound settings. The bike felt a little mushy on the backend compared to the front end. Sitting there thinking on all this I was tempted to reach for the compression knob to stiffen the rear a little bit but I was worried about losing the cornering balance that was so amazing. So after a few minutes of using the three good braincells that I have, I backed off the rear rebound two clicks then pushed off. All I can say is wow. The rear tracks the ground so well its amazing and a side benefit was that you can hit some serious ruts while cornering and the bike doesnt care. It holds the line you give it.

Let me add one last thing for the moment. I will be updating this little report as time goes on because its very hard to draw a solid conclusion based on a first test, but if the first ride is any indication, Slackers are just a bad ass part that you need to have as they take a great bike and make it amazing.

Update 3-14-09:

Managed to get in 3 runs today on last weeks downhill course at Fontana. I wanted to see how the bike performed in the heavy braking bumps that develop during a race weekend. Im actually shocked at how well the Uzzi is performing. The braking chatter is almost unoticable.  There were a few turns that also had deep braking bumps right at the apex of the corner and again the bike rips right through them. The bike has become so much better than me it’s embarassing.

The low bottom bracket height really seems to help keep your weight low. I was thinking that the longer chainstay dimension might make the bike slower when whipping it around tight corners but this turned out to be untrue.  Im having a tough time finding something to complain about with these dropouts.

Only change on the bike today was one more click of compression on the forks to counter the g outs and sharp corners with fast entry on this particular course.

Update: You can find Slackers and Vince at Powell Precision.