GOrilla urban cycling is a mostly utilitarian bike company based in Zurich, and even though most of their frames are Italian-made they manage to still be pretty reasonably priced. A lot of that is a result of a pared down aesthetic with basic paint and the desire to keep things simple that leans them towards a lot of fixed-geared or internally-geared hub city bikes. But that is thrown out the window with the Swiss-made retro-lugged Nash track frameset. Spin past the break for a closer look…
Gorilla’s first lugged track frame, the bike takes its name from a limited run of the Nash lugset from the 1970s. The frame is then built with traditional road Columbus tubing, brazed in Zürich and finished in Berne. The Nash lugs feature some pretty unique shapes with a large hexagonal bottom bracket shell and flat sides on the seat lug that provide a nice base for some GOrilla-branding engraving.
The bike sticks with a 1″ threadless fork with a matching rounded point crown, a BSA bottom bracket, and 27.2mm seatpost. The 2750 CHF (~2500€/$2750) Nash frameset comes in standard geometry, but is made to order so does offer a good bit of customization like sizing (within the lugs range), rear spacing, and braze-ons. It also uses a brake bridge and a drilled crown to keep city riding functionality and the ability to run brakes. Frames are around 1750g painted, with another 850g for the fork with Campagnolo fork tips.
If a GOrilla sounds nice, but the Nash is too steep, their standard Italian-welded Hattara frameset is a more reasonable 845 CHF (~780€/$850).
Gorilla also recently teased us with news of a collaboration with Japanese saddle maker Kashima. The GOrilla x Kashimax deal could bring a bit better access to the sought after saddles at least in Europe. We don’t have many details, other than to say that three shapes of the classically padded saddles are expected to be available including the Aero (AX), the self named Kashimax (KX), and what may be the FiveGold (FG), each one in several of the almost 70 standard covers of the long running Japanese saddle maker.
