Your thoughts on the Orange Alpine 160?

[Mudgey]

Hey guys, considering swapping frames to an alpine 160 frame 2nd hand, havent found one yet but i love the looks of the black with the ccdb shock. There are a few things that concern me and considering the frames cost a grand 2nd hand i gotta be sure its right for me!

1. How bullet proof are they? I have a kona stinky 09 and it can take some stick tho its heavy! I am still looking for a tough frame but it would be nice to save some weight.

2. How durable is the single pivot design? My stinky has 4 bearings and 2 load paths to transfer forces and resist bending moments where as the orange only has one connection with the front triangle. Are these single pivot designa troublesome or are they even more reliable?

My main goals with upgrading Is to shave some pounds, allow the use of an adjustable seat post and move to a smaller cockpit to make the ride feel more agile and flickable. I only have space for one bike so it kind of has to be a jack of all trades!

What are peoples thoughts on the alpine 160?

Many thanks, mudgey

[missing the VR6]

Don't really know what a Kona Stinky is but I rode a 5 Pro and an Alpine 160 about 8 weeks ago round Whites Level and much prefered the 5 as it was more fun and the Alpine felt a bit inert, although on the Black Run it was a blast, on normal trails the 5 was better.

Certainly for a AM/DH bike it didn't feel heavy and rode up the trail out of the car park there very well for the travel on offer. If you're after a 160 type bike I'm sure it's excellent, guess I'm more trail riding than DH/AM.

[Jimbo.]

Saw plenty of Alpines getting smashed about in the Alps last year. Rented one myself. No problems reported. Damn good fun

[deadtom]

Mudgey said:

1. How bullet proof are they? I have a kona stinky 09 and it can take some stick tho its heavy! I am still looking for a tough frame but it would be nice to save some weight.

it probably wont be as strong as your Kona, but they are certainly toward the more heavy duty end of the all mountain spectrum. ive used one in anger a fair few times, including DH racing, and never had it feel anything other than solid no matter what i was doing with it.

Mudgey said:

2. How durable is the single pivot design? My stinky has 4 bearings and 2 load paths to transfer forces and resist bending moments where as the orange only has one connection with the front triangle. Are these single pivot designa troublesome or are they even more reliable?

in my experience it has always been multilink bikes that have been prone to bearings wearing out. one of the main reasons orange still use the single pivot design is the simplictity and durability of it.
and even if it does lunch the bearings, there are only 2 of them to replace.

Mudgey said:

What are peoples thoughts on the alpine 160?

lightweight, tough, good angles for trail/am stuff, little too steep for full on DH, but of course thats not what the bike is designed for.

have you ridden single pivot bikes before though? they feel very different to linkage bikes like your kona

[-C-]

I think there are better 160mm travel bikes out there.

The frame is definately not light either. You're looking at 7lbs without a shock. If you put a CCDB on there it's going to be 9lbs.

They are fairly tough and simple though. Bear in mind if you want to use a dropper post on them, anything pre 2010 came with a 27.2mm seat tube diameter which limits you a lot in terms of posts available. The 2011 onwards bikes came with a 30.9mm seat post diameter, which opens you up to all the posts avilable.

Bearing wear, weill it's only got 2, but I wouldn't buy a bike on the basis that it may need a set of bearings (2,4,6 or even 8) once a year or so.

[Mudgey]

Hey guys, thanks for the replies. I used to have an saracen havoc years ago but cannot remember what it was like and i was only 15 at the time and since have only ridden multi linkage bikes, how does a single pivot feel in comparison to multi linkage designs? Has anybody tried both a kona stinky and an alpine??

[deadtom]

Mudgey said:

how does a single pivot feel in comparison to multi linkage designs? Has anybody tried both a kona stinky and an alpine??

thinking about it, i'm going to have to backpedal a bit here as your Kona technically is a single pivot, only it has a linkage to actuate the shock.
that being said, because of where the pivot point is located on the orange compared to where it is on your frame, they will still feel very different.
Its hard to describe the difference really, the main things i notice when riding frames like the orange is that they are good at taking square edge hits at speed, and tend to be quite stable, however when sitting and pedalling the pedal jack is noticeable. also when shifting weight backwards (eg doing manuals and suchlike) it feels like the frame is folding in the middle underneath me.
due to the angles involved, conventional designs like the orange also tend to have a falling rate progression, which is good for the aforementioned square edge hits, but not so good for single big hits as it can blow through the travel more easily.
this is one of the reasons manufacturers (like kona) often use single pivot with extra linkages for the shock, because that way it can be designed to have a rising progression rate, but still keep most of the benefits of a conventional single pivot.

tl;dr: technically your bike is a single pivot, but will still feel a lot different to an orange. if you can, ride both and make up your own mind.