The obligatory box shot. Two weeks from order to delivery. At the door no taxes – just $40 brokerage!!! Carefully guarded. Don't even think about it - running would be futile. Second guard in the background is on a break.
Mrs. Gib even contributed to the process – she chose the colour – pebble grey. And proudly wearing a made in China label. What’s strange is that it means pretty much the same thing as made in Italy
.
Paint and some resin overlapping the brake mounts. Fork was worse than rear. Sorted the rear with some careful file work to reveal a well faced surface. Interestingly, I mounted the front caliper right over the paint and it was dead square.
The bottom bracket window – these guides run full length and are attached to the entry grommets at the front of the frame. Without them, threading cables would be a serious challenge. A note about the bottom bracket shell – again too much paint overlap, and again, careful file work revealed a nicely prepped surface.
Heavy duty rubber protector (wildly out of focus) for the bottom of the dropped chain stay. An excellent touch not mentioned on the website, and not seen in various G2 build videos. Well done Winspace
This thing is covered in mounts. An adventure bikers dream.
Some of the mounts have bolts installed, others are just open threads – that’s not good, could end up full of crap and corroded. So added a touch of class while I was filling holes.
Here’s a problem. Clearance with 48/32 chainrings on road crank is basically nothing. Winspace sells one of their builds with Shimano 105 50/34 crankset. I call BS. Not good. Gravel crank on the way.
Another issue. Space for the rear tire is limited on the size XS. Winspace was very clear about this. Still it’s a dumb design. The slightest reconfiguration of the top section of the seat stays would solve the issue. Whereas all other size can take 50mm plus, Winspace says 35mm max for the rear of the XS. The tire in the pic measures almost 38mm. 40mm should be fine. Not concerned as Mrs.Gib walks at the first sign of technical terrain anyway. She refuses to mountain bike – says it is exactly the same as hiking except that you are also carrying a bike
.
Cable mayhem. But it’s how it must be. Note the Campagnolo barrel adjuster – best of it’s type IMO. Necessary as the RD has no barrel adjuster. Also, note the crossing of the shifter cables in front of the head tube (I like to cross the streams
). Remember those cable guides, they had to switch sides to accomplish this. Very difficult task because they were attached to grommets that could not be switched. But with such a short stem, the cables simply cannot handle the tight bends required if they are to enter the same side of the frame as the shifter. And they would rub on the headtube. Still, my advice with regard to the G2 would be leave the guides as is and route cables accordingly on a larger frame size with a longer stem.
Wheels are WR36 on some older Industry Nine torch 2:1 hubs, CXray, brass nipples. Bearings replaced with SKF. A really gorgeous wheelset.
Sram XX RD with 11-36 cassette. Shifters are original Sram Red 10 speed that had been sitting in a drawer for at least 10 years. Crank is temporarily Praxis Alba, but will be replaced with Sram Rival Wide 43/30.
Full build
Final verdict is that I am very please with the Windspace G2. Even with the minor problems, the basics (alignment, tolerances etc.) required for a problem free build ranged from acceptable to very good. As for how it rides, I’ll never know. What I do know is that it is damn stiff. I tried making the chainring contact the chainstay by wrapping my hands around the crank arm and chainstay and squeezing – didn’t move at all. Twisting the bars only flexed the bars – the fork is dead solid.
Aesthetically the shape is a bit weird but still attractive. The colour is excellent. Paint quality seems very high. Metallic silver graphics are very classy. Oddly I am not as repulsed by all the mounts as I thought I'd be.
Sorry no weights. Too impatient.
I didn't look jet if it would even pass under the alloy sleeve.
