Mountain Biking - 2004 Norco Torrent A Good Bike>?

Hey everyone...just looking around the market for a new bike...I started a thread a while ago about two bikes with full suspension, but now I am sure Im looking for a hardtail. Ive been looking around at some of the hardtails out there, and the bike that really convinces me is the 2004 Norco Torrent. The bike includes many of the top of the line parts for a freeride bike; Truvativ Holzfeller crank, the SAINT Rear derailleur and Hub, along with many more aweosme parts. Folks at my LBS have shown me this bike, its the top of the line for the Norco hardtails. Does anyone own this bike...or have ridden one. Also do you think there is a better more suitable bike out there. I want to get into Urban Freeride / some trail riding also, and want to do some jumping along with drops. The bike includes a Marzocchi JR-T fork with 8" hayes dics front and back....any advice or opinons would be great!...thanks!

It is an awesome bike. Can't say much more. The geometry is incredible for a fr ht. In reality Norco and Kona were two of the first companies to adopt the fr ht geometry. Short chainstays, sloping tt and short height. The bonus with this bike is you are getting a jrT and it still comes with rapid fire shifters with the saint deraileur. That is great. Personally this would be a bke I would buy if I didn't already own one that was close to it.

speced...there really isn't anything better. Maybe try specialized, but if I remember it still isn't speced as good.

I bought a Sasquatch last year, lowend version of the Torrent. I'm not too impressed with it, I'm normally a cross-country rider and so far I busted the BB in half, destroyed the pedals, broke the back wheel numerous times and basically wrecked the frame in the chainstay area because the POS has no tire clearence at all, those were the stock tires that it came with too. You might think that I'm a hack, but this was all riding cross-country trails that I have no problems flying down on my hardtail cross-country bike. I find that it handles like crap too, generally not too happy with it.

No offence but there is no comparrison. The only part good on the sasquatch was the fork, and 2003 were bad for clearance.

You complained about all the parts. What size tire were you running? Norco usually fit a 2.7. The rims that came stock were garbage and would have broke under the easiest of conditions. That bike is marketted to someone with little cash but can upgrade later. Either way the Torrent is in a whole other league.

well mmmm I feel a little bad now buying the holeshot :/ doesn't even comes with the Saint derailers

The bike came with 2.35s, they barely fit. The rims are actually not bad, it's the spokes, should have at 36 spokes and all 14 gauge stainless for the riding it's intended for. I talked time and again about black spokes and they are on every new bike practically. Basically the coating wears off in the spoke elbow after a short while and they develope play and eventually break. Also Norco uses a wheel building machine to make the wheels for their bikes, it incorrectly tensions the spokes. The owner of my local LBS has toured their factory and told me he wasn't impressed with the way things are done there, especailly the wheel building, and on nearly every Norco they sell, they have had to do warrenty work on the wheels, just not built correctly. The pedals I'll admit where a POS to start with, but they should have lasted longer then a week before the bearings went in both of them. I tryed to repack the bearings and gave up after I noticed that the bearings were nearly square after I took them out. Norco speced a XC bottom bracket in the thing which pretty much goes along with their whole operation, still it should have held up to more then two weeks of cross country use before the entire thing broke in half inside my bottom bracket shell. Having a mountain bike frame with 1/8" of tire clearance is ********, what happens when someone decides to ride in the mud? Also the torrent has the exact same frame as the sasquatch, I was going to buy one instead, but by the time I sold my other bike they had sold it. Lucky because I wouldn't have wanted to sink in $900 more for the same troubles. This isn't the first Norco I've owned, a long time ago I bought a Norco cross country bike, it was nonstop trouble too, I had thought that they had progress slightly, I guess not.

well mmmm I feel a little bad now buying the holeshot :/ doesn't even comes with the Saint derailers

Its not that big a deal. They don't stop breakages which is the point behind them.

flybyu...sasquatch was worth less than 1000$...the parts were crap and the frame was strong. You are the only person I have ever heard complain about 2.35 wheels. I assume there was something else wrong or what you are calling a problem is a common thing (like deep gouges removing paint)...either way the torrent is in a different league and I have seen 2.7 tires in the bike and they fit fine. They have the same clearance of 90% of the other freeride bikes I know of.

The pedals you got were (or should have been) wellgo bmx pedals. Those are wicked pedals, and about the only ones I use on my ht or dh bike. If you had a problem with them it would be bad luck, not a bad spec.

I blew my bb out in 2 weeks on my roast. I would never say that was a bad bike. I got the bike because it was cheaper than the chute. If I had gotten the chute the parts would have lasted longer but I would have payed 500$ more.

You think Wellgo BMX pedals are good??? That explains alot, take them apart one day and look at how they are made. No seals at all, bearings riding right on the aluminum pedal body, yeah steel bearings on aluminum races, good idea. No bottom bracket on earth should break in half in two weeks of light trail riding. Also it is pretty ******** that they spec a XC BB on a bike that is ment to be ridden hard. Also the Sasquatch retailed for $1500 last year, I got mine for $1300. Yes there is a tire clearence issue, go to MTBreview.com and you will see that I'm not the only one who thinks that it is ******** that they didn't design the frame better. I haven't snapped the frame in half yet so I guess it can't be all bad. Basically the only good thing on the whole bike as far as I can see is the fork. Also they do dumb stuff like put a 22 and 32 ring on the front, why even have a fr. derailer? You can climb trees with a 22 on the front. I took mine off and put a bash ring on instead, threw the crap fr. derailer out and the shifter too. Less stuff to go wrong.

ooops...my wellgo's are sealed. And to be honest I don't take things apart for the sake of it. They have lasted on my ht for 3 months and then my dh bike for a month :D...and this is for a 250pound rider that isn't smooth :) I went through 6 pedals before I found a set that lasted a month, and that includes a couple of high end sets.

Most fr ht's come 22 and 32. Its pretty standard (Most kona's, Norcos and specialized come like this). With a bashring on the outset. Personally I love the 22 for trials type moves etc... You seem to be complaining a lot about things that are pretty standard on a low end fr ht (2004's have seen more improvements due to the sudden dj craze :)). (excluding the clearance issue which if it was an issue would suck ass)

hey Maelstrom....what kind of bike do you have:)

I think he has a 2002 Kona Roast, am I right?

I have a specialized bmx, Kona Roast 2002 (I don't think I have an original part on it) and a bighit for dh (slowly getting rid of all the original parts. Ironically all of them were bought in different years but they are all 2002's. I just kept getting good deals on them.

whoah thats awesome....the bighit is asmazing too.....and a kona roast....thats sweet...you sound like your rihg tinto biking(Y)....I hope if the torrent is the right bike for me...I can go for some of the bigger stuff:)

I enjoy biking a lot. I am not that good but like the challenge.

I would take a look at the torrent and ask the shop to throw a 2.7 tire in. If the clearance is actually true I might just skip that bike. Tire clearance is a definate issue if you wanna go bigger on a ht. Big tires help lower the impact of a drop :)

I have no clue if it will fit or not...the bike comes with 2.5's, but you never know....

On another topic...I am wondering if the torrent would be right for urban riding...?....like taking some ledges....some hops...and so on....almost a bit of trials...do you think the bike is too heavy for this?....or is it in the weight range of most other urban bikes...the guys at my LBS told me it weighed around 40 someodd pounds....is this still kind of heavy to be whipping around?

I don't have any experience, but I did read alot and shopped around too, and from what I saw the Norco Torrent is more of a trail bike/DJ.

I've seen a few people around town doing urban with Kona Roast which is a comparable bike, or Brodie Holeshot/brut/bruzza

other than those most urban stuff I saw was with more trial specific frame.

These are 2003 reviews, I'm pretty sure the frame is the same for 2004, from what I've seen it is.

http://www.mountainbikereview.com/reviews/2003_hardtail/product_121556.shtml

i got a kona roast heh

www.freewebs.com/kona_roastbika