Appleman gave us a teaser in our Road to NAHBS preview, but his custom 29er still had a few surprises. For starters, it was sitting atop the prototype ENVE carbon rigid fork.
The frame itself was made for a 250lb, 6’4″ guy, so it comes in around three pounds and is the strongest tube set builder Matt Appleman offers. He uses a custom tube maker in Minnesota, which lets him get a specific diameter, wall thicknesse, layer count and layup for each bike and it’s rider.
But the tube set wasn’t the only thing making this bike tough…
Black Kevlar was added on the surface of the chainstays and bottom of downtube to protect against impacts.
Certainly a much more elegant solution than wrapping an innertube around it.
The non-drive side thru axle section used a full carbon dropout with the reinforcement shaped like an apple.
The logos on this one were titanium.
This frame was around $4,500, which is about average for his frames and includes your choice of carbon, ti, stainless steel or wood logos.
He also had his usual assortment of road and cyclocross bikes on hand, the latter being his most popular build. This one was for a state champion rider that had been punishing it for a full season and it still looked good as new.
The customer designed the graphics for his CX bike. Yet another of the many benefits of a full custom build.
The road bike had stainless steel logos with the face slotted cut to resemble the grill of a classic car the customer liked.
