Salsa announced the Stormchaser, a new aluminum gravel bike that’s made specifically for mud and poor weather conditions. With clearance for 700x50mm tires and a single-speed drivetrain, it is designed to keep on truckin’ no matter what nature throws your way. Alternator flat mount dropouts and multiple bottle/gear mounts round out the package.
Salsa considers the Stormchaser to be their doomsday-prepped gravel bike – for times when even their Warbird might not cut it. Those with experience know that in the worst conditions, you need simplicity, mega tire clearance, and a single gear.
The 6066-T6 aluminum frame features Salsa’s Class 5 Vibration Reduction System (VRS). They quote maximum tire clearance at 50mm for both 700c and 650b applications, or 45mm with fenders. To keep bottom bracket heights in check, Salsa gives a minimum tire size of 650b x 47mm or 700c x 32mm.
12mm thru axles keep the wheels bolted up front and rear. The rear-end also uses Salsa’s Alternator flat mount dropouts, allowing for 15mm of chainstay length adjustment. They also offer an alternative dropout for use with 1x geared drivetrains, should you decide to go that route (complete bikes ship ONLY with SS dropouts, while framesets include both sets).
Size 57.5 – 61 frames feature three bottle mounts in the main triangle, with smaller frames featuring two. All frames have an accessory mount on the underside of the downtube, a top tube Salsa EXP mount, and fender/rack mounts.
Click to enlarge.
Seven sizes complete the range, with full geometry listed above.
Spec & Pricing
Without a groupset per se, only one level of complete bike is offered. It includes both 17t and 18t cogs, for a complete bike price of $1,499. All sizes include wider-than-average Salsa Cowchipper bars.
The Stormchaser frameset includes both sets of rear dropouts, and is compatible with SS, 1x mechanical, and Di2 drivetrains (maximum 38t chainring). It is priced at $1,099.
The Stormchaser is available immediately through Salsa retailers. Update: Salsa has since released an updated availability date of April 2020. -Ed
Made for mud clearance, but only one press shot that even comes close to illustrating the design?
Saw one up close at Mid South today. Clearance is indeed pretty big at the chainstays. Still…if it’s so crappy that I need to ride this, I’d rather spend the day at Iron Monk than $1500 on a bike I’ll ride once.
70° head tube angle – why?
Because with the 51mm offset fork it gives a 70mm trail figure. So good high speed stability combined with low speed manoeuvrability.
Instead of you know…..being a road bike.
A floppy sort of trail number but a neutral lower trail might feel bad from that high front end. Disconnected.
Any more details on what appears to be the anti wear metal plates on the inside of the fork crown? That seems genuinely smart
Yeah, cool feature and surprising they don’t seem to draw attention to it. I suspect it’s similar to what we see some builders add around the chainstay on the drive side, to limit damage from chain suck. Great idea. Someone should sell that “armor” for retrofit to existing frames and forks (maybe they do, but I’ve not seen it).
That wear guard shows up in other Salsa forks, on the Warbird and the Cutthroat that I’m personally aware of. I’d actually like to see them expand it a bit.
Aw, I hoped they were coming out with something more interesting than this.
Looks like kona sutra and kona unit had a sister.
surly ogre is the father. moots baxter is the mother.
I dig it, especially for the money. Not sure about what look like ram air crud scoops where the chainstays meet the bb, especially if there’s no derailleur cable filling the hole.
Love the SSCXWC golden bikini reference in the paint! Craig beet SVEN.
Because Sven didn’t want the tattoo. You don’t put a bumper sticker on a Ferrari…
Make it in Titanium and I am buying!
Hope some one was riding one at Mid South today. Mud fest!
The guy in the photos was! Matt Acker, 8th place overall.
Tyre clearance looks good until you see the chainstay length and the very limited max chainring size.