Originally Posted by
waterbugg
Good point - I think a suspension fork would probably mess up the Pangea's geometry. Which leaves me thinking the Pangea is not the bike for this trip.
Thanks for the pic. My husband will be taking his Thorn Nomad on the Divide tour. What suspension fork did you use on the trip pictured?
I assume your husband's Nomad is the Mk II version that is designed to take a solid or a 100mm travel suspension fork.
That is a Rock Shox XC28TK. I was looking at slightly more expensive forks when I found that one on ebay that was new, I put in a low bid and got it. I wanted a suspension fork for that trip of 4 days, I did not know if I would ever use a suspension fork again so I was not looking to pay very much. That fork worked just fine for that 4 days.
A critical factor in selecting a fork for the Nomad would be length of steerer tube that you need. I saw a lot of used forks on Ebay that had too short a steerer tube. I used the Rock Shox with an uncut steerer, yet I still use more steerer spacers on my solid Nomad fork than I could use on the Rock Shox fork. I have a 590M size frame and as you might have noted in the photo I had the accessory T bar for my handlebar bag mount, that consumes some steerer tube length too.
Some of the other suspension forks also did not take V brakes. I assume your husband's Nomad uses V brakes on the front, staying with V brakes for both forks would be a lot cheaper than having to switch to disk brakes for the suspension fork.
I was in a group of 10 riders, the others in our group either owned full suspension bikes or rented such bikes for the trip. I had the only non-full suspension bike, but I wanted to see how the Nomad would work, that is why I brought it. There were a few places with some rough bedrock where the full suspension guys flew past me, but for most of the ride it was pretty comparable. I found the ability to downshift a Rohloff to be an advantage over the other guys with derailleurs, I could downshift much faster since a derailleur bike requires some distance to complete a downshift which might require a few wheel revolutions.
If you look at the Nomad brochure, it becomes pretty clear that they recommend that if you are using a suspension front fork, you do not try to carry much weight on the front. That could be a factor for your plans. Although it is possible to put front panniers on a bike with a suspension fork, that does impact how well it works. The issue is minimizing unsprung weight with suspension. Thus, I would not rule out the Pangea yet, if you need front panniers you might find that bike would meet your needs just fine.
I was using 2.25 width tires on the trip in the photo. What width tires will the Pangea take?