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| Original advert, note the fork and disc brakes! |
There have been many things written about the Mountain Cycle San Andreas, pioneer, classic, icon, while all of these are true they have been extensively written about before, so here is only a brief history lesson.
Mountain Cycle was formed by Robert Reisinger and unleashed the San Andreas in
1991. He brought for the first time a monocoque full suspension frame with
adjustable sub frame, suspension fork and disc brakes. Just one of these would
of been remarkable but all of them together...
The San Andreas first came on my radar when a UK journalist called Paul Smith
had one, it featured as a full page poster in MBUK and was/is the only picture
of a bicycle I ever had on the garage wall. I loved the fact it looked like a
500cc GP motorcycle with the engine removed, ultra tech and ultra cool in a
world full of steel rigid bikes.
In 2003 the company for which I work became the UK distributer for Mountain Cycle, so I had to have one. We sold the frame set in two guises, DH with a 190mm eye to eye shock (Van R or Van RC) or XC with a 165mm (Float RL or X-Fusion). So a San Andreas XC in red with an x-fusion coil shock (cheapest option) came my way.
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| My first San Andreas, note 'official' VPS shock position |
When we took over distribution of Mountain Cycle the production had just moved
to Kinesis USA, but most importantly all of their frames were all still hand
made in Mountain Cycle’s traditional Portland home. The frame featured an
up-rated cartridge pivot bearing, a new VPS new shock shuttle and was
compatible with a new bolt on fork stop to prevent damage to the frame caused
by triple clamps.
How Mountain Cycle described the San Andreas at the time
(1993). “The most versatile all-mountain high-performance frame in the mountain Cycle
line. The legendry San Andrea is the bike that started it all. Twelve years
after its introduction, the classic design is optimized, refined, and in high
demand. The San Andreas can be built up as a lightweight yet extremely durable
4.5 inch travel XC bike, or as an all-mountain machine with six inches of
travel.”
At the time there was a very negative magazine test, mostly
targeting the high b/b height. Being a US made bike it was actually designed
that way for rock clearance, however this felt a little weird for the UK tester...
This led me to experiment with the VPS shock mount to see if I can ‘iron’ out
some of the frames weaknesses and to get it to handle more like the UK norm. The
official MC line at the time was that the bottom two holes were exclusively for
the shorter XC shock, while the upper two holes were for the longer DH shock.
In the owner’s manual it did actually say not to use the upper holes with the
XC shock, but I thought that if you could it would lower the b/b height to a
reasonable level...?
I proposed my idea
directly to the factory and they replied that they could not see any reason why
you could not use the XC shock in the upper shock mounts, so they told me to
have a play to see what happens!
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| VPS mount top hole, 165mm shock |
I ended up at the highest shock hole with the smaller 165mm
shock; this dropped the b/b to 13” and slacked the head tube to a more stable
angle with a 100mm fork. For me this gave the best compromise and is a set up I
would whole heartedly recommend to try, the bike will only have 4 ½” of travel
but the improved handling will by far compensate for this. Another set up
option that works well when using a 140mm travel fork is the second hole from
top with the 165mm shock.
I sold my San Andreas and moved on to other things, but the
bike always had a special place in my personal cycling history... Until one
night on the internet I spotted a dealer selling a new-old-stock 2003 model on
clearance, the price was so cheap it was insane, I had to have it. I rebuilt
the bike using the same ultra-rare Marzocchi RAC carbon fork for a modern take
on the original ‘Reisinger’ look. I will never sell this bike; it is now part
of me.
One new upgrade I have made that makes a massive difference is
to swap out the old FOX Float to a ROCO Air LO, more modern damping keeps the
back end in check and because the ROCO is a low pressure unit it has enabled me
to lose about 50psi of pressure.
In summery the San Andreas is now old tech, it has a high
pivot, it bobs a bit and doesn’t have much travel ... Of course none of these
matters, cycling is about much more than that. In a world of big corporate
cycle companies with instantly forgettable models the Mountain Cycle San
Andreas still stands out today as something very special.
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| note: 140mm fork set up, VPS mount second from the top, 165mm shock |
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| singletrack hunting |
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| What's better than one San Andreas? Two! |
