Field Test: Contra MC - The Steel Steamroller
PINKBIKE FIELD TEST
Contra MC
Words by Mike Kazimer; photography by Dave Trumpore
Contra MC
Words by Mike Kazimer; photography by Dave Trumpore
The Contra MC (MC stands for Magic Carpet) is the home brewed creation of Evan Turpen, a former pro downhill racer and mechanic who taught himself how to use engineering software in order to create bikes that matched his needs.
The MC is aimed at the enduro / gravity crowd, with 29” wheels and 164mm of rear travel paired with a 170mm fork. The frame is a sight to behold in person – it has sort of a steampunk vibe to it thanks to the skinny steel tubes paired with shiny machined aluminum links and a large idler pulley.
The MC's suspension design gives it an axle path that moves the wheel rearward 22mm over the course of the travel. The idler pulley wheel is fairly large, a conscious design decision that was done to help reduce the amount of drag in the system – with a larger pulley wheel the chain doesn't have to make as sharp of a bend on its way around. Seb Stott's First Look article does a great job explaining exactly how the dual-link suspension design works – you can check that out here.
The MC is aimed at the enduro / gravity crowd, with 29” wheels and 164mm of rear travel paired with a 170mm fork. The frame is a sight to behold in person – it has sort of a steampunk vibe to it thanks to the skinny steel tubes paired with shiny machined aluminum links and a large idler pulley.
The MC's suspension design gives it an axle path that moves the wheel rearward 22mm over the course of the travel. The idler pulley wheel is fairly large, a conscious design decision that was done to help reduce the amount of drag in the system – with a larger pulley wheel the chain doesn't have to make as sharp of a bend on its way around. Seb Stott's First Look article does a great job explaining exactly how the dual-link suspension design works – you can check that out here.
Contra MC Details
• Travel: 164mm / 170mm fork
• Steel frame, aluminum links
• Wheel size: 29"
• Head angle: 63.5°
• Seat tube angle: 78°
• Reach: 480mm (L)
• Chainstay length: 438mm (L)
• Sizes: XS, S, M, L (tested), XL, XXL
• Weight: 37.25 lb / 16.9 kg
• Price: $4,500 USD (frame w/ EXT Storia shock) / Approx. $11,379 USD as tested.
• contrabikes.com
• Travel: 164mm / 170mm fork
• Steel frame, aluminum links
• Wheel size: 29"
• Head angle: 63.5°
• Seat tube angle: 78°
• Reach: 480mm (L)
• Chainstay length: 438mm (L)
• Sizes: XS, S, M, L (tested), XL, XXL
• Weight: 37.25 lb / 16.9 kg
• Price: $4,500 USD (frame w/ EXT Storia shock) / Approx. $11,379 USD as tested.
• contrabikes.com
For such a small company Evan has hit the ground running, and will be offering the MC in 6 sizes, from XS to XXL, with reach numbers ranging from 420 – 520mm in 20mm increments. The smaller two sizes get 27.5” rear wheels (the XS has 27.5” wheels front and rear), while all the rest run full 29” setups.
As far as geometry goes, our size large test bike had a head angle of 63.5-degrees, a seat tube angle of 78-degrees, and a 480mm reach. The chainstays measured 438mm, a number that varies depending on the frame size – they grow by 6mm as the sizes increase.
With a steel frame, a high-pivot suspension design that delivers 164mm of travel, and a build kit that's skewed towards the gravity-oriented end of the spectrum it's not entirely surprising that this ended up being the heaviest bike we had on test, tipping the scales at 37.2 pounds.
The Contra is only offered as a frame and shock only; the frame with an EXT Storia is priced at $4,500 USD. That's certainly on the higher end side of things, but keep in mind the frame is handmade in California.
Climbing
The Contra's weight can't be overlooked, but judging this steel machine by that one figure would be doing it a disservice. The actual pedaling performance was quite impressive – that big EXT coil shock stayed remarkably unfazed by weight shifts during climbs, with minimal bobbing even during out of the saddle effort.
The overall position is comfortable and upright, thanks to the steep 78-degree seat angle. I did end up going with a 40mm stem versus the 35mm stem it was supplied with, and while 5mm may not seem like much, that increase helped calm down the steering a touch while climbing and descending.
Compared to the other bikes on test, I'd put the Contra in the same realm as the Commencal Meta SX. Both have pedaling positions that work well for sitting and spinning up steep climbs, but neither one feels particularly energetic – they're calm cruisers through and through. The Contra did offer a little more traction than the Meta SX on rougher, chunkier climbs, likely due to a combination of the larger rear wheel, high pivot suspension design, and coil shock.
Compared to the Deviate Claymore, the other high pivot bike in this field test, the Contra has more subdued climbing manners. The Deviate's head angle is a bit steeper, and it weighs a couple pounds less than the MC, factors that make it a bit easier to handle on tighter, slower speed climbs.
As far as noise and drag from the idler goes, the MC remained refreshingly quiet despite being subjected to a whole bunch of mud and grit. High pivot bikes do require a more frequent application of chain lube – that's key to keeping any chain noise to a minimum.
Descending
The Contra possesses a sense of calm that brought to mind the way it feels to ride with a full-face helmet versus a half shell. With a half shell, the wind and trail noise are clear indicators of how fast you're going. With a full face, those indicators are muffled, making it easier to go even faster. That same sensation prevails with the Contra MC – it muffles the trail in such a way that letting off the brakes and plowing straight ahead usually seems like the best course of action. The EXT Storia coil shock has excellent bottom-out resistance, which made it easy to chuck the Contra MC into rough section of trail and trust that everything would be all right.
Timed Testing
Our timed lap started relatively flat with some pedally sections, then dropped into steeper, choppier terrain, with a series of stair-step drops, a few root doubles, and some fast corners. Don't forget that timing is just one of many ways to judge a bike, and fast doesn't always mean it's the best for everyone.
"I put down my fastest time on the Contra, with the Transition Patrol slotting into second place .9 seconds behind." - Mike Kazimer
I wasn't surprised to get my fastest timed lap on the Contra, and Matt Beer had the same experience. This is a bike that comes alive at higher speeds and on rougher trails, with loads of traction that keeps the rear wheel glued to the ground no matter how slimy the conditions are. That stuck-to-the-ground feeling doesn't mean it can't jump, though, it just means that it feels most at home on bigger hits rather than hopping and popping over little mid-trail hits. It would make a great park bike, especially for riders that like to mix it up, hitting chunky DH tracks one lap and floaty jump lines the next.
On slower speed, steep trails it remained manageable, although there were a few times I had the sensation that there was a slight disconnect between the handling at the front of the bike versus the back. It's hard to accurately put into words, but it was almost like it took longer for the rear end to respond to steering inputs. The rear wheel does get further away as the bike goes through its travel, although I haven't experienced anything quite like this on other high pivot bikes. I wouldn't necessarily call it negative trait, but it was different from what I'm used to.
I'd classify the Contra as the most gravity-oriented bike out of this bunch, followed closely by the Commencal Meta SX. They're long, slack machines that have a fiendish appetite for steep, rough trails, and can feel a little underwhelming on mellower terrain. That's different from the Fezzari La Sal Peak or the Santa Cruz Megatower, bikes that are lighter and livelier on a wider range of trails.
Would the Contra make a good enduro race bike? That depends. I can see it doing well somewhere like Whistler, where the stages are rough and on the steeper side, without too many really tight turns. It's less well suited to tighter, more awkward tracks, where its weight and ground-hugging nature would make it more of a handful.
Over the course of the test period we did notice a few paint scuffs showing up where the cranks get close to the chainstays. As mentioned, it was muddy most of the time we were on the bike, but no matter what the crankarm to chainstay clearance is pretty tight – it'd be nice if there was a little more room to keep dings and chips from appearing. According to Evan Turpen, production frames will be powdercoated, which should greatly improve the paint durability, and a change has been made to the chainstays to allow for a tighter radius bend, increasing tire, heel, and chainring clearance.
Pros
+ Smooth, bottomless suspension feel in rough terrain
+ Quiet, especially for a bike with an idler pulley
+ Mutes terrain and vibrations very, very well
Cons
- On the heavier side of the spectrum
- Not much clearance between crank and chainstay, although this should be improved on final production versions
The 2022 Enduro Bike Field Test is presented by Rapha, POC, and Continental. Thanks for keeping us dressed, safe, and rolling rubber side down.
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Regardless, never played either,so ....
IDDQD -- Invulnerability
IDBEHOLDI -- Temporary invisibility
IDBEHOLDR -- Temporary radiation suit
IDBEHOLDS -- Temporary berserk
IDBEHOLDA -- Temporary automap
IDBEHOLDV -- Temporary invulnerability
IDBEHOLDL -- Temporary light
IDKFA -- Full health, ammo, weapons, armor and keys
IDFA -- Full health, ammo, weapons, and armor
IDDT -- Change map detail
IDCHOPPERS -- Gain chainsaw
IDCLEVxx -- Warp to level 'xx' where xx is 01 to 19
IDMYPOS -- Displays your position and bearing
IDMUSxx -- Music select. 'xx' is the level who's song you want.
IDSPISPOPD -- Walk through walls!
IDCLIP -- Walk through walls
I played the heck out of Wolfenstein then Doom but ended up wasting way too much time multi-playing Duke Nukem...
played the hell out of contra and castlevania, got-em on retropi emulated for my boys.
I replaced my cane creek coil IL (the shock with no piggyback for weight savings) with a Storia. For a 215x63mm size, the EXT Storia is 70 grams lighter!
Those cute little ext springs are soooo light.
@mikekazimer Can you please photograph these bikes with the dropper at full extension or full compression? Running the post at half mast looks like it was taken off a cross country bike!
Got a spare few hundy bucks?
I spy the new low-profile carbon rims from We Are One... @mikekazimer et al, any idea at this point how these contribute to ride quality? They're approaching a 3zero moto-like cross section.
And I can attest, steel is real. Riding a Ferrum 170mm currently (Handmade US made steel frame as well) and there is certainly something about the material. Kudos for the little guys getting it right and making killer stuff at home.
I’ve also owned a couple of steel bikes that were pretty meh despite good tubing.
So if steel rocks your boat, have at it, but it’s not magical.
The Kavenz sits a little closer to the all-round (but gravity-oriented) category, and the Contra is all about finding the roughest, fastest trails around.
What really gets me scratching the ole Mellon is how a high pivot with a lengthening chainstay is gonna be @the thing”.
Maybe the high pivot designers could start with a shorter chainstay? You take a high pivot with a 441mm chainstay, then sit on the bike, with sag it immediately grows to ~450.
This ^ is crazy sauce
(1) Specialized Stumpjumper Expert $6,200
and
(1) Specialized Enduro Comp $5,400
understood.
I’m all for boutique builders, but part of what you’re paying for is better work. Unlike a brazed or lugged (or carbon) frame, a welded frame shows how well it’s made. Good welds look like a stack of coins from the outside, no burn through inside the tubes.
If you’re gonna charge this kind of money, you’ve gotta bring the a-game on welds and paint.
I've copied and pasted it here for you!
"Hey Guys! Evan from Contra Bikes here...Yes I completely agree that downtube weld isn't pretty. The bike that Pinkbike rode (what you see pictured) was the second prototype of the newest design. They needed the bike earlier than expected for this review, so this was the most recent bike I could provide them. Those plates were laser cut slightly oversized, then mitered on a manual mill by me. By trying to miter it to fit the tube, I made the ends where it met the tube quite thin and the fit wasn't perfect which made the plate really tough to weld. The production frames have a precise laser cut plate that doesn't require mitering. There is a nice consistent pocket for the weld to sit in and this will make it much easier to get a clean/straight consistent weld. Lesson learned!
As for the paint finish, this color shifting wet paint job, although beautiful, is not at all durable. The local powder coaters were moving locations when this bike needed a paint job so I went with wet paint on this bike from a local frame painter. The production frames are all powder coated, which provides a way more durable finish."
So I dig the bike, but don’t dig the fanbois drooling over this frame. It’s somewhere between a test mule and a production bike. Props for getting it tacked together for a test at the 11th hour, but it ain’t pretty.
At this price, the production ones had better have Brent Steelman level welds and Spectrum quality powder coating.
Seems like a lot of PB readers are like G Body fans. If it looks cool from far away-unwarranted lust.
In 2011 I visited a factory in Taiwan who still employed every single weldor they'd ever employed. Not because they were some sort of dead end, but because they knew that welding was the most important process to get right and paid accordingly for skilled workers. The company was about 30y old at the time, if memory serves.
Punch yourself in the junk and take a lap!
Go have fun on your chinese mail order bike. Which is absolutely OK too.
Evan has explained the deal with this particular frame and that it's not up to production standard. I fully believe him even though this doesn't look good. And hope that if any production frames are delivered with workmanship like this, the customer will refuse to accept it.
I can't help wondering if it would get more versatile with an aluminum frame-maybe take a pound or 4 out.
a few degree temperature change, .25 psi difference in the tire pressure are all bigger differences than material choice on a bike with 165mm of travel running rowdy tires (other than weight).
Steel can kind of make a difference on a roadbike when you're sitting at 120psi, but now days with most riders running tubeless at far lower pressures, even that difference is gone.
Pretty much the main benefit of steel is that its cheap and pretty easy to work with. Which appears not to have happened here.
Or more realistically, inflation has hit hard and running a small botique frame building company in America profitably enough to keep the lights on makes bikes more expensive than we like.
with regard to the pricing here...I cannot bash the price, guy needs to make a living and its gorgeous. Its like a super car for the bike world....Intended customer is not someone needing a bike...its someone wanting this specific bike to add to their collection.
Steel also isn't inherently good at damping/attenuating vibrations like people always seem to claim... we make tuning forks and springs out of it... it rings. If steel frames feel softer / more compliant, it's usually because it's just a flexier, heavier frame.... which also happens to be what people are looking for when they seek out a steel bike. So it's a bit of a chicken-and-egg thing going on.
As far as price... $4500 for boutique frame + EXT shock isn't the most insane thing I've ever heard in the bike world, and you could certainly build it up for less than $11k. Not for me but obviously some people will be super stoked on it.
Bikes move in complex 3D ways and are subjected to complex loads and pass complex forces to the much heavier rider.
It’s easy for armchair engineers to make sweeping statements but as someone on the receiving end of similar (not) wisdom in another field, I can tell you that your over-simplication is just that.
Someone told you something about another field, so it's complex and we're wrong? Ok...
That's not true according to science and replicable testing. I believe that you feel a difference. But material choice itself has a negligible effect on ride characteristics compared to any number of other measurable things ranging from tire choice and suspension, to things like frame design. You'll get a bigger change in handling characteristics by changing the joining at your HT than you would from steel vs not steel.
Look, I get it. I've owned a bunch of steel frames, road and mountain. I've also owned aluminum, ti, and carbon.
And this "steel rides this way and aluminum rides this way and carbon rides this other way" is just made up shit by marketing wankers and people trying to justify their purchasing decisions. Your bike rides a certain way because whoever designed it decided they wanted to make the joins a certain way so that the bike would ride the way it does. Not because it's made out of a certain material.
Stop trusting the marketers and start trusting the engineers when they tell you that. The engineers aren't out to get you.
Make up your mind.
You can’t compare like with like because no-one uses steel tubes in the same wall thicknesses and diameters as al alloy tubes - and for good reason. And steels do not behave like aluminiums regarding fatigue. You can’t separate frame design and material choice because the former can’t be done without fixing the latter.
engineered / adjustable lateral compliance is an interesting topic, speaking of which.
I had a eureka moment last year when I was riding my (laterally stiff) Orange full sus on very twisty, greasy trails and going really well. Then I noticed the pivot axle had loosened off, allowing the rear to flex a bit in the corners.
I've now sold that frame and replaced it with a Starling. Funnily enough I did a blog about it called "the velvet steamroller" a while ago, mirroring the title of this piece.
It took longer for the rear end to respond to steering inputs? Can you describe specifically what was happening on the bike to make it feel this way,? Something to do with the suspension? Or the rear axle path? Seems like it's implying the handling is slow, but it's not?
Dangerholm builds always look great, at the expense of all other performance metrics.
Mike K: "That's a hard one..."
Bike companies: We love sustainability. (We know you are susceptible to justifying lavishness if its greenwashed enough.)
Also bike companies: Make everything wear out in a season and require replacement.
For those who are wondering, steel production emits 2 tons of CO2 per ton of steel, aluminum is nearly 12 tons of CO2 per ton of aluminum. Its not about saving the planet (also, from what in EXACT terms), its about making money.
well, it actually does what says on the tin right?!
Hot tip: Run the MT5 HC brakes with aluminum clamps (instead of the plastic ones that come stock) for a stiffer lever feel, then combine these with 220 rotors and you have a really powerful brake. It's a lot easier to set up drag free while still having that nice Magura feel. That's what I am running on my personal bike.
That said, once set up, for me they have worked flawlessly and I don't notice/hear rubbing.
◀️▶️◀️▶️️️start
For grins, I "built" and priced a VERY tricked out Deviate Claymore yesterday (Trickstuff Brakes, Fox Factory 38, EXT Storia Lok V3, Shimano XT + GX AXS drivetrain, I-9 Aluminum Wheelset), and it can easily be done for $9,400 (including sales tax on all parts!). I included each and every part, down to bottom bracket and grips.
So I will continue to cry about Santa Cruz's $12k+ pricing. It's absurd. Insultingly absurd. Especially for an incremental advancement on a legacy platform that isn't particularly impressive compared to the broader market.