Cockpit Setup, Handlebars, Grips, etc

[XXX-er]

Your wearing them so whatever works for you

I have some ODI grips with extra ribs on half the grip ( for pleasure ? ) so i razored off the ribs to get rid of some diameter, the rough surface seems to give extra grip with these gloves which increase diameter of ones grip

https://www.watsongloves.com/wp-cont...e-753x1024.png

No leather at all, foam padded palm and those big chunks of rubber on the back are great if you smack a tree with 800mm bars and only 26$ at the chainsaw store, i can pretty much punch a wall wearing these

I gave up on mtn bike gloves and I am liking a work glove but you gotta try them on to get the right feel

[bagtagley]

Main thought is don’t take grip advice from randos on the internet. My hands are small so fat grips give me all sorts of trouble and I’ve never met an Ergon grip I didn’t hate. Grips are relatively cheap and comfort is critical. If something doesn’t work, move on until you find something that does.

I like silicone grips cause they do a great job of damping vibration and I can get a decent amount of material without having to run a grip that’s too thick. Removal is more difficult, but not really if you have a compressor. YMMV obviously.

[XXX-er]

Main thought is don’t take grip advice from randos on the internet. My hands are small so fat grips give me all sorts of trouble .

well IMO read > 1 artical & form a consensus^^ from multiple things you read

But yup, what i found with paddles is if the shaft is too fat for my hands the paddle never just lays there in my hand, instead I gotta hold onto it for hrs at a time in cold water which gave me tennis elbow ( 5 times) and wearing gloves made the grip fatter & the situation worse

[rideit]

the shaft is too fat for my hands

Tee hee

[XXX-er]

sensitive stuff beavis

[BigHerm]

Small hands here. When I use thicker grips (GE1, WolfTooth Karv Cam) I get hand soreness/fatigue. Thinner grips work great (GE1 slim, GD1 slim).

I am running Spank Vibrocore 31.8 bars at 760 and I freaking love them. I used OneUp 35 clamp and they were fine but I was also running Karv Cam grips and armpump was a problem at the bikepark. Never tried OneUp with thinner grips at bikepark but I was over them due to my propensity for crashes and decarboning my Madonna.

[skinipenem]

I like the carbon OneUp and Enve bars I have owned. I had a stock carbon Yeti bar on a new bike last year. Holy fuck that thing was harsh.

As other's have said: You are probably running your bars too wide. I've gone down to 760mm....I have run 800 which is stupid. I'm a smaller guy anyway, but you lose so much control of the bike with super wide bars. Imagine doing push ups at the gym with each hand 3 inches wider than your shoulders. Just stupid.

I'll take on the grips thing as well cause i'm in a mood: Super thin rad bro dirt jumpy grips are also stupid. "Dude they look cool!" Yeah and you can feel every pebble the front wheel hits and your hands hurt all the time for a reason. I went with really fat grips for a while and then found the holy grail:

https://revgrips.com/

Run those in size large and you will not want to run any other grips ever again.

I have revgrips on a dh bike and do not like them. Too large of diameter for my girly sized hands. The grips have a vague feel to them due to the suspension function.

On my dirtbikes, I use the protaper full diamond single density grips. Smallest diameter grip. Downside is poor grip of they get wet and muddy vs the half waffles.

I don't get arm pump, but used to before I figured out how to hold onto grips lightly.

Grips are truly personal preference.

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[skinipenem]

https://youtu.be/TQN-i9Vk4XA

Aaron Gwin cockpit setup. Pretty good watch.

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[goldenboy]

Trump sized hands here, can't stand the thicker grips, they jack up my hands and forearms. Like others, I go thin

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[XXX-er]

The Perfect Cockpit Set Up by Aaron Gwin

[beaterdit]

Small to medium hands here, 5'7" with +2 ape index but relatively narrow shoulders.

Grips:
Issues with thick grips. I used to use ODI OURY lock on grips. I thought I liked them being a bit thicker, eventually went to Rogues when I couldn't find OURYs anymore, they were a bit better. Tried ESI silicone, liked the regular ones pretty well, tried the Extra Chunk and they fucked up my hands bad, went to their slim version and they were the best of the three. Now I'm on Wolf tooth Razer, thinnest silicone grips available, they're the best yet.

Bars:
Went from narrow to 780 to 800 back to 780. They're prolly too wide but they feel good. With 800s I did notice I was at the limit of my range of motion a lot. My hands are always at the ends regardless, even hanging off a tiny bit, even when I ran lock ons grips. Went from narrow alloy to 780 Funn Fatboy Alloy to SixC Carbon 31.8 to SixC 35 to Chromag BZA 35 to We Are One "Da Package" 31.8/35. Had progressively worse arm pump from SixC 31.8 to 35mm, better with the Chromag BZA now totally gone with the WAO.

Funn Fatboy Alloy (OK?) had arm pump but it thought it was just par for the course
Race Face SIXC carbon 31.8 (pretty good) moderate arm/hand pump
SIXC 35 (BAD) severe arm/hand pump.
Chromag BZA 35 (OK) were better but still moderate to severe arm/hand pump
WAO "Da Package" bar/stem (best) my problems are literally gone. They're an engineered layup 31.8 carbon bar with an alloy shim up 35mm for use ONLY with their (77 designs) one piece stem. Kind of a pain in the ass with the one piece stem, no cross compatibility, and expensive but, best upgrade I've made in a while. Very precise, very noticeably damp, very light (not a big concern) but DH rated. The real deal.

Brakes:
I rub them far inboard with my shifter/dropper remote. So just my index fingers reach easily and my thumbs barely reach the shifter/dropper remote. I don't like any interference with my other fingers or thumbs. The angle of my brakes has been climbing but I can't go full horizontal. Prolly about 20-25 degrees down still. I run the bite point relatively close to the bar. Code RSCs exclusively.

[Duffman]

Question re: bar roll. Should the angle of the bars at baseline before tweaking for preference be aligned with the HTA / steerer tube , or from 90 degree vertical ?

[Spats]

It's important to remember that lock-ons are much harder and absorb less vibration than normal grips, because a substantial part of what would normally be grip material is taken up by the hard plastic sleeve. They're nearly guaranteed to make your hands hurt.

I like silicone grips cause they do a great job of damping vibration and I can get a decent amount of material without having to run a grip that’s too thick. Removal is more difficult, but not really if you have a compressor. YMMV obviously.

Silicone grips are the best. Most people complaining about "harsh vibrations" in handlebars wouldn't notice or care if they ditched the lock-ons and used a pair of ESI, Wolf Tooth, or other silicone grips. (Or at least some old-school Ourys.) They're never slippery and don't slowly disintegrate while leaving crap on your gloves. And they come in sizes, so you can be happy whether you have baby hands or NBA hands.

It's funny how people demand endless time be spent on stem and saddle positioning to the half-inch, but the part of the bike you literally hang on to gets no attention whatsoever. Big hands need bigger grips, small hands need smaller grips, lock-ons are convenient for swapping parts but will make your hands hurt.

Fun fact...a syringe makes silicone grips easy to get off, especially if it's the right size to fit a WD-40 or chain lube straw into. Just inject water as far under the grip as you can, and they'll spin/slide right off.

I just know many people personally who complain about hand pain and they are running these paper thin grips simply because they look cool and not cause they actually work well or are comfortable.

This x10.

[volklpowdermaniac]

all i know is every time i build a new bike or get a new bike it takes a solid anywhere from 5 to 13.9765 rides of neurotic tinkering to get it right ,, and once it is, i do not fuck with it other than brake angle which i also overthink but much more frequently. its rf next r 35 carbon770, 20 mm rise, o rise stem 50 mm, ergon ge 1 slim, on all my bikes, if its not all the same it messes with my head. im very curious to try these new age comfy carbon bars or whatever the cool kids call it everyone worships, but im way too neurotic and scared to change to something that didnt have the exact same back sweep and angles and stuff

[Andeh]

I tried some of those silicon foam push on grips (Wolf Tooth I think) a few years back, and fucking hated them. The surface texture was nowhere near as grippy as rubber so my hands were rolling forward and back, and 1 little spill where I laid the bike over tore a quarter sized patch of the end of one. I literally cut them off at the end of that shuttle run and went back to lock ons for the next run.

I could see push on rubber grips (like Renthal Super Tacky) being ok, but the foam ones are stupid for aggressive riding.

Like VPM said, now that I've found a setup that works for me, I will duplicate it exactly on the next bike.

[toast2266]

Bigger grips = more hand fatigue and arm pump, at least for me. Thick squishy grips feel terrible to me. It's like putting a gel saddle on my handlers.

[volklpowdermaniac]

Bigger grips = more hand fatigue and arm pump, at least for me. Thick squishy grips feel terrible to me. It's like putting a gel saddle on my handlers.

^this. For me too. As Bart so eloquently put it “anything slim”

[bagtagley]

Silicon grips last a good while if they’re installed a skosh in from the end of the bar with the end caps installed to protect the bar. I haven’t torn a grip in a while. My riding is more playful than aggressive, though, so maybe that’s helping.

[Boissal]

Silicon grips last a good while if they’re installed a skosh in from the end of the bar with the end caps installed to protect the bar. I haven’t torn a grip in a while. My riding is more playful than aggressive, though, so maybe that’s helping.

That's what I do as well and I haven't destroyed grips all season, something I used to do all the time. And that's while taking a number of fairly rowdy falls where the bike bounced away on its own.
Lately I've been wrapping the very end of my bars with a narrow strip of electrical tape so I notice if my hands creep outward. The tape feels completely different from the grip and it tells me my pinky is perfectly positioned to caress a tree next time I misjudge a line.

I had a pair of ODI Dreadlocks sitting around that I decided to try recently. Lock-on version of the ODI Vapor I like a lot, slightly thicker. Made it one ride before taking them off. Larger diameter with what felt like 1/4 of the padding. They may look cool but they are worthless in terms of ride quality. At
twice the price...

[XXX-er]

i tore the ends of yeti and SC grips laying the bikes in the truck so i like lock-ons with double rings which take all the abuse of the bike being on its side, also I like the mechanical aspect of a grip that is screwed to the bar, I don't get sore hands from skinny lock-ons and of course

looking cool is the most important

ymmv

[El Chupacabra]

I tried some of those silicon foam push on grips (Wolf Tooth I think) a few years back, and fucking hated them. The surface texture was nowhere near as grippy as rubber so my hands were rolling forward and back, and 1 little spill where I laid the bike over tore a quarter sized patch of the end of one.

Same experience here, but with ESI grips. No grip, slippery, terrible feel, tore nearly immediately - which was no great loss.

Grips should be round, rubber, thin, and grippy.

[Boissal]

You guys riding without gloves? Foam grips feel really weird with bare hands and the tiniest bit of sweat makes them super slick...

[funkendrenchman]

Any favorite grip for smaller hands.

I have ESI Chunky's and can't really complain, but I might check out something different.

As far as the ESI's go, I wear gloves and have no issues with grip. If I don't throw my bike on the ground they last just as long as any other grip.

[XXX-er]

You guys riding without gloves? Foam grips feel really weird with bare hands and the tiniest bit of sweat makes them super slick...

I want the pertection when I smack a tree cuz of the 800mm bars so I wear work gloves with big chunks of rubber on the knuckles, also good for punching walls or the odd bar fight

[Falcon3]

Revgrips? I’m super curious, heard enduro/park bros rave about them.

Me and my bike are heavy anyways and I’m spending a lot more time at parks and in heavy chunk. Recs?