No problem, I'll be happy to answer all tech questions. Please not in the style "it looks like a tractor, so it will surely ride like one ?"... but more in-depth.
This is not some weird concept that comes falling out of the sky, we've been developping these bikes for 4 years, invested almost 1 million Euro in the development, we've tested in over 20 countries and on all sorts of terrain. The website for the moment is rubbish but the new one will go online in about 10 days time. The article here comes a tad too soon in fact.
Our main problem is that we're being compared to the Surly Pugsley and other "snow" bikes. A Sandman bike can ride on snow as good as any of those tour bikes, but it's conceived as a bike for the agressive trail biker. As a (and I know I'll be getting a lot of comments on this
), as a "fully killer", it really runs circles around any AM fully...
There are 8 different wide tires to choose from, ranging from agressive "MX" tires to 3.8" wide slicks which are killer for city, street or sand use. If you put in 29ers wheels (with the adapted rear hub) you basically have a very fast 29er hardtail, which you can bring down below 10kg. You can even mount a road or cyclocross bike on the same frame.
As a touring or expedition bike it's also perfect: simple mechanics (no rear suspension linkage) and extremely comfortable. Cobblestones feel like rough asphalt, it's less tiring than any fully on long stretches.
Our slogan is "Change Trail, Not Bike"
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The forks were co-developed with German Answer. From their standard Flame model there's not much left: it's for 29er wheels (the fat wheels are 26", but with the height of the tires they're effectively 29"), no more travel reduction, different valving, wider fork legs to accomodate the wide tires, but with new dropouts you can still run standard 20mm thru-axle hubs ... They weigh about 1900 grams, again: the looks are beefier than reality.
Just to say that Sandman bikes don't come falling out of the sky as a goofy project, they're very well thought-out, terrain-tested bikes. And hopefully here to stay, we'll se we can get a few testbikes running around Germany soon