Kingdom Ronin clamps a tiny titanium stem to your enduro or trail bike

Written by Cory Benson Jan 04, 2019 12:20 p.m. ET

Kingdom Ronin machined ti titanium mountain bike stem 31.8mm 35mm zero-rise enduro trail bike

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It’s been too long since we last took a deep look into Kingdom Bike’s catalog, but their new titanium Ronin mountain bike stem reminds us to pay attention. Joining machined bits & with tiny welded tubes, the no-rise trail stem comes in both 31.8mm & 35mm clamps to fit any modern geometry mountain bike. Oh, and with Moonmen’s included shim, this would be a great match for that new ti FuelMoonRiser flask, er, handlebar…

Kingdom Ronin titanium mountain bike stem

Kingdom kicks off the new year by opening a pre-order for the new Ronin stem. But don’t fret, this isn’t some far-fetched Kickstarter scheme. The stem is in production now, and its first run will be shipping to early buyers already in the first week of March.

The 155€ titanium Ronin stem will give you a nice, stiff and compact cockpit and add a little high-performance jewelry to the front end of your bike. It comes in both polished ti for that ‘full bling’ look, or raw so you can see the colors of each weld.

The zero rise Ronin comes in two sizes – 35mm long to fit 31.8 bars, or 40mm long to fit larger diameter 35mm bars. Stack height on either stem is 38mm (shorter than the pre=production samples show by about 7mm) with opposing bolts on the steerer and a two-piece/4-bolt face plate. Claimed weight for the CNC’ed & welded tubing stem is just 139g & 140g, respectively.

A limited pre-order has just opened up for 125€ a pop direct from Kingdom to get in on the first run. Use code: IAMRONIN at checkout now to get the pre-order discount.

KingdomBike.com

Cory Benson

4,160 articles

Cory Benson is the EU Tech Editor of Bikerumor.com.

Cory has been writing about mountain bikes, enduro, cyclocross, all-road, gravel bikes & bikepacking for over 25 years, even before the industry created some of these names. Prior to Bikerumor, Cory was a practicing Architect specializing in environmental sustainability, has designed bike shops & bike components, and worked as a bike shop mechanic.

Based in the Czech Republic for 15+ years, he is a technical mountain biker, adventurous gravel rider, and short & medium-haul bikepacker. Cory travels extensively across Europe riding bikes, meeting with key European product developers, industry experts & tastemakers for an in-depth review of what’s new, and what’s coming next.

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JNH

5 years ago

Forget the stem, they needto get the Sparta riser bars back in stock.

Stephen Michael Champagne

5 years ago

The bolts are not centered…lets have more attention to detail for expensive parts.

JBikes

5 years ago

Aren’t colors in Ti welds a sign of atmospheric contamination? I’ve seen straw as acceptable but anything showing violet/blue/green hues is a not go. Given its a stem, I want that weld perfect.

Ding-Dang

5 years ago

Reply to JBikes

https://www.millerwelds.com/resources/article-library/titanium-101-best-tig-gta-welding-practices

stevo

5 years ago

Reply to JBikes

yes, colorson ti welds=contamination. it doesn’t guarantee the welds are dangerously compromised, but it’s a red flag for construction practices and very low manufacturing costs. they definitely should not be charging that kind of money for a stem with sub-alibaba construction quality.

colors on steel welds=totally fine, fyi.

Jason

5 years ago

Reply to JBikes

The thing to worry about is the grey spot in the second photo where the pinch bolt boss is welded on. That’s what titanium looks like when it comes into contact with oxygen when it’s really hot (1500*F and up) and is likely to crack. The weld color is what’s important, a little blue on the edges isn’t anything to panic about. It could be better though and I’m sure once they get into the swing of making them they will dial in the weld process a bit to get better results.

Maus Haus

5 years ago

The steer clamp bolts have very shape edges for busting a knee on. Wonder why they did not bevel/smooth the edges like they did on the bar clamp area. Front of the stem is much sexier then the back… (that’s what she said).

Pinko

5 years ago

Is this another Chinese alibaba stem with 100€ markup?

Bazz

5 years ago

I really wish dentists and lawyer type people would just go back to golf so there wasn’t enough demand for over priced bike stuff.

Thesteve4761

5 years ago

Reply to Bazz

Don’t buy it.

Robin

5 years ago

Reply to Bazz

It really sucks that you’ve been forced to buy “overpriced bike stuff” like this. You have my sympathies.

Bazz

5 years ago

Reply to Robin

I might be too stupid to have a job where I could afford to by overpriced and under performing stuff like this but I’m not so stupid that I would by stuff like this when I can and do by equipment that performs better in every way at a much better price.

Robin

5 years ago

Reply to Bazz

The cool thing is that you have choice. No one is making you buy this, despite what you might think. Of course there’s this inescapable fact: what you consider stupid is not proof that something is stupid.

I really don’t worry about the price of things, like this, that I’m not going to buy. It seems like a pointless thing to worry about, especially since the price of this stem likely has no influence at all on the price of other stems. I also don’t worry and really don’t care how others spend their money. It’s up to them to enjoy cycling as they wish, not self-appointed judges in BR comments sections such as yourself.

Richard

5 years ago

Actually looks like Tig Brazing not Tig welding i.e. using brass rod. Regarding bolt alignment, I agree that if this is supposed to be a high end product that there should be better attention to detail.

http://www.weldingtipsandtricks.com/tig-brazing-vs-welding.html

JBikes

5 years ago

Reply to Richard

I’d be interested to know how you could tell that.
The article you posted is for tig brazing, and does not mention titanium alloys in this application. Nor do I think brass based brazing fillers are used in titanium brazing