Carbon Enduro Gearbox Bike - The Zerode Taniwha

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The new Zerode Taniwha in all its native NZ glory. This is one of two bikes fresh off the production mold ready for testing.
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Rob Metz, Zerode's founder, with his new baby.
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No more high pivot idler as seen on some prototypes and on the DH bike.
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A Pinion gearbox makes the bike go, and the linkage-driven single pivot is built around it.
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She looks fun to ride to us!
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A beautiful rear wheel. Rear wheels can be built dishless since there is no cassette or freehub to worry about. This means the wheel is stronger and ready for smashing.
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The Zerode DH and the new first production Taniwha built up.
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The carbon frame and refined gearbox put the Taniwha in a competitive weight class.
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65-degree head angle, 160mm of travel. Reach for the large is 445mm and the medium is 420mm. An XL frame is coming soon, too.
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Shifting is done via a grip-mounted twist shifter.
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It goes to 11. In fact it even goes to 12, a number soon to be popular with more than just the Pinion gearbox.
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Made to pedal.
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Carbon details.
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Clean down low.
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The bike that started it all.
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Mike Metz (Rob's brother) and co-owner of Rotorua's world-famous Bike Culture bike shop will be riding and testing this other prototype.
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Can you wait 3 more months? We can...barely.
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Metz rides an XL but this is a medium, so don't worry about the off-sized pairing. Mediums and larges will be the first to start shipping!

Zerode's Rob Metz shows off the first production samples of his new carbon gearbox trail/enduro bike called the Taniwha. The Taniwha features a Pinion gearbox and more traditional "faux bar" suspension design. The bike has a 65-degree head angle, gets about 160mm of travel with reach for the large at 445mm and the medium at 420mm. He's hoping the bikes will be available for purchase in about three months, starting with medium and large sizes and an XL coming in the near future.​ We like it!

Photos and story by Sven Martin

See the high-pivot carbon prototype from 2014.

Related:
Gearbox
Zerode
Enduro
Trail / All-Mountain
27.5
41 comments

View replies to: Carbon Enduro Gearbox Bike - The Zerode Taniwha

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maximumradness
8 years ago
This bike is the hyphy shit!
Seriously, can we all just accept that it is about time for a new battle: the 12-18 speed wars are here, and bikes like this will bring the heat!!!! Yeah, a higher pivot/trigger/lack of pulley thingy-- would have been rad. but I'll take any step towards the future at this point.
When zerode wins: we all win.
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Primoz
8 years ago
The cranks would have to be custom since the mounting points on the axle are further appart on the pinion than on normal bottom brackets if I see correctly. Also, the axle is not mounted to one of the cranks with the pinion.

As for electric shifting, that would be possible, but there's little point in developing a system with such a small potential customer base.
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Roots_rider
8 years ago
With the RF arms being removable from the spindle I feel like pinion could pretty easily machine a spindle that had the RF spec for just the arms. Would knock off a fair bit of weight for all the people that complain about the gearbox weight.
Di2 would just be the icing, haha. Simplify the shifter setup a bit.

I would love to see the industry move this direction, get that shit off the rear wheel. It's going to come down to which of the "big 2" is willing to play. Seeing as you'd be killing off a huge part of the market by doing away with deraileurs and cassettes...
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big bear
8 years ago
If you need to use grip shift for the pull of the cable in either direction, and you need two cables, why not replace the grip shift with a left and right thumb paddle shifter? That would seem a little more ergonomic to me. Grip shift seems to be one more reason why the masses don't like gearboxes.
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Kidnotorius
8 years ago
Yeah i really need to test a gripshift before buying one. With that said the bike looks incredible
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Primoz
8 years ago
So you're going to press the left and release the right shifter (or vice versa) at the same time? Where are you going to find a 12 speed right hand side shifter with the correct cable pull? A better question, what about the left shifter with 12 speeds?

The reason for two cables is that the mechanism is actuated (by the cable) in both directions. Standard derailleurs use springs for the return action.
If i wanted a trigger shifter (and i would want one, if i had a Pinion), i'd take the upcoming Sram 12 spd shifter, take the cable from it into a black box and route the two pinion cables out of the box. inside the box would be a simple rotary 'gearbox', adjusting the cable pull ratio between the input and the output (the input and the output would just be fitted to different diameters, simple stuff), which would also be spring actuated, to pull both sides of Pinion's cable.

The simplest solution would be to just incorporate a torsional spring into Pinion's gearbox itself (by Pinion of course).
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aurech
8 years ago
Solution for Effigear is like that: on one side there is a traction spring, on the other side, SRAM trigger with 9 speed. So that's possible Wink
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Primoz
8 years ago
One side, other side? Traction spring?

The 9 speed pinion has the gears spaced zoo far appart I think. You need the 12spd.
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csermonet
8 years ago
I wouldn't get too hung up on the fact that its grip shift. If this bike proves to be even half as popular as the Zerode DH bike, you can be sure that someone/some company will come up with some sort of trigger shifter mod.
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bturman
8 years ago
Heck yes.

Awesome to see wide bearing/axle spacing on the main pivot. ISCG tabs and dual ring setups have held that area back for far too long.
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Primoz
8 years ago
Come to think of it, are there any gearbox/pinion carbon enduro bikes out there??
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chasejj
8 years ago
Totally bummed. This is not at all what the Zerode fans were waiting for.
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YoYo
8 years ago
Will still have amazing bump eating capabilities without the noise and drag of an idler. Should pan out to be a great balance of compromise.
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hissijono
8 years ago
Feel the same way. High-pivot with 100% anti-squat and a gear box might be just too good thing to materialize. Another chance would be enduro-version of Commencals dh-frame, but can't hold my breath with that coming to reality either. Also sad to hear that they need to design frame to not to confuse people, I thought Orange Bikes and others with non-linkage singlepivots were catering fine for those people...
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MrPlow
8 years ago
Although they played with the idea Zelvy will never release a bike Colin.
There is another company in Aus working on a high pivot enduro and gearbox DH bike though I hear.
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bradleyjreece
8 years ago
Really? And what data do you have to support that? For me, this is the only thing of interest from Zerode.
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Primoz
8 years ago
I was expecting a high pivot bike as a Zerode should be. I'm slightly disappointed by this :/

EDIT: i understand that this probably caters to the masses, which should mean more frames sold and more money in the bank. Which is a good thing for any company, even more so for one like Zerode. But still, high pivot? Tongue
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norbar
8 years ago
I don't think a super high pivot makes sense on a 160mm frame. I get it that some people want a bike that has plowability close to a dh bike but it takes all the fun out of having a smaller, lighter more nimble bike. For me enduro bikes have to be more agile so you get to play around more on them.
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aurech
8 years ago
Not the first, you have Nicolai with Pinion, Cavalerie with Effigear and probably others that I don't know
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Primoz
8 years ago
Maybe he meant the first of many Zerodes? Or the first of many carbon enduro gearbox bikes? Smile
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sspomer
8 years ago
he does not say specifically in audio, but says it's competitve to existing bikes. we'll update if we find out specifics.
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sspomer
8 years ago
Sven just said Mike's build (the black one in the pics) with "big EXO tires" is coming in around 30lbs.
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kperras
8 years ago
The tires shown are 2.3 Minions which is standard fare still as the Wide Trail tires haven't become commonplace yet. The team here at RMB approves of this bike, weight be damned.
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antgreen
8 years ago
I am looking forward to an actual weight. Quick addition of typical component weights, include 1.12 gearbox and monarch and you get more than 30lbs. I wonder if 35lbs is considered close to 30lbs? Personally, I am fine with 35lbs, I just want to know how this is possible. Can you drop out 5lbs with a full-douche (enve etc) build?
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Dave_Camp
8 years ago
Straight from Pinion's website: http://pinion.eu/en/p1-12-gearbox/

WEIGHTS
Gearbox 3 2350,0 g
Rotary shifter 95,0 g
Crank arms „CNC“ 175 mm 4 434,5 g
Crank arms „Forged“ 175 mm 4 481,5 g
Chain tensioner (Federstärke: 2,5 mm) 5 122,0 g
Chain ring 30t 51,0 g
Chain ring 24t 37,5 g
Gearbox Spider 104 mm 40,0 g
Rear sprocket 26t 37,5 g
Rear sprocket 21t 29,0 g

So gearbox is 5.1 lbs by itself. I think you could take a 'normal' carbon bike build, add 4 lbs and be pretty close to the total weight.
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antgreen
8 years ago
That's a more efficient way to look at it. For the record, my addition was wrong. The build would be closer to 25lbs, not 30.
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YoYo
8 years ago
Actual weight is slightly misleading, as the gearbox moves weight from the extremities(think of leverage) and places it low and centered porviding stability and agility. So it'll throw around nicely and by being in the right gear more often by not having to fuss over when to change to avoid pedal strikes, you will probably have saved energy by the end of a ride.
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