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Taro?

30K views 78 replies 23 participants last post by  in-vico 
#1 ·
Anyone one one yet? What's the bike weigh?
On paper this looks like my next ride, just waiting for some feedback.
Thanks.
 
#69 ·
Well, I went ahead and set up my Taro with a Race Face 32 NW chainring and it was AWESOME!!!

No problems running the stock chain length with the entire chainguard removed. I did manage to brake my chain on the trail, so I had to shorten the chain a full link and now it rides even better.

I think the chain needs to be run short on the non clutch derailleurs, like very short. In the largest cog I have maybe one or two extra links of cage "stretch", the cage is adjusted to be close to the large cog, so tight tolerances.

I am adding a bash guard to protect the chainring and to prevent an drops to the outside. I tried to add a "hook" on the inside top, but the seat tube weld at the down down tube kept the hook from dropping low enough to be effective. I'll probably make my own as someone has done on the NW thread.

Initial set up was stock except for:
RF NW 32t chainring
Fleegle 15deg sweep bars
RF 70mm stem
Ergo cork
WTB V
Nuke Proof Electron Pedals

Okay, so how does the bike ride? Well, the short CS and slacker head is a different kind of beast, so it should not be set up like an XC bike. I ran mine intially with a 70mm stem (stock is 55mm) and it just didn't handle well, felt akward and had a mind of it's own. Yesterday I went back to the stock stem and what a difference! Handling was awesome, so good that I am going to try a shorter stem 40-45mm this week :)

Changes to come:
The front Ardent 2.4 is kinda akward, likes to wag and can be a handful with the slacker head angle, but the rear Ardent 2.25 is just a little to skinny to get good grip, so I'm thinking of a lighter 2.2-2.4 tire on both ends, Ikon, new RR, ...
Shorten the stem and see how things change.
Seat, either get used to the WTB Kona braded Lazer (?) or get a Brooks C17 "rubber seat" (I have one on order)
Seat post, it's kinda short (350mm), so I have a 400mm on order, though I am contemplating a Thudbuster or a dropper. I don't think a dropper will help as I am riding terrain that chanes so quickly that a dropper would be useless, but I really want my seat out of the way... the 350mm post is long enough for most riding, but not for doing miles of climbing.
The Alivio Shifter is garbage! I'll be swapping to an XT 9sp or similar.
Also looking at changing brakes, the Avids Elixir 1 are fine, but I prefer the feel of mechanicals; hydros are so quick and don't modulate well.

Overall the Yaro is a reall nice bike, esp for the price, so I'd say skip the Honzo unless you need a slider and like the extra weight. The aluminum frame does not ride harsh in the least bit, and the slightly longer (10mm) CS still ride quite quick, perhaps better than the Honzo :eekster:

The 120mm Rockshox TK fork is not bad, at 200# I'm running 120psi with -2/3 to the slow side of rebound, works fine, lock out is decent, not a heavy fork, flex is not noticeable. The Revelation would be nicer, but it's a lot of $$ and really wouldn't be worthwhile for what is essentially a fancy BMXer ;)

I'm under 30# as it sits, with lighter tires/tubeless I could easilly hit 28#, maybe 27", not bad for low end running gear and no CF stuff :)

If I were looking to build a short CS bike, this is a nice frame for not much $$

I am riding a medium, 6"/32" inseam, and other than needing ~20mm more in the seat post, this bike fits fine. Standover is not great, a large is 1" taller, TT is quite long and with the bike wantiing to ride with a shorter stem, I can't imagine getting a large. There's a guy riding the a medium Honzo who is 6'3", and though that's probably tight, it is more doable than you'd think.
 
#71 ·
Besides the CS sliders and 142mm axle on the Honzo, there seems to be some very small difference in geometry.

1) the Standover in some sizes (S and M sizes are lower on the Honzo.)

2) the chainstay lenght which is 420mm(Taro) versus 415mm(Honzo)

3) And third difference, here is my little analysis...
Kona's website Geometry's dont seems to be very acurate For the Taro. 2013 and 2014 numbers are still the same when the 2014 Taro geometry is now dialed with a 130mm fork! (120mm for the Honzo)
I believe this to be because of the low stack height of the internal headset on the Taro.(versus external headset on the Honzo)
Internal Headset has about 4mm stack height(bottom cup). And I have found Honzo's FSA external headset to be something like 13,4mm tall. So 9.6mm difference. There is the 10mm travel difference in forks! So with the same fork, a Taro will have the front 10mm lower than a Honzo.(this must be the case of the 2013 Taro with a 120mm fork)

I think the original 2013 Taro geometry(120mm fork = 10mm lower front) is the main reason for the "theorical" 3mm longer Reach and 7mm lower Stack versus the Honzo.

So,
I truly believe that if you put a 10mm taller HeadSet bottom cup on a Taro, The only geometry difference is the 5mm longer chainstay, and this not seems to be a negative point considering that some people already prefer there Honzos with sliders at 420mm for better stability and tire/mud clearence.

I am myself considering a medium Taro buildup with "zero stack" headset and X-fusion Trace 140mm fork.(+8mm total front height versus a stock 120mm honzo).

But considering that some peoples reports pedal strikes on stock honzo and prefer a 140mm fork to avoid strikes, I am thinking about the option of a taller bottom cup or even an "angleset" which ad 10mm in height plus, why not, something like 0.5 degree slacker HA.

And for rich people, another nice setup can be a Taro with zerostack headset and a 150mm Pike ;-)
 
#72 ·
I have ridden both in a parking lot, so not much to compare, my Taro is a 2013, so it has a 120mm fork. I don't know that I'd like an even slacker front end (as it would be with a 130mm fork), it is already a little on the "waggy" side of life. I have a 45mm stem on the way, so I'll try that and see how it handles, also got an Ardent 2.4 for the back.

In terms of choosing one or the other, from the standpoint of a frame up build, the Taro is just as nice as the Honzo, but lighter, though it uses a standard rear wheel QR/axle. For a complete bike, The Taro has a strange mix of parts, 20mm thru axle, standard QR rear axle, but otherwise the parts list is not bad, esp if you can get it cheap. The Honzo has a much better fork, slightly better componments, but geometry and ride is the same: seat, tires, stem, bar.

I tend to break stuff and upgrade, didn't need the sliders, so I spent less now so I could change things over time. I do wish the TK were a little nicer fork but it works, so maybe the fork is the biggest thing in deciding Honzo vs Taro? Though, isn't the Taro spec'd with a TK gold and 15mm thru axle for 2014? That might make the decision easier :)

So pedal strikes, yeah, these bikes have very low BB, the Taro runs 170mm cranks to help overcome the hits, but the pedals are low. But in comparision to an FS, a low BB is a relative thing. I don't think this is a game changer, a low BB handles better, so it just depends on what you want. I prefer handling and having to take care on pedalk strikes.
 
#74 ·
Taro is absolutely fine with the Sektor 120. Wouldn't want it any slacker at all for what it's good at, and I'm used to much slacker bikes. Jack the front end by 30 and it'd wander all over the farm.
Also running 175 cranks and having no issues with strikes.
 
#76 ·
Maybe, offset could change the feel, BUT it would not change the geometry nearly enough to compensate for jacking up the front end an additional 20mm.

I concur with Haggis, a more slacker front end would not make for a nicer riding bike, so if you insist on running a bigger fork on these frames, it'd be worthwhile getting an adjustable angle headset.

120mm is enough for a hard tail, any more than that and there is just too much geometry change, might as well have an FS, but to each their own. It's an expensive "chance" to spring for a fork and not get a good ride, many bikes are spec'd for a fork so they have a certain geometry... don't wanna spend a bunch of $$ only to make a bike ride worse.

I have recently ridden a number of similar bikes from Canfield, a custom frame builder, and a custom Honzo, each has a slightly different feel in the front end. Realizing that there are tons of variables involved in tweaking feel, the custom and the Canfield are running 140mm forks and did not feel to slacker at all. The frame up custom Honzo SS was running a 120 mm Fox fork and it felt more sluggish than it does with the 120mm Revelation; a different offset?

On an aside, I replaced my stock rear Ardent 2.25 with an Ardent 2.4 EXO last night, and lo and behold that rear tire is a thin sidewall wire bead version weighing in at ~800gms!! Unlike the Honzo, this bike gets the cheap rear tire, so upgrading to a 2.4 didn't add any weight :)
 
#77 ·
Nice info about the stock tire weights!

About Geometry, just think what is the result if(as an example) you build a Taro with a 140mm X-Fusion Trace... Look, first, the Trace is 2mm "axle to crown" shorter than a Revelation/Sektor. Second point is that going from 120mm to 140mm doesn't mean that you will be 20mm higher. This is because during the ride these 20mm will be sagged too. So when you are on the bike, 20mm travel upgrade will convert to 14-15mm in height increase. Substract from that the 2mm of the shorter X-Fusion Trace and you are at 12-13mm over 2013 stock Taro and only about 4-5mm over a sagged 2014 stock Taro OR any stock sagged Honzo!(remember that with the same geometry, a Taro has 10mm more "room" for the fork than a Honzo -> see previous posts in this thread about zero stack lower cup and new 130mm 2014 Taro)

So these 140mm are obtained with only 4-5mm riding height increase over a Honzo or a 2014 Taro where lot of happy Honzo users are riding with the taller Fox 34(5mm longer than Rev and 7mm longer than Trace), which means 19-20mm front height increase over stock riding height and about 1 degree slacker front end, and again, most of these users report clear benefits in the general handling of the bike.

So my little empyrical research tend to say that a 140mm Trace upgraded TARO is still a very conservative build. (only 4-5mm front riding height increase versus 14-20mm for most builds in this forum).



Now something more subjective is that, looking at the builds, I am starting to think that the point of view difference come from the fact that most Taro USERS seems to be more XC oriented than Honzo USERS, and probably they chose the Taro over a Honzo because of the 2lbs lighter frame, but the fact is that besides the 10mm headset height difference these two frames have the same geometry.

So, if there is a lot of 140mm Honzo happy users, then there can be a lot of 150mm Taro happy users too.


P.S. sorry for my bad english, I am still learning...
 
#78 ·
I suppose a fork with more travel would be fine for some people, But this bike is not really a "big hit" bike, it's more attuned to a big boyz bmxer with some really big hoops.

I ride in East TN, it's very rugged, lots of rocks and roots, goat path kind of trails, real single speed country, and the Taro is a great bike to rip around on. I don't really need a lot of suspension because the speeds are moderate, for the most part a fork takes the sting off and keeps the tire on the ground.

If someone wants a big fork, it makes me wonder why they don't want rear suspension to boot. A big front end that squishes a long ways is not gonna be all that fun, the geometry will be poor except when the fork is fairly compressed, but this compression won't last long, so for most of the ride the head angle will be super slack, too slack.

Ideally a hardtail would be ridden full rigid to take advantage of the constant geometry, adding a fork is a compromise not matter how you slice it, whereas FS is designed to work together. Just my take, for all it's worth, I just wanna make sure readers don't make a mistake and think big forks make a bike ride better, it's generally the opposite unless the frame is designed for the longer travel fork.
 
#79 ·
Like you said its just about the kind of terrain you use to ride, if you ride most "flat" trails, 120mm is more than your needs. But if you ride MOUTAINS, because we are talking about "All-MOUNTAIN hard tail" frames, 140mm is just right on a 29er. Just look these 650b hardtails with 150mm forks and 66° Head tube COMMENCAL BIKES, ALL MOUNTAIN HARDTAIL, HT, NEW, 2014, 150MM, 140MM, 130MM, AM, ENDURO

Of course in all mountain riding a FullSuspended frame will be faster in the DH, but a lot less FUN! This is why there is some AM riders which are selling theirs FS bikes after riding a bike like the Honzo. The big travel in the front "directive" wheel make you feel confident, and the rear "direct", or more "connected" rear wheel let you "feel" the mountain without slowing you too much. There's where the FUN comes from, in the hills and in the downs.
 
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