Cjell here with a quick report from the field on my latest prototype bike model, the Monē Hachita. I’m still dialing in the details but have released a few protos into the wild. The new/forthcoming frame featured here was just built up by my friend Bailey Newbrey. For those unfamiliar, Bailey is the owner/operator/janitor/DJ of Sincere Cycles in Santa Fe.
The new bike is one we’re working on over here at Monē. The current Monē line-up has a slack/playful hardtail with very big tire clearance, a drop bar with very big tire clearance, and a gravel bike with just big tire clearance. In many ways, these thru-axle, disc-braked bikes are superior to this new bike. In all ways, really, save one: ultimate retro compatibility.
Hachita
The Hachita comes from my love of all the old stuff and rim brakes. I think those race-cross Vanillas with cantilever brakes are so fly. And Ronnie’s Crust builds. Or Chapman or Weigle… I wanted to do something that can be built like those bikes, with whatever choice hotness is in the parts bin. An old Chris King headset? A set of Campy Record hubs? Funky Paul Brakes? Yes, yes, yes! Throw a parts bin at it!
Nerd alert! For the following six paragraphs, I’ll be speaking exclusively in colons. Say you have a blank slate: you have X old part… How do you use it? Well, I’ll break it all down for you.
Spare Parts & How to Use Them: A Guide
Brakes: V (linear pull), canti, roller cam, center-pull, high pivot, disc… How to accommodate all that without looking like a minefield of braze-ons? I took a page from the On-One Inbred and Voodoo with removable canti posts and made them modular, mounting to the frame on two of three M6 HD bottle bosses per side. I kept a relatively low pro clean setup when removed for disc or coaster setups. For Bailey’s bike, as photographed by Prolly himself, the brake is in the 700c canti/v brake position.
If you switch the sides/ flip and slide to the top two braze-ons, the plates line up for 650/700 high pivot position for Paul Racer, Shimano U brakes, and, yeah, Rollercams. I’m currently working on some center pull, and road caliper brake bridge dohickeys mounting cool brakes like a Mafac center pull. If you’re into stopping, the frame also takes discs with a low-key ISO disc mount (change my mind in the comments).
Hubs: 100/135 (130 plays) QR, bolt-on. I thought about rear dropout inserts to take thru-axles, but I already have bikes that do that, then the semi-horizontal front opening little tensioner dropout is just too classic.
Wheelsize: With the brake plates in the prototypes, the frame/fork takes 650b/700/29er setup and clears 64mm of tire with all the road cranks I’ve tried so far. I’d probably run up to a 29×2.1″ tire. I will have a 26er plates too. I’m just messing with the bottom bracket height to ensure everything is gravy with that wheel size. My goal is to see if I can’t cheat it up a tiny bit without totally fucking the standover height that is already tight from being horizontal on the size M-XL. Someone suggested an eccentric shell and I’ll offer a soft pass. We’ll see what Matt “Monumental Loop” Mason says after throwing 26ers on his XL. That’s big Long Haul Trucker energy… and daddy like.
Tubing: Sizes small and medium are slated to have double-butted oversized tubing, while the size large and x-large will sport double-butted double oversize. This will ensure the bike still maintains the skinny steel aesthetic but will be able to handle a rack setup without going to noodle town. We’re using Taiwan tubing, so we’re not wasting money on a Reynolds 520 sticker for tubing made in the same place. The headtube is lugged, and the seat cluster is bi-lam with filleted stays and TT. The bottom bracket is also filleted. This allowed the most luggy goodness without going to full lug jail. The seat tube on the S/M should be 27.2 i.d., the L and XL are 29.4 with supplied 27.2 shim—easy!
Headtube: Brazed lugged (34mm), 1 1/8 compatible. I will be able to thread the 1 1/8 steerer tube, use a big nut to tension the stack, and use a shim to set up a quill stem, but I was thinking of all the dope Shimano 600 road bikes with dope parts and no tire clearance, could donate their quill stem, and bar without undoing the bar tape. Mind. Blown. Threaded or threadless, the Hachita does both. All that said, I’d still recommend a threadless setup over threaded because, yes, it’s better. See you in the comments 1″ quill diehards!
Geometry: There’s a 51, 55, 57, and 60. French fit AF. Sporting 445mm chainstays to make room for all cranks and tires. 67mm bb drop (might go a hair less), 71º HTA for S,M,L, and 73º XL. 54mm offset to return a little sport back into ol’ Hachi.
Cranks: Road or Mountain, room for big rings or triples on reasonable spindle lengths. Square taper to 30mm spindles.
Color: Mauve (pictured here) and Ochre, with a cream headtube. Needs a cream panel on the seat tube and maybe some cool little accents I don’t even know about yet. Thoughts on the color? I figure I’ll do 2/3 painted and 1/3 raw with a clear coat for folks that want to paint their own or clear it to show off those fillets.
Hachita… Continued
So this article got a little techy but lots of “tech” is packed into this bad Betty. I find the engineering challenge to be fun and rewarding. It’s not just a new bike, for new bike’s sake. It’s not the next standard that isn’t quite compatible with the last. It’s the opposite of that. It’s backward compatible.
The Hachita is a bike that’s more Erocia than expensive. It’s more receptive than deceptive. It’s more co-op than REI. It’s a frame that can take old parts, makes an amazing gravel, dirt, trail bike with the clearance that old steel just didn’t quite have. It’s a slave to the aesthetic but drips with function. My vision for these bikes is to have them serve as a pretty high-level self-expression medium for some crunchy bike people and I am very excited to see the directions people take them.
I was a little worried about talking about the Hachita before folks could buy them, but the nature of the diverse builds my friends are doing right now to test these out are just too good not to share.
See more at Monē Bikes.