Introducing The Ranger Plus

Unless you’ve been hiding from the long arm of BTR social media, you’ll be aware that we’ve built a rather special bike for the 2018 Grinduro Scotland race. It’s something we’ve been asked about plenty already, and even built a few custom frames, so we’ve jumped on the opportunity to build the Ranger a wider sibling; the 650B+ shod Ranger Plus.

For the Grinduro event, BTR has been supported by Columbus tubing, SRAM, WTB, Fabric, Hunt Wheels, Chris King, Fat Creations and Alpkit, all under the watchful eye of The Bicycle Academy. We’ve been provided with almost every part of the build, which has given us room to play with some things we wouldn’t normally use; a tapered head tube and pressfit BB, GX Eagle drivetrain, insane paintwork, prototype tubing…the list goes on. It’s been an opportunity for us to experiment with some things which wouldn’t normally make it onto a production BTR. The race should be a great test of the Ranger Plus’ endurance credentials too.

What’s it for and what can it do?

The Ranger Plus borrows geometry and some of its construction from the Ranger, but is tweaked to fit and extract the best from big tyres. This shifts the focus from outright speed up and down hill, to pace over longer distances in comfort…while keeping as much of the Ranger’s handling intact.

The Ranger Plus is a little lighter, a little less stiff, and a little less strong than the Ranger, but we don’t expect you to throw it down an EWS stage like you might a Ranger. The Ranger Plus keeps the 120mm of fork travel from the Ranger though, since this still gives a great balance of performance up and down hill.

If the Ranger is an ‘enduro’ bike, the Ranger Plus is probably an ‘all-mountain’ bike

Geometry

When can I get one and what will it look like?

We plan to make production versions available in the coming months (around August or September 2018), once we’ve had time to fully test the prototype and make the necessary changes to the design for production.

While we don’t expect to change the geometry significantly, tubing selection will certainly change; with probably only the seat stays remaining in their current form. We’ll certainly do away with the pressfit BB featured on the Grinduro build! That said, we’ll be selecting tubing to do a very similar job to the current spec, so the production version will look quite similar to the Grinduro prototype. The biggest visual change will probably be reverting to a straight 44mm head tube, to maximise fork compatibility and reduce stack height.

EDIT 06/02/2019: The Ranger Plus frame is now available to buy! Configure yours >

How much will it cost?

Pricing will be similar to the standard Ranger, though with materials yet to be finalised, we can’t say for sure just yet; somewhere around £1000.

EDIT 06/02/2019: The Ranger Plus frame is now available to buy! Configure yours >

Can I get a frame bag too?

Of course! The good folk at Alpkit (and many other awesome custom bag manufacturers) are ready and waiting for your order. We’re hoping to at least streamline the order process with Alpkit – taking care of templating and specifications.

Our Grinduro prototype has a direct mount bag – secured to an array of bottle bosses within the front end. This is by far the neatest solution visually, and reduces the risk of the bag (or straps) wearing the paintwork. This is a feature we’d love to carry over as an option on production frames.

What about that paint!?

The Grinduro prototype was painted by Fat Creations, again specially for the grinduro event. All logos are painted on, under the lacquer. If you want something like this, we can arrange your frame to be shipped directly to Fat Creations, so they can work their magic.

More questions?

Contact us for further information; [email protected]